Orono Community Education

Tess Georgakopoulos, also known as “Chef Tess—Culinary Artist”, has been cooking and baking for well over 45 years since she was roughly 6 years old. Born into a Greek family, the art of cooking traditional meals using ones senses rather than recipes and measurements was passed on from one generation to the next. Her father was also a trained chef who brought the magic of food to life in another form on the weekends as they cooked elaborate family meals together. Food prepared from the heart, with ones own hands and creativity was, and continues to be an expression of love in her home. As an accomplished cook and baker, Tess enjoys creating original recipes for her family and friends. Sweet, savory, or doughy, she enjoys experimenting and creating in the kitchen daily. Tess is proficient and experienced in creating classes and curriculum for conventional cooking, baking, pressure-cooking, air frying, pizza making, Mediterranean Cooking, bread baking, and meal preparation as well. A Culinary Artist indeed! She has been teaching both in-person and on-line cooking classes through community education for a number of years having successfully worked with just over 50 public school districts in and around the Twin Cities, in many corners of Minnesota, in addition to school districts in Wisconsin, Missouri, New York, and Arizona. Through her teaching, Tess has helped people of all skill levels increase their confidence and expand their skills in the kitchen reaching heights of their own personal creativity that they never new existed! Always working towards expanding her culinary repertoire, Tess enjoys spending much of her free time in her test kitchen creating new recipes and reinventing traditional ones using traditional cooking methods and new cooking appliances such as, the Instant Pot® and Air Fryers too. Tess has recently started writing her first cookbook, and her food blog is also in the works! Some of her creations can be seen on her Facebook page, “Dish it up Good”, https://www.facebook.com/dishitupgood/ or on her Instagram Feed.