MERRILLVILLE | A couple of healthy dishes, nine interested students and one positive role model proved the perfect recipe Sunday.

Chef Glennard Brooks spent the afternoon talking to students from Chicago's Gary Comer College Prep, a charter high school, about healthy eating habits and how he became executive chef at the Hilton Garden Inn in Merrillville.

"He talked about what I want to go to school to learn how to do," said Jamani Jones-O'Bryant, 15, a sophomore who said he watches cooking shows and cooks at home.

The U-Cook program was a partnership among the Chicago school; Black Men Sharing & Caring, a mentoring group based on Chicago's Southeast Side; and Catalyst Sports Performance in Dyer. Catalyst owner Tony Czapla brought the groups together as part of We Can!, a federal program geared toward reducing childhood obesity and juvenile diabetes.

Orlandus Thomas, a physical education and health teacher at Gary Comer College Prep, said a key goal of the day was to show the students how to cook food that is a part of the student's culture but also healthy. With that in mind, Brooks said he used recipes for the lunch from the American Heart Association in two cookbooks that focus on traditional African-American and Latin-American cooking.

The skinless chicken rolled in cornflakes and oven-fried proved to be the biggest hit, he said.

"It was very educational for me as well. I didn't realize my sodium intake," said Brooks, who said he was asked more questions about how he became a chef than healthy cooking and eating habits.