But can learning to cook with your co-workers improve morale in the office?

Dozens of Utah businesses think it can, sending their employees to team-building cooking classes offered by Utah chefs.

The hands-on classes get employees out of their cubicles and into a commercial kitchen where they work together to prepare a multiple-course meal.

Initially, peeling potatoes, mincing garlic and rolling pie dough may seem rather mundane to a group of investment bankers, sales representatives or mechanics. But the neutral setting allows employees to relax and get to know each other, which can make for smoother sailing back at work.

"And they learn to cook and come away with a great meal," explained chef Jim Light.

Light, owner of HomeCooks Culinary Adventures, is one of several Utah chefs that have run team-building exercises for companies such as Fidelity Investments, Back to Basics and T-Mobile. He teaches the classes in the kitchen showroom at Kimball Distributing, 2233 S. 300 East, in South Salt Lake. Classes cost $75 per person, with companies picking up the tab.

Chef Bryan Woolley, and his company Zoop Strategic Consulting, also gives team-building classes at Sur La Table and Kimball Distributing. He has taught classes for employees of Discover Card, American Express and Marriott, charging $1,000 for groups up to 16.

Before becoming a chef, Woolley worked in the corporate world and said employee turnover was costly. He believes bringing employees together in the kitchen can make employees feel more like a cohesive group and potentially keep them from leaving a business.

"The whole idea is to give people a positive experience with their co-workers," said Woolley. "People can make lifelong friends over food."

Decades of research supports the idea. According to the Great Place to Work Institute in San Francisco, employees are most satisfied when they "trust the people they work for, have pride in what they do and enjoy the people they work with."

The engineers in the Salt Lake City office of T-Mobile have mastered that concept. About every six months the company pays for the eight employees who plan, design and build cell sites to get outside the office and have fun.

This month the group attended one of Light's team-building classes. The employees - all men - were skeptical at first, as cooking was quite a departure from previous activities such as downhill skiing and paintball.

But they quickly warmed up to the kitchen instruction after learning gourmet steaks, potatoes and apple pie were on the menu. (See recipes at right.)

"I guess we'll know how much we like each other after we eat each other's food," joked Willie Salas, who was teamed with James Bergen to make the compound butter that would be used to flavor the thick steaks.

During the work week, the T-mobile colleagues rely on each other regularly. Take for example, the heavy August windstorms that knocked out several T-Mobile cell sites. Getting them up and running required teamwork - and several long days and nights.

"I think it's important to get together like this where we aren't thinking about work," said Charlie Kennamer, as he sliced apples for the Scottish apple pie.

Cooking classes may be the "rope courses" for the new millennium. Outdoor adventures, where participants climbed massive logs, hung from ropes and fell backward into the arms of their colleagues, were popular over the past two decades as a way to build trust among employees.

The programs worked for some, but excluded many who might have physical limitations, or just weren't interested in thrill-seeking, said Light.

Cooking and eating appeal to everyone. Light has taught classes for as few as eight employees to as many as 80. But the best class size is 14 to 16 people. Classes can be tailored to individual company needs. Employees can spend three hours making an elaborate dinner or they can take 60 minutes for a quick lesson on breakfast.

"We all have to work for a living," said Woolley. "We better enjoy who we are with, otherwise it's a drag."

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* KATHY STEPHENSON can be contacted at kathys@sltrib.com or 801-257-8612. Send comments about this story to livingeditor@sltrib.com.