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Morning Sentinel
Local TV chef demystifies fine cooking for the holiday
By BETTY JESPERSEN
Staff writer Kennebec Journal & Morning Sentinel 11/19/2007

FARMINGTON -- Stan Wheeler is your everyman kind of chef.

An unassuming guy in the kitchen, Wheeler, the star of a new food show on local cable access TV in Farmington and Wilton, believes anyone can cook a great meal once the mystique is demystified.

By day, Wheeler works in the high-stress job of dispatcher at the Franklin County Sheriff's Department. Planning and preparing a good meal on his time off is what he loves to do.

With a dish towel flung casually over his shoulder and wearing regular clothes, Wheeler might be showing his viewers how to make sushi and spring rolls, sautˇ chicken breasts in a delicate white wine sauce, assemble an elegant salad and cook risotto.

"The goal of the show is to show different techniques and different recipes that people might not use every day," he said as he prepared for the filming in the kitchen of his home.

For the show that will be aired today at 2 and 8 p.m. and also in streaming video online at www.mtbluetv.org, Wheeler's focus is easy to prepare Thanksgiving side dishes.

The selections are curry pumpkin soup with sautˇed onions; crisp brussel sprouts sautˇed and baked with Italian bacon called pancetta; mashed sweet potatoes with maple syrup; and blanched fresh green beans sautˇed with almonds and flavored with minced ginger.

"The Thanksgiving meal centers on traditional foods -- things like turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes. I want to show people some new ways to make familiar food that might become a new tradition," he said.

What with the Food Network and an overwhelming selection of online recipes, Wheeler offers viewers ones he has tried, modified and simplified.

He credits TV kitchen maven Rachel Ray for the pumpkin soup recipe but he adds his own panache with curry.

"A recipe is something you vary," he likes to say. Wheeler said he grew up watching his grandmother and mother cook delicious family meals in their kitchen. When he married his wife, Donna, they came to the conclusion early on that he liked the cooking more than she.

"As a result of doing more cooking, I became a better cook," he said.

One of Wheeler's locally, well-known items is the chocolate-dipped biscotti he sells at Up Front and Pleasant Gourmet on Front Street in Farmington. Out of consideration of customers who loved sweets but not lard, Wheeler experimented substituting light olive oil.

"They are fantastic. We had customers concerned about the fat and now, they love them," said owner Nina Giaquinto. "And we have people say they love biscotti but they are too hard. I tell them to just try one of Stan's."

"He always brings in breads and soups for us to taste and they are delicious. He is so creative!" she said.

Wheeler is the former pastor of the First Baptist Church in Waterville who would spend his day off cooking in the soup kitchen at Sacred Heart Catholic Church. As a member of Old South Congregational Church in Farmington, he is head chef for the monthly community luncheons, and he helped cook community meals as pastor of the Henderson Memorial Baptist Church in Farmington. He also had a short-lived venture of cooking meals to order.

The taping of the half-hour show takes hours.

Then J.P. Fortier, the station manager of Beeline Cable's Mt. Blue TV, spends hours editing the tape. Most of Mt. Blue's shows can now be seen on high-speed internet at www.mtbluetv.org and clicking on the Video Gallery. Fortier is also working with Wheeler to produce a Simple Gourmet Web site.

Betty Jespersen -- 778-6991

bjespersen@centralmaine.com

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