The Collegetown Kitchen
recipes and lessons for your college apartment
ORGANIZATION & TIPS
AFTER SCHOOL BAKERY
@collegetownkitchen
About Jeremy Scheck
(founder / editor-in-chief)
Scheck is a student at Cornell University double majoring in Spanish and Italian with a minor in nutrition. He has years of experience both as a home cook and working at a local bakery. He is also the founder of After School Bakery, a home baking website. In addition to cooking, Scheck enjoys spending time with friends, working out at the gym, traveling, foreign language, politics, and the subjunctive mood. He dislikes skim milk and when people use apostrophes to pluralize a word.
A few fun facts:
He's from DC and lived in the area his whole life
He's the second of four brothers
He practiced tae kwon do for 10 years and is a black belt
He speaks fluent English and Spanish, and is obsessively learning Italian
He has no sense of rhythm and struggles to clap to the beat of a song
In 2016, before starting 11th grade, Scheck launched the website After School Bakery with the intent to share his favorite baking recipes and explore his creative side during his free time — after school — while balancing the demands of International Baccalaureate classes, jobs at a local bakery and babysitting, and the college application process. During his last two years of high school, Scheck went on to develop After School Bakery by upgrading to professional photography equipment, growing a following of over 600 foodies on Instagram, and teaching several baking demonstrations at Williams-Sonoma in the DC area. While juggling high school life, Scheck tested, developed, cooked, photographed, wrote, and marketed over 80 recipes on his site — just for his enjoyment. These recipes were geared toward parents and kids his age alike with the attitude "if I can do it, so can you".
About the Collegetown Kitchen
The Collegetown Kitchen is a living diary of what our writers and experts are cooking, but it is also a point of reference for cooks of all calibers. There are basic recipes every student should know, like how to roast vegetables, fry eggs, and make chocolate chip cookies without a mixer. But there is also chicken confit and risotto, which aren't as difficult as they sound. In addition, there are guides to creating a functional pantry with shopping lists tailored to the kind of cook you are. There's an equipment guide that tells you exactly what you need in your kitchen, and there are different options for that too. There's guidance on food safety and also how to take care of a cast iron skillet, the versatile friend of a nifty cook.
Collegetown Kitchen aims to:
Share accessible recipes for college students and grads
Be your guide to organizing a first kitchen
Include healthy food with GF/vegetarian/vegan options
Teach basic cooking techniques for first-time cooks
Please with easy baking recipes from scratch
Include diverse perspectives from college students and wise cooks!
Aproveche, buon appetito and bon appétit!
Jeremy's Food Philosophy
Think Vegetables First. Pick what you like and what's in season. ​​When cooked well, vegetables can be the most exciting thing on your plate.
If Eating Meat, Try in Moderation. As a 19 year old boy, avoiding meat just doesn't keep me full. I might feel full in the moment, but even after really good vegetarian meals, I am always hungry an hour later. Chicken and seafood tend to be healthy, and they, along with the not-so-healthy-but-delicious pork, have much lower carbon footprints compared to beef, so I eat chicken often, fish when I can afford it, and pork and beef on special occasions.
Enjoy Plant-Based Proteins. Beans, lentils, nuts – all of these foods are delicious and provide cheap and healthy supplements to meat proteins.
Limit Dairy to Butter, Parmigiano Reggiano, Greek Yogurt...and the Occasional Cookies and Cream Ice Cream. Although I believe dairy contributes little to adult nutrition, boy does it taste good! In my opinion there is no real substitute for butter or parmigiano reggiano cheese. Luckily, these two foods happen to be naturally lactose-free (most human adults are lactose intolerant). Greek yogurt is a good snack, but I also like to use it in baking to lighten and moisten foods. And when the cravings hit...I'll always reach for a scoop of ice cream.
Embrace Carbs, but Try for Complex. To get the most nutrition out of your food, choose brown rice and other whole grains. Unless you're buying artisanal sourdough, whole grain bread is not much healthier than white, and not really worth it. When you're making pasta, cooking it al dente isn't just tastier; it also is more nutritious as it causes you to digest the food more slowly.