Mr. Ripley has been teaching at Hueneme High school for 3 years, if you don’t know him, he’s an English teacher and the boys and girls water polo coach, he also coaches swimming. Recently he became the adviser for the cooking club!

Why did you become the adviser of the cooking club?

So, I became the adviser of the cooking club because I love cooking, and, um, cooking’s been a big part of my life and i think that if students or, not students but.. if people know how to cook they can take care of themselves.

What are your future plans for the cooking club?

I hope that one day the club will become an actual class on campus.

Do you think knowledge about food is important for a healthy lifestyle?

Absolutely. Elaborate more on that. I-I think that health is- uh, the foundation of good health is good eating habits, and if you’re not eating good food, you’re just setting up for unhealth. If you are what you eat, and you eat terrible things you’ll be terribly unhealthy.

You live a gluten free life, right? Why?

Yes I do, because that’s what all the popular people do. Oh my gosh. Heh heh, no I am gluten free because I found out about 5 years ago that I react- my body reacts to gluten like it does when I get a cold, um, it starts my immune system and if I eat gluten I end up uh- anything that’s going on with me is made ten times worse. So, if I have a cold, the cold is really bad. It stretches my immune system too thin, so when I got rid of gluten, I found that it helped my body take better care of itself.

What is your favorite meal to cook?

I don’t know my favorite meal to cook. Or to eat. I know, I know what you mean, but, I think, well I like to cook. Right now my favorite meal to cook are- I really like making chicken pot pie. Is that hard to make? It’s not hard, it’s actually really easy. The hardest part for me is to make the crust because it’s gotta be gluten free.