Cook your way to the top with culinary scholarships

The typical college scholarship has a few entry requirements -- an application, an essay, maybe even an interview. But to win one of the culinary scholarships to Le Cordon Bleu, one of the world's premiere cooking schools, you'll have to cook to earn your tuition.

Le Cordon Bleu gives away more than $250,000 each year in culinary scholarships to would-be chefs who demonstrate their cooking skills for the school's judges. Culinary scholarships make sense in a profession that's all about how you can perform in the kitchen.

Culinary scholarships are important because the cost of culinary school can be steep -- anywhere from a few thousand dollars a year at a community college to $45,000 a year at a private university. Fortunately, many different organizations offer culinary scholarships for students who are interested in working in the culinary arts.