(upbeat music) - It's gonna be a pretty busy day today, so we're expecting close to a hundred folks.

- [Narrator 9] At American River College in Sacramento, food is bringing people together in more ways than one.

- Customer feedback is always wonderful.

You don't realize or remember that you're sitting in a community college restaurant.

- [Narrator 9] That restaurant is called The Oak Cafe.

It's open to the public two days a week, and is fully run by students.

It's part of the community college's culinary arts and hospitality management program.

- The student body is diverse not only in its ethnic makeup, but also in its age.

So we have students that are right out of high school as well as students that are returning to learn.

- [Narrator 9] The $10 million Evangelisti Culinary Art Center opened in 2014, giving community college students a chance to train in a state-of-the-art facility at a fraction of the cost of private culinary schools.

Students can earn degrees or certificates in culinary arts and restaurant management, with the options to focus on front of house or back of house operations.

That includes everything from cooking and baking to hosting and managing a restaurant.

- [Brian] The culinary Center has three teaching lecture and lab classrooms as well as a demonstration kitchen and a full running restaurant.

- We went from like teaching out of two classrooms and now we have this facility where we have cutting edge equipment.

We have this dining room where we do a three course lunch that changes every week and everything is made from scratch.

If we have a hundred guests that day and they each have three courses, which they do, then they're putting out 300 plates that day, which is really good experience.

- [Narrator 9] Graduates are often snapped up by restaurants in the Sacramento region and beyond.

- We also have students working at other levels.

Some of our graduates go run food trucks, some of them run catering businesses or work for caterers.

- Our program and our instructors really try to curate this course to imitate a real career.

So how we are basing this line and how we are basing today's service of these six, seven hours, it is how you would in working as a line or working as a sous chef in an actual restaurant kitchen.

We have multiple positions such as saute, grill, pizza, pantry, desserts, and we switch through all those positions so everyone gets comfortable, - But there are times when something goes wrong.

This morning we almost didn't have bread for service because something went wrong and they managed to pull it off and make it happen, which is exactly what you would do in a regular restaurant.

- First batch might be workable, but because it's so wet, it's taking way too long to get to what it needs to be.

- Today I am a host, but the main position I have been has been a server.

- [Narrator 9] Finch Duong has done just about every restaurant job, starting out as a dishwasher and now studying to become a chef.

Outside of school, Finch works at The French Laundry, a three Michelin star restaurant in Napa Valley.

- It's really dynamic, even though sometimes you can't really have the answers to what's going on in the dining room.

It's taught me some of the skills, especially when it comes to taking care of the guest and being able to take care of your section.

- [Ashly] From the beginning to now, I feel like I've learned so much.

- [Narrator 9] Ashly Meza makes pastries and other baked goods for the Oak Cafe Bakery located right next door to the restaurant.

Like the Oak Cafe, the bakery is run entirely by students.

- Students don't just learn those technical skills, like they don't learn just how to make bread or make a really good cookie.

They also learn more of these critical thinking management business skills, so they see how to do a whole production schedule.

How bakeries, you're not gonna make everything from start to finish in one day, but how to take a product, break it down to its individual components, and then create like a week long production plan.

- Everyone's so welcoming.

If you need help, they're always willing to help you, especially the teachers.

It's a good opportunity for someone to go there to start and improving on their skills.

- [Narrator 9] This space is not just for culinary art students.

Today, students from the wider community college can sign up for demonstrations to learn about cooking on a budget, like a Thanksgiving meal for eight people costing $44.

- And that way your turkey's not sticking to the bottom and the skin's not gonna come off.

- [Narrator 9] Culinary arts instructor, Teresa Urkofsky, leads these demos, using ingredients found at discount stores, and the college's food pantry.

- And this is the way I put it, I just wanna avoid the $5 pizza.

You know that people would get on the way home to feed their kids, when they can use the produce, and they can use the staple items that they get from the pantry.

They can just provide so much more nutrition to their kids and themselves.

- [Narrator 9] American River College faculty say whether you're looking for a career in the restaurant industry, or just curious about cooking a turkey on a budget, there's an opportunity here at the Culinary Arts Center.

- Even if you're not too sure, I would say the classes that you would consider taking for fun, like some of the breads and pastry classes, or some of the culinary basics to at least teach you how to cook.

So even if you're not trying to seek out an education for like a AA in hospitality, the people you meet along the way will be amazing.

- Alrighty, breathe, you're breathing?

It's okay.