Page 29 - The Peorian, Vol 3 Issue 2

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thePeorian.com The Future Continued on page 30
FROM THE FIELD
Learning to cook with healthy choices
By Paul Gordon
B ill Turney wasn’t interest-
ed in trading one stress-in-
ducing career for another
when he decided nearly a decade
ago to go back to school.
While the career he now has
is busy and can often mean long
hours, Turney is doing something
he enjoys and helping others
learn to enjoy it as well. He
hopes, too, he is teaching them a
little about healthy eating.
“Going to culinary school (at
Illinois Central College) was the
best career decision I’ve made
and it also was the best two years
of my life,” said Turney, who will
be 62 later in March. “I was like
a walking history museum to the
kids in the classes. I hope I was
able to teach them a little, too.”
Teaching is what Turney does
for a living now. He left a lucra-
tive position in manufacturing
and is the founder and owner of
From The Field Cooking School
in Morton. There he teaches
basic cooking skills, how to plan
and cook healthy meals, how to
do specialty food and foreign
cuisine, and holds classes for
couples.
He also has classes that use
cooking to build teamwork, class-
es he said have become popular
with several companies in the
area, and his school also does
catering for special occasions.
He had no interest in working
as a chef for a restaurant be-
cause he was aware of the stress
involved with trying to operate
a restaurant as a business while
cooking to please clientele that
would then be repeat customers.
“I was a suit-and-tie guy for 30
years, working a real high-stress
job as a sales manager and opera-
tions manager. I got to a point I
felt I needed to find a hobby for
the stress release. Cooking was
something I enjoyed so when I
found out ICC had a culinary
school, I signed up,” he said.
“The more I got into it, the
more I loved it. I decided I
needed to find some way to make
cooking a career.”
It was his wife who suggested
he start the cooking school. From
The Field opened in September
2006. “It was a big financial hit
for us, at first. It took quite a
while to start making any money.
To help we opened a bakery and
café, but the recession wiped
those out for us. But we have
found other ways to make the
school work,” he said.
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