The Essentials

No less a food authority than television’s Rachael Ray has singled out Manndible Café for praise in her magazine, Every Day with Rachael Ray. Gushes the magazine: “Located in Cornell University’s Mann Library, the Manndible Café is a study in eco-friendly eating. Student employees serve garlic, herbs and veggies biked over from a class-run organic farm. A campus favorite: overstuffed burritos with garden peppers, onions and fresh salsa.”

With the opening of a new life sciences building on campus comes the unveiling of a new place to eat. The Weill Hall atrium is home to a new eatery, Synapsis Café (not to be confused with the student organization named Synapsis, whose focus is to foster professional relations between members of the plant-breeding community). The café features Ithaca Coffee Co. java and hot breakfast entrées. For lunch: fresh paninis, flatbreads, pasta bakes, calzones and sliders. Also: smoothies, deli sandwiches, soup and desserts – everything for the famished scientist or student.

A lucky few got to partake of specially prepared kosher beef Oct. 2 at the Center for Jewish Living’s 104 West! kosher dining hall. Hosted by Norman Turkish ’56, the dinner featured $46-per-pound Wagyu beef from Japanese cattle known for succulent marbled meat. The night’s entrée hailed from the Strube Ranch (struberanch.com) in Texas, where they were raised free of hormones and antibiotics; the meat was prepared at a facility in Kansas, where the Orthodox Union oversaw the kosher certification process.

Turkish had the 18.2 pounds of the storied beef FedExed to Ithaca, where it landed in the skilled hands of 104 West! executive chef Kevin Spinner. A longtime supporter of Jewish life at Cornell and a familiar face to students at the Center for Jewish Living, Turkish threw the invite-only party to celebrate the success of Cornell’s kosher dining program.

Two Hotel School professors have found that the French classification system of Bordeaux wine châteaux is out of date. This may not come as a shock when you realize the system was developed in 1855.

The study from Cornell’s Center for Hospitality Research, “An Analysis of Bordeaux Wine Ratings, 1970-2005: Implications for the Existing Classification of the Médoc and Graves,” finds that while the three major modern wine raters – Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate, Steven Tanzer’s International Wine Cellar and the Wine Spectator – are reliable. Some Bordeaux châteaux wines have moved up in rank based on ratings by the three.

“However, because one rater is consistently higher than the others, consumers should not consider all equally rated wines as being equally good, when those ratings are coming from different sources” Thompson wrote. Vive la France. Thus, certain wine prices do not correspond perfectly with quality. The full report is here.

Members of the Applied Dietetics in Food Service Systems class chose sustainability as the theme of its annual dinner, held April 15 in the Carl Becker House dining room. Billed as “American Classics Gone Green!” the dinner featured locally procured meat, produce and baked goods. “We are challenged by creating a menu in the very early spring but have been able to use produce from the Ithaca Farmers Market and local bakeries, and our meat is coming from producers that believe in humanely grown, grass-fed beef. The chicken is hormone free and humanely raised,” said Becker House executive chef Eileen Hughes.

“We are thinking about what we are menuing and then producing for our project the foods that we hope will attract students into thinking about where our food is coming from.” Matthew Nulty ’08 (in green shirt) and members of the course oversaw marketing, pricing, menu design, ticket design and entertainment.

As a child, was the TV on while you ate? Did the whole family dine together? Hotel School professor Jordan LeBel organized a conference in Montreal March 21-22 called “Domestic Foodscapes: Towards Mindful Eating?” that among other things looked at the impact of childhood “foodscapes” – the regularity (or not) and formality (or not) with which we consumed food in our youth – on adult eating habits.

Academics from the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand attended the conference, which also dealt with the art and ritual of putting food on the table and the ways food is represented and eaten. One way to combat the mindless grazing often blamed for obesity and other detriments to health, LeBel told the Montreal Gazette, is to take your time and pay attention to what you’re eating: “Stop, bend down and smell your food. I’ve done this in restaurants, and I’m sure I must look like a sick dog who can’t decide whether it’s safe to eat. But we’ve made food so antiseptic. Just taking two seconds to really smell the pasta is enough to remind us that it’s food, not just fuel and convenience.”

Bon temps roulez! Robert Purcell Community Center and Cornell Dining will help you celebrate Fat Tuesday in style, with two Mardi Gras celebrations Feb. 5, from 4:30-8:30 p.m. and 10 p.m.- 1 a.m. The carnival features traditional New Orleans-style food, live music, games, masks, and of course beads, beads and more beads.

From Pad Thai to Panang Curry to Tom Yum Kung, gastronomes were treated to a wide array of savory dishes Nov. 26 at the Thai Food Festival in Willard Straight Hall.

Sponsored by the International Students’ Programming Board and the Southeast Asia Program, the event featured dishes from local restaurants Taste of Thai and Sticky Rice. It was hosted and staffed by the Cornell Thai Association, and was attended by more than 200 people. While some of those present said that they enjoy Thai food regularly, a number of newcomers to the cuisine were also in attendance.

This marked the first year that a Thai banquet has been held in the fall. The Thai Fest, however, has been an annual tradition during the spring semester for a number of years.

Knowledge may be power, but sometimes caffeine is supreme, especially when faced with an all-nighter.

Olin Library’s Libe Café has expanded its hours to meet the demands of the campus community, especially during these last frenzied weeks of the semester. Until the end of this calendar year, the café will be open from 8 a.m. to midnight Monday through Thursday.

Cornell University Library also has two other cafés where snacks and java are served up, including Uris Library’s Tower Café, which offers a bird’s-eye view of Ho Plaza, and Mann Library’s recently opened Manndible Café, which serves Gimme! coffee and local foods and produce.

Cornell University Library Cafés and hours:

Libe Café, on Olin Library’s first floor:
Sunday: 12:30 p.m.-midnight
Monday-Thursday: 8 a.m.-midnight
Friday: 8 a.m.- 8 p.m.
Saturday: 12:30 p.m.- 5 p.m.

Tower Café, on Uris Library’s eighth floor:
Sunday: 11 a.m.-10 p.m.
Monday-Thursday: 10 a.m.-10 p.m.
Friday: Closed
Saturday: Closed

Manndible Café, in Mann Library’s lobby:
Sunday: noon-10 p.m.
Monday-Thursday: 8 a.m.-10 p.m.
Friday: 8 a.m.-6 p.m.
Saturday: noon-6 p.m.

Cornellians are serious about their coffee.

So serious, in fact, that when the three-year, campus-wide coffee vending contract (now held by Seattle’s Best/Starbucks) came up for renewal, Cornell Dining set up blind taste tests for the community, with 15 coffees from five companies vying for the new contract.

Tastings were held Oct. 30 and 31 in Trillium, Kennedy Hall; at Robert Purcell Community Center and in Willard Straight Hall. The prospective vendors were Seattle’s Best, Ola’s Exotic Coffee and Tea, Omar Coffee Company and two local vendors: Ithaca Coffee Company and Gimme! Coffee. All offered decaf, light roast and bold varieties at the tastings.

At a trade show following a tasting in the WSH Memorial Room, companies offered information on their products and business ethic, touting their employment and fair trade practices, support for farmers and rainforests, and the quality of their beans. Ola’s and Omar had marketing displays with mockups of Cornell-specific brands (“Ezra Cornell” and “Big Red,” respectively).

More than 250 survey forms were collected at the three tasting events. “We wanted to make sure to include everyone’s feedback, including staff and faculty,” said Karen Brown, director of marketing and communication for Campus Life, which includes Cornell Dining. “They took the tasting very seriously.”

The current contract expires at the end of December; the decision on a new vendor or vendors will be made by mid-December, Brown said.