Des Moines Register
06-29-06
Olympic-size lasagna bake
4-H members prepare lots of pasta for the National Special Olympic Games.
By JEFF LEWIS
REGISTER CORRESPONDENT
Ames, Ia. — It was laughter and lasagna all morning long Wednesday as more
than a dozen chatty 4-H members did their part to help prepare for an epic July 4
pasta feed at the first Special Olympics USA National Games.
The high school 4-H members, who were at Iowa State University for the state
4-H Youth Conference, were among several service project groups donating time
in advance of the games, which open Sunday.
Wearing gloves, the 4-H kids worked in an assembly line in the kitchen of the old
Knapp/Storms residence hall dining area at ISU, cranking out some of the 420
full trays of lasagna that will be served Tuesday. They filled pans one by one,
layering pasta sheets, tomato sauce, mozzarella and ricotta cheese.
"We probably got the best service project," said Lesley Walz, a soon-to-be high
school senior from Clayton County.
Walz was part of a four-person team putting together 12-by-20-inch pans of
vegetarian lasagna. Walz and her teammates said they were happy to be making
food instead of cleaning or weeding, as other 4-H groups were doing for their
service project.
Megan Fischer, a recent high school graduate from Minden who serves on the
state 4-H council, said the organization wanted to volunteer for the Special
Olympics because there are a lot of people that need to be fed.
"We decided it would be an excellent opportunity to help because there's so
many people coming," said Fischer, who will attend Iowa State University in the
fall.
Rae Ann Kolbet, commissary kitchen manager for ISU Dining, said the students
made 30 cheese-only pans of lasagna.
In addition to the vegetarian lasagna, ISU Dining has already prepared nearly
400 pans of beef lasagna to feed the 10,000 people that are expected to attend.
She said that since participants are living in the residence halls, ISU Dining was
given the task of making meals.
''It's automatic for us," she said. The pasta bake had been in the planning for two
years.
Kolbet said ISU Dining facilities would be used to store all the pans of lasagna
until July 4, when all the residence halls on campus will be used to cook them.