Penn College culinary students prepare for ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ Kentucky Derby experience

Chef Amanda Farr-Lepper’s culinary lecture class at Pennsylvania College of Technology last Tuesday included several students that will be going to Churchill Downs on Monday for a week’s worth of food service support. The students were bright-eyed and crisp looking in their white chef coats. They will soon look very different as they face palettes of vegetables to prep and cook, cases of herbs to trim and snip, and towering stacks of insulated boxes of chocolate bonbons to painstakingly arrange.

The students have various reasons for wanting to participate. Clara Wilson, a student from Lancaster, looks forward to “an experience you’ll never get anywhere else.” Kaedence Lyles, from Williamsport, wants to “learn from higher chefs” at the top of their game. Two students from the Reading area, Charlie Shimp and his brother, Paul, signed on to “see food production on a much larger scale.”

Be careful what you wish for ...

The number of food service workers for the week runs over 4,000 and the shifts are often 15 to 18 hours long. Food prep goes on around the clock. The students will be housed in local hotels and transported to their work areas by shuttle bus. Many won’t see their compatriots until they get back on the bus on Sunday to go home.

The May 2 running of the 152nd Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs is a stakes race that will have 150,000 on site attendees and will be watched by roughly 20 million TV viewers. The “Run for the Roses,” aka “The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports,” is a big deal. It’s a party with time-honored protocols that involve a lot of food and drink, not just on the momentous day, but throughout the week.

Chef Charles Niedermyer, a chef instructor of baking and pastry arts, leads the charge on the paid internship/fully immersive experience for the 26 students selected in February by the officials from Levy, the food and beverage provider for Churchill Downs. A subsidiary of the British multinational company Compass Group, the Levy division operates the premium sports and entertainment dining venues. That means these students won’t be dropping fryer baskets of chicken fingers or serving hot dogs — though those food options are available at many concessions stands. The Penn College culinary students will work in the 16 fine-dining rooms and in the Main Kitchen, where food is centrally prepared for distribution to the many sites.

The Pennsylvania College of Technology in Williamsport has been providing support at the Kentucky Derby since the early 1990s when Chef Paul Mach spearheaded the project. Chef Amanda was an early participant in 1998 as a student, when she accompanied Chef Paul for a Breeders’ Cup, a thoroughbred racing event that takes place in the fall.

Chef Paul turned over the Kentucky Derby reins to Chef Charles Niedermyer, who is returning for his 17th Derby this year. He was also in the saddle for a Breeders’ Cup race in 2018.

The scope of the Derby culinary challenge is daunting. Throughout the week, there will be 400,000 guests served, including the 150,000 to 200,000 on Saturday’s Kentucky Derby and on Friday’s Kentucky Oaks Day.

The Kentucky Oaks race, known as the “Run for the Lilies,” features the best 3-year-old fillies and has come to represent breast and ovarian cancer awareness with a Pink Out and a special Cosmopolitan-like pink cocktail called the Oaks Lily. The drink, first created in 2006, contains vodka, orange liqueur, cranberry juice, and lemonade or sours mix, garnished with blackberries and a lemon wheel. The beverage is popular with the ladies in their bright pink dresses and fancy hats. For the first time, the 2026 Oaks race will take place in the evening, at 8:40 p.m. ET, and will be covered by NBC Sports and livestreamed on Peacock.

Chef Robert Lopez, senior executive chef at Levy and Head Chef for the Derby, creates the menus for all the dining rooms and brings in celebrity chefs from across the country. This year, Louisville native Akhtar Nawab, Food Network star Damaris Phillips, Pitmaster Rodney Scott, and Top Chef winner Tristen Epps are just some of the many culinary stars who will put their special spins on the menus at select premium dining rooms.

Local flavors and farms are a priority for Chef Lopez, and he will incorporate mint from Nelson Family Agriculture, a Kentucky farm; goat cheese from Capriole Cheese in Greenville, Indiana, and from Kenny’s Farmhouse Cheese in Austin, Kentucky. Bourbon will be used for more than the iconic Mint Juleps; it will feature in Honey Bourbon Grilled Chicken and Barbecued Shrimp with Bourbon Butter Sauce. Pimento Cheese, served in “bird-bath” sized bowls according to Chef Amanda, is a popular Southern specialty as is a cream cheese and cucumber spread called Benedictine.

The featured local items will augment menus that use 5,000 pounds of shortribs, 4,000 pounds of shrimp, and 6,000 pounds of carrots. Now that’s a shopping list.

Derby desserts include Bourbon Balls, and thousands of hand-crafted molded bonbons and mini-chocolate squares that Chef Charles’ class has been working on throughout the semester. For the squares, molten ganache made with Guittard chocolate was spread into 10 by 10 forms and then cut with a special confectionary tool called “guitar” to create 100 identically shaped morsels that were hand dipped in tempered chocolate and then individually decorated. Chef Charles’ passion for chocolate and for teaching the next generation about the intricacies and ecstasies of that food group is unmatched.

Ronald Bryant, a student in the chocolate lab, said he hopes “to meet a lot of new people and chefs ... and get to try some new things,” and there is no doubt that he will.

When asked if the week is as grueling as it sounds, Chef Amanda said that there is joy as well. Just prior to the race, the students all queue through the dining room to the rooftop to watch the race while the diners applaud them. They get to see the stands filled with well-fed, decked-out fans in bright red and ladies with outrageous Derby hats, and they hear the thunder of the horses’ hooves for those two minutes.

Chef Amanda first attended as a student. Now she is leading her students to the same watering hole. Her reflection says it all.

“Derby is a once-in-a-lifetime experience for most; some of our students can participate multiple times, depending on how long they are here at the college,” she said. “It is a great opportunity for them to experience mass production of food and to see another aspect of the industry that we would not otherwise be able to immerse them in here at the college. Whether they love it or hate it, that experience will help guide where they desire to go as a professional, and they will remember it forever.”