Three Reasons Our School Cafeteria Is So Good

The Cafeteria Crew: Debbie Guilford, Bing Mowrey and Zach Holley

One – Debbie Guilford, two – Bing Mowrey and three – Zach Holley. Every day our public school is open, they put out an average of 190 breakfasts and 270 lunches for our K through 12 public school kids – wiithout fail, cooked from scratch and with a smile.  Farm to Cafeteria thought you might like to know a little bit about them.

Debbie, our Food Service Director, came to live on Orcas permanently in 1978.  After 21 years in the banking business, she felt the calling to open a new professional door when she answered an ad for help in our school cafeteria.  It sounded perfect because she could be on the same schedule as her kids and be home when they were. After 10 years in that job and her kids (now 25 and 21) moved out of the nest, the Food Service position opened up and she went for it.  “I absolutely love my job!” Debbie enthusiastically says.  “I love food, and working with the farmers, my staff and the kids is wonderful.”  Debbie’s responsibilities are huge, and she juggles all of them with grace. Debbie’s husband, Steve Guilford, works in construction and has lived on Orcas practically all his life.

Bing Zhao Mowrey, was born in Yinchaun China where she earned a Masters Degree in Business Management. Her first and only job in China was with China Telecom where she became manager of their customer service department, supervising and training a team in her Province. Then Dave Mowrey came along and changed her life.  Dave, a long time resident on Orcas who is one of our valued EMT’s and works at Country Corner, was introduced to Bing in China in 2006 by Bing’s aunt whose husband had been a friend of Dave’s for 20 years.  In October 2008, after a few more visits, a lot of emails and expensive phone calls, Bing and her son, Di, moved to Orcas and Bing married Dave that November. 

Bing studies her English relentlessly and has come a long way since the day she interviewed for help in the cafeteria about two years ago. She loves to cook, but finds American cuisine challenging.  Often, she prepares and serves a Chinese dish for the school menu which is always a treat, and she loves to share her knowledge of Chinese food.  Her son, Di, is a Junior at Orcas High School and plays football and basketball.

Zach Holley is the newest member of the team but fits in like he was made for the part. “My mom always believed that the most valuable gift she could give her sons was the gift of self-sufficiency,” Zach says. And learning to cook was part of that equation. “She loved to brag how I learned how to make beer bread at age 5.”  

Always sporting his clean, ironed chef coat and looking the part, he turns the 35-year old kitchen into a food-generating machine and is always on the serving line receiving thanks and admiration from kids who may have never before seen a young man in the kitchen. Gaining much of his most recent expertise from Christina and other talented chefs he was exposed to when volunteering to help for her Children’s House cooking series, Zach was ready and eager to take on the challenge of chef in our school cafeteria a little over a year ago. A lot of the Farm to Cafeteria success stems from Zach’s fearless approach to scratch cooking and exposing kids to more fresh, Island-grown vegetables, expertly seasoned and served by “Chef Zach.”

The Farm to Cafeteria and Farm to Classroom programs are working so well because of this crew, and any chance you have to thank them for all the time, effort and love they put into their jobs, it will be humbly accepted.