I know it’s a bit juvenile but I’ve been observing the different changes made to the dinner menus over the semester. During freshman year, I frequented the Risley Dining Hall many times and I found that they had some of the most amazing sauces. When I started to live at Rose House last year, I found that the food, many times, was very fresh and seemed home cooked in comparison to places like Bethe or Becker. It was also amazing to see the sheer amount of fish that the Rose Diner spouts out. I don’t think I’ve seen that much seafood other than at North Star. So, this Rose Cafe was a great experience to formally meet the man we have all seen walking near the dining hall.

Chef Hans made several important points and what I found the most amazing is that the kitchen actually takes notice of what is left off on our plates and make adjustments to our meals. Last year, I used to see small little empanadas on Taco Tuesday and I realized just recently that they’ve been switched out. I know for a fact that people are appreciating the switch because, otherwise, we wouldn’t have the freshly baked chocolate chip cookies around. Many would also notice that the quesadillas are gone which, Chef Hans described as being a very boring process  which yields to something that doesn’t necessarily taste good. Chef Hans also pointed out that we actually have fresh fish delivered to Rose due to a partnership and he orders fish two times a week.  As a result, finding clam chowder in Rose House is pretty common.

Another small point that Chef Hans made was that  he didn’t like having precut vegetables being served in Rose House. As a result, we see broccoli with a substantial amount of stalk attached to them unlike other dining halls. I’ve actually seen a lower frequency of packaged products being served at Rose House. For example, sure, the pies are bought but, we have cookies and brownies that are made very often. My parents and my boyfriend have visited Rose several times and they still find it an amazing eatery.

When I went to the Rose Cafe with Chef Hans, I didn’t exactly know what to expect. My first thought was that he couldn’t possibly talk about cooking for an hour. Surprisingly though, the whole hour was very enlightening and I realized there’s a lot more to the dining hall than just cooking pre specified recipes. For example, logistics plays a huge role in what we are served. The quesadilla station that used to exist in Rose was removed since it (surprisingly) took a lot of prep and time. Instead, the cookie platter has replaced it and has been a huge success.

Something I was struck by in the cafe was that Chef Hans really cares about how the workers at Rose feel. Their stress levels and morale are a key factor in his decisions of what to cook. He likes to get them invested in work and encourages them to do research on what dishes they’d like to introduce. I thought this was a great change to what we traditionally perceive food service jobs to be like. My own mother constantly stressed to me that I should never seek out a job in food service, since I would probably be treated terribly and my work wouldn’t be appreciated. I don’t think Chef Hans’ workers feel that way at all.

My own experience with dining halls is often pretty impersonal. Since you aren’t being waited on by anyone, it’s not like you can send your thanks to the chef through them. When I like the food, I tend to tell my friends who I’m eating with, but never the actual staff who cooked it. I don’t even tend to think of the people who cook it at all, which I now realize has been a mistake on my part. I think from now on I’ll make an effort to seek out the chef at a dining hall if I really enjoyed what they made, since I know the effort and planning that goes into it now. Overall, I was really impressed by Chef Hans efforts and ability to manage the dining hall.

Last week’s Rose Cafe featured Hans Butler, the chef at Rose House. Since the talk was less populated than usual, probably as a result of fall break, it was a great opportunity to have a really open discussion. I really enjoyed hearing from Hans about his vision for Rose house, and learning about the work that goes on behind the scenes at Rose House Dining. I’ve always enjoyed dinners at Rose, and eat there almost exclusively, but I had no idea the lengths Hans goes to to ensure that we are getting fresh, quality meals. It was also interesting to hear how Hans’ work at Rose goes beyond just producing great food. Hans talked about how he likes to cook Middle Eastern and South American food at Rose because it is underrepresented on campus, which I think is an excellent and perhaps underrated way to promote diversity/inclusivity on campus.

Hans also described one program that was particularly impressive, which allows Rose House Dining to get fresh seafood from fisherman located in Boston. I have always enjoyed the quantity of seafood that is available at Rose, and so I love to hear that the program which brings in the product is committed to both freshness and sustainability. Overall, I am very impressed with Rose Dining and it is a part of my experience on campus at Cornell for which I am very grateful.

This week I attended the Rose Cafè with guest speaker, Chef Hans of Rose dining hall.  Immediately, I could tell he was extremely passionate about cooking and had his own “vision”, as he called it, about food.  A lot of thought and hard work goes into every meal, especially house dinners.  I don’t think we realize how lucky we are in terms of dining hall options- most schools either only have one dining hall, serve stagnant meal choices and/or just use food straight out of a box (the same that’s served in prisons nonetheless).  Chef Hans doesn’t even use frozen vegetables- the dining hall staff chops up fresh heads of broccoli,m cauliflower, etc. for us every night.  The menu isn’t random, it’s carefully planned in order to accommodate a variety of people (ie. vegetarians, vegans, gluten-free, etc.) and changes when something isn’t working- in other words, our opinions matter.

Overall, I was very happy that I attended this talk.  Chef Hans was very open and friendly and genuinely seemed to value our feedback.  The dining hall staff works very hard for us and we can easily show our appreciation by smiling and thanking them, disposing of our food and utensils properly, and being respectful.

This week’s Rose Café featured Rose’s very own Chef Hans. It was really cool being able to talk to Chef Hans and get a different outlook on how cooking/the kitchen works in Rose. I could tell he was incredibly passionate about what he did, and I admired how he steered kitchens away from frozen food/packaged food and implemented more responsibility and fresh foods in the kitchen. Another thing that I never considered as much as I should was, why all the dining halls except for one close at 8 or why there are very few dining halls open for every meal. I used to think it was rather annoying or inconvenient for me, when I didn’t consider the workers from the dining halls and think about it from their point of view. I learned that they often don’t leave before 10 p.m. when the dining hall closes at 8. It is remarkable how much work they put in every day for us, not only with foods but with clean up and preparation as well. This Rose Cafe really made me appreciate the dining halls we are blessed with here at Cornell.

This week’s discussion hosted one of our own staff members, Chef Hans. Though Chef Hans may look a little intimidating in his white chef suit and tall physique, he is actually one of the kindest, down-to-earth, humble people at Cornell. He explained how he started off working on a farm and recalled times when he pig roasted right in his house on the farm. He then decided to make the move to Cornell. He was very skeptical at first because he did not want to limit his cooking style and become a follower of the institutionalized meal plan recipes. In the beginning, Chef Hans worked in Bethe House under the cook there. He said he did exactly what he was afraid of doing–cooking out of cans and following recipes. Slowly, though, he began to let his passion shine through and motivated the workers to cut broccoli and cauliflower and onions rather than purchase prepackaged ones. He then moved on to Risley where he completely redesigned the menu. From there, Chef moved to Rose where he currently works today.

The Chef is adamant about three things: one, fresh foods over prepackaged/canned foods, two, creativity in foods, and three, employee morale. In regards to fresh foods, did you know that the Chef imports fresh seafood from Boston twice a week? The company catches the seafood and it is served within 3 days of catching it at Rose dinners. This news was completely new to me and really amazed me. No other place in the vicinity has the financial capabilities to order fresh seafood at large volumes and serve customers at reasonable prices. Chef Hans is also very experimental as he constantly brings innovation and fresh ideas to his menu. Tonight for instance, he decided to try making lamb belly although he’s never cooked with this meat before. Taking risks proved to be successful when he received positive feedback on his food. For instance, he realized that the employee was being stressed out when he/she was given the mundane job of making quaesadillas. And, the Chef realized that when they sit too long, the quaesadillas were becoming soggy and students were not very satisfied. So, Chef Hans decided to replace the quaesadillas with housemade salsas. This employee now enjoyed the benefits of having the ability to use his/her creativity while removing the stress of constantly making quaesadillas that were quickly becoming soggy. This is just one way how Chef Hans is able to boost employee morale and in effect, improve the overall quality of the food.

I’m so glad I signed up for this Rose Cafe to have a talk with chef Hans, because it was such an interesting time to learn about not just amazing food he created at Rose Dining, but also the managing strategies, and stories behind the scene. I have never thought about the science of preperation, crew morale in the diner team before, and this talk was beyond my expectation, and really worthy of time.

He introduced us some of the food material with interesting flavors and taste, such as Zumas, which is a red flower with fruit on it and if you put that in water, it will make the water taste like lemonade.

My favorite part is he talked about the creative dishes at the house dinner,  like the special chicken, and lamp dish that we have today. They all taste really good, but hearing him explaining how he makes the meet juicy with the equipment in Rose dining hall, how he merinate the sauce, I recaled the good food that I had before, and I was so appreciate them. He also talked about the experiment that they tried and some might fail, and they will make changes based on the feedback, some collected in the dish washing procedure.

It’s really a management strategy, how to make the employees excited for their work, instead of repeating the work. For example, Rose had Qusadilla before, but since they are best to eat before they get cold, which is really hard in the dining hall, and the person who make them involves a lot of work. Chef Hans recognized the problem and change it to different flavor of salsa.

I also like the comments by prof.Blalock, when we talked about the team morale in the dinning hall, he mentioned the trade off of team creativity and consistence quality. It brings me a perspective of thinking of management, team dynamics.

I think this is really a nice talk with a lot of learning as well as appreciation for the amazing food that I have at Cornell everyday. I really like this cafe time and enjoyed a lot!