OA is YOU: Patty Burcz

Patty Burcz got tired of dishing one meatball at a time. So she went to work.

She’s been employed as a food service helper for about four years at the Apalachin Elementary School (AES). One day, when the menu offering included meatball subs (which call for three meatballs nestled inside the sandwich roll), Patty decided there was a better way than to pick each and every one of those protein spheres and land them on the bread.

So, Patty went home and talked to her husband Jerome. She shared her brainstorm for a utensil that would nab all three meatballs at once. Boop, done.

“I drew it up. Then I made a model of it from cardboard,” Patty explained, smiling the entire time. “Then my husband made it himself from stainless steel. He’s a mechanic and a fabricator by trade. He restores antique tractors, that sort of thing.” And builds school kitchen utensils.

Patty Burcz is an inventor, then. But she’s also known for her baking around the AES main office. A quick check there this morning elicited the following, “She loves to bake but doesn’t like to eat it herself, so she brings it to us … and we don’t complain a bit!”

“I love to bake. I also do woodworking,” she said. “I do everything.”

Everything includes leaving her job in the AES cafeteria midday, then beginning her next job, for three hours at Pay Yard Concepts (the after-school program at AES).

Did we mention Patty is also retired? Yeah, from Frito Lay in Kirkwood. She’s just not so retired in these parts.