Robert Cross of 3-C’s catering found his passion for cooking as a 4-H youth and developed it into 3 C’s Catering.

Chautauqua County 4-H is celebrating National 4-H Week – and one local business owner is celebrating his root sin the program.

The path that led Robert Cross to founding 3 C’s Catering happened, in part, because he hated cows and barn work. Cross grew up on a dairy farm and one thing that he truly despised was barn chores.

Whenever possible, he chose to do some of the other hard work of growing up on a farm: canning, preserving, and cooking food. These became the heart of Cross’s 4-H projects over the years.

Dairy cows, however, were his ticket to the 4-H competitions at the Chautauqua County Fair. The fair was life changing, Cross said. Food was a big part of the competition in the 4-H building at the time, and Cross had a stiff but friendly competition with another 4-H’er to see who could get the most blue ribbons. The rivalry inspired Cross to try new recipes, push the limits of his cooking, and continue to improve.

At the time, he did not realize how much 4-H was preparing him to run a catering business. Not only was he learning cooking skills, but his club worked on a variety of projects, including electrical work, building lamps and more. Cross may not build lamps anymore, but he has used those same skills to keep equipment working in the middle of a catering gig.

“4-H has always been a close-knit community. It’s more like a family. When I launched 3C’s, 4-H members and judges were my first customers,” Cross said.