GR students win recipe contest

A new item called the quesadilla burrito created by two Green River students will be added to a business's menu after they won the company's culinary competition.

Vincent Leahy and Kassandra Reyes, both Green River High School seniors, recently won the Taco John's culinary competition in Wyoming.

Their culinary arts teacher Marisa DeClercq said every year Taco John's hosts a contest encouraging high-school students to come up with a new and innovative recipe to add to its menu.

She said Reyes and Leahy came up with the quesadilla burrito recipe to meet the company's requirements. Their recipe moved them on as one of six finalist teams.

As finalists, they traveled to Cheyenne to compete at Taco John's test kitchen in the final round to see if their recipe would make it or not.

After the judging was done, Reyes and Leahy's recipe was selected.

"They ended up winning the whole thing," DeClercq said.

Leahy said it wasn't hard to pick a partner when it came time to do so in class because he and Reyes have known each other for years and work well together.

He said they had to come up with a recipe that incorporated Taco John's sirloin steak burrito.

"We were just sitting in class and thought, "You know what sounds good? A quesadilla. You know what sounds better? A burrito," Leahy said.

They decided to put them together for one amazing quesadilla burrito. Their quesadilla burrito consisted of sirloin steak, taco meat, onions, lettuce, sour cream, cheddar cheese and for the quesadilla part, colby jack cheese in-between two tortillas rolled together.

"We worked together through all of it," Reyes said.

Both Reyes, Leahy and DeClercq tried the recipe and thought it was delicious.

Not only will their creation make in onto the menu in the summer of 2019, they both were given $500 scholarships to their college of choice.

Reyes said they have both been invited to work with the Taco John's marketing team to come up with advertisements for the new food. Reyes said she couldn't believe how long the whole process takes to get an item on the menu, something she found interesting.

Leahy said they learned how to continue working well as a team and how to communicate when in a real kitchen.

"I've been in a kitchen before, but just doing dishes," Leahy said.

Both students welcomed the $500 to help pay for college.

Leahy plans to become a biomedical engineer and cooking would be his contingency plan, while Reyes wants to pursue a degree in secondary education either teaching math or English.