Valencia College Stories

Star pupil

Carlington Brissett was in the first culinary classes to study at Valencia’s new culinary kitchens. Now he’s helping to wow diners at the Ritz-Carlton Orlando. 

— by Linda Shrieves

Carlington Brissett experienced many milestones in his time at Valencia College. His culinary class was the last group to cook in the teaching kitchens on West Campus – and the first class to cook in the new kitchens at the Walt Disney World Center for Culinary Arts & Hospitality at the new Valencia College Downtown campus.

Today, Carlington (class of 2020) is also forging another path – as both a chef and a teacher, as the chef de partie at Knife & Spoon, the flagship restaurant at the Ritz-Carlton Orlando Resort.

His interest in culinary school started in the Jamaican military. While serving in the military, Carlington liked to cook for his friends on the weekends. So, when he retired after serving 20 years in the military, he decided to research culinary programs in the United States.

He discovered Valencia College was near the top of the list – and because it was in Florida, the climate felt like home. Looking back, he thinks he made the right decision – both in his career choice and the choice of colleges.

“I must say I have not been disappointed. It has been absolutely amazing. I love learning, working with my hands, doing practical things,” Carlington says. As for Valencia, “every single course, I have been totally satisfied with what I’ve learned, the people I’ve interacted with, and my fellow students.”

Of course, coming to Valencia in his 30s as an international student was quite a transition. As an international student, he couldn’t get a job at any restaurant in Orlando. Instead, he had to find a job on campus – and that left him with few options. But he landed a gig at the Dunkin’ Donuts location on West Campus. “It was my first dip in the pond of commercial food production here in the U.S.,” he says. “It was very valuable because it gave me an opportunity to see how that part of the food industry is here.”

When Valencia College’s culinary arts program moved to the downtown campus in fall of 2019, Carlington was astounded by the new facilities.

“Oh my gosh, it was night and day, compared to West Campus,” he recalls. “West will always have a warm place in my heart, but oh my goodness, it was amazing, seeing all the amenities inside the facility and the fact that we had kitchens on three different floors. We were not so cramped for space.” 

Near the end of that semester, impressed with his work ethic, his culinary professors suggested that he apply for a part-time job as a culinary laboratory assistant.  The lab assistants prep the kitchens for culinary classes, handle food deliveries, manage the cooler by rotating the stock, clean the kitchens and troubleshoot any maintenance issues.  If the professor needs help during a lecture, the lab assistant is also there to pitch in.

“We had the opportunity to work with very talented chef/professors and what that gave me is an understanding of hows and the whys of doing things in the kitchen. Anybody can look at a recipe and follow directions. But the education at Valencia College taught me the reasons why we do what we do. The professors and the facilities gave me such a wonderful environment to learn in. 

And the beauty of being a lab assistant, he notes, was that “you were able to have conversations with these chefs. They would share so much, and they tell me you so much. It was so rewarding.” 

 

 

As a lab assistant during the COVID semesters, Carlington helped the professors create videos to teach students remotely.  “We would search for YouTube videos of different cooking methods and instructions” before deciding to create their own videos, he says. And even though students came back to the classrooms months later, Carlington and the others on the team realized that “we were building this library for students to access.”

In summer of 2020, Carlington graduated from Valencia with his A.S. degree in culinary management and a 4.0 grade point average. Because he was an international student, he had limited options, but the restaurant where he’d done his internship -- Hagan O’Reilly’s Irish Pub in Winter Garden – offered him the chance to continue and work one year there to gain practical experience. 

Preparing pub food – many fried items and a few grilled items – Carlington got to tinker with sauces and introduced a few to the menu. To his delight, the owners and customers enjoyed them.  He also found himself learning to work a deep fryer. “In culinary school, we didn’t work a lot with fryers, but it taught me a lot,” he says. “And in every single kitchen I’ve been in since, the deep fryer is there.”

After a year at the pub, Carlington was itching for a different challenge, so he applied for a job at an International Drive steakhouse that serves about 300 customers a night. He felt that working in a high-volume restaurant would burnish his resume.

“It was also a scratch kitchen, meaning everything there is pretty much made from scratch,” he notes. “It was good, I really enjoyed that. It took me back to almost like a hybrid of being in culinary school again. You’re getting into all the details of why we do things, how we do things to ensure quality.”

After nearly a year at the steakhouse, Carlington began searching for a different kind of experience. 
“I was trying to make myself a more well-rounded culinarian. I wanted to experience fine dining, so when I saw job openings within the hotel industry, I applied to the Ritz-Carlton, which is a luxury brand,” Carlington says. “My application caught the eye of the executive chef.  He said one of the things that popped out to him was the fact that I went to Valencia College, so he gave me the opportunity for an interview. At the time, he didn’t have an opening at the fine dining restaurant, but if I wanted, I could get a job at one of the hotel’s other restaurants.”

Carlington started out in the lobby lounge, making burgers, quick bites and from-scratch sauces. It didn’t take long for he and his team to get noticed – during his tenure, the hotel was voted best hotel lounge in Orlando.

After seven months, he transitioned to Knife & Spoon, the Ritz Carlton’s steakhouse. His first post was the pasta station, where he made fresh pasta dough every day, along with the sauces. 

“Making pasta dough every day, you’ll get good at it. This was getting right b ck to stuff you would do in culinary school. You find ways to be more efficient.:

Next, he moved to broil station, where he handled the most expensive steaks. – from dry-aging the steaks, to cutting them into portions, and cooking them. 

In late 2023, the executive chef tapped Carlington to be the training coordinator for the restaurant. To do that, Carlington had to learn about every station – and then train the staff and develop a morning team that will butcher meats and poultry, prep lobsters, make the pasta dough daily, and prepare complex sauces such as demiglace, that take a long time. 

Today, he’s happy with the direction his career has taken.

“I am thrilled,” says Carlington. “I’ve often heard people talk about how, when you go to work and it’s something that you really enjoy doing, it doesn’t feel like working. I think I’m very close to that definition.”

“I’ve had a few times when a guest will come up to where we’re cooking on the front line, and say, ‘That’s the best dining experience I’ve had.’ Those things will warm your heart.
Those moments are the reasons why I still enjoy what I do. It’s the ultimate satisfaction.”