Business: A Berkeley Education

Culinary icons and Cal Dining�s staff learn from each other in the university�s Chef Partner program.

By Scott Hume, Editor-in-Chief -- Restaurants & Institutions, 10/15/2007

Deborah Madison (standing at l. with Cal Dining Executive Chef Ida Shen) has made frequent campus visits to talk with students about food and nutrition and to sign cookbooks.

Chuck Davies chuckles at the misconception that university foodservice enjoys the luxury of a "captive audience."

If that were so, says the associate director of residential dining at the University of California, Berkeley (UCB), he and colleagues at Cal Dining—a 2007 R&I Ivy Award recipient—wouldn’t have worked so hard to create and implement the Chef Partner program for the fall semester. That program brought to campus:

Mai Pham, chef-owner of Lemon Grass Restaurant in Sacramento, Calif., and author of "Pleasures of the Vietnamese Table" (William Morrow Cookbooks, 2001). She developed Star Ginger, a branded Southeast Asian concept within the Café 3 dining facility.
Mollie Katzen, author of "The Moosewood Cookbook: Recipes from Moosewood Restaurant, Ithaca, N.Y." (Ten Speed Press, 1977) and many other cookbooks. She serves as a vegetarian-cooking menu consultant at the Crossroads dining hall.
Deborah Madison, founding chef of Greens restaurant in San Francisco and author of "Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone" (Broadway, 1997) and several other cookbooks. She serves as consultant on local and sustainable foods at the Clark Kerr dining hall.
Suvir Saran, formerly chef at Dévi in New York City and author of "Indian Home Cooking: A Fresh Introduction to Indian Food" (Clarkson Potter, 2004). He is working with Cal Dining to create an Indian-cuisine concept, American Masala (also the title of his cookbook being published this month), that will open at UCB later this year.

Director of Residential Dining Shawn LaPean always has stressed that Berkeley needs to do all it can to retain its customer base, Davies says. "Our only ‘captive’ audience is freshmen, because they’re required to sign up for a meal plan, but we’re selling more nonresident meal plans each year as our quality improves," he says. "When Shawn came [in 2003], we were selling about 200 nonresident meal plans a year; now it’s 3,000. We need to grow that business and retain those customers. There are a lot of restaurants in the area, and we’re not a monopoly on campus by any means. There are plenty of options for students."

Establishing certified-organic salad bars last year at its four dining halls (Café 3, Clark Kerr, Crossroads and Foothill) was one important competitive step for Cal Dining. This year’s Chef Partner program gives the dining program even greater appeal, says LaPean. "The certification brought more credibility and helped us sell more meal plans," he says. "The Chef Partner initiative brings even more credibility and some very tasty food. Meal plans are up 33% this year."

Mai’s Way

Creating Star Ginger with Mai Pham was the most ambitious undertaking because it meant developing a standalone concept, translating her recipes to university-size portions and training staff to properly prepare her dishes.

"At Star Ginger we’re serving a hot entrée—a curry or a rice bowl—as well as a bun, which is a [Vietnamese] cold noodle salad, and her pho soup," Davies says. "We change proteins: there’s always tofu and then chicken or pork. We’re using her recipes and specs, [which] we’ve adjusted, but Mai is an amazing teacher; she came in and worked with the staff very closely."

Both Pham and Cal Dining wanted Star Ginger’s foods and flavors to be as true to her recipes as possible. "We have a 45% Asian student population," says Davies. "They know authentic flavors, so the more of those we can provide the better."

Pham initially was a little nervous about the Cal Dining staff’s ability to prepare her foods just as she wanted, says Ida Shen, Cal Dining assistant director and executive chef. But Pham and the staff quickly won each other over. "Mai did a presentation [to chefs and cooks] to share the concepts of the food and to talk about flavor building—her dishes are all about flavors and textures and hot/cold, and she was very particular about how she wanted them presented," says Shen. "But the staff really enjoyed the chance to work side by side with Mai. She’s an incredible teacher. We bought copies of her cookbook for everyone that Mai signed, and they loved that."

New suppliers—including a Hmong farmer in the area—were contracted to supply a few ingredients not available from primary distributors. And some recipes had to be adjusted because of the volume of meals a university dining operation prepares in a short time.

"Mai was astounded by the crush of people all coming at once and wanting to try everything. People don’t order that way in restaurants," Davies says. "We’re serving 900 for lunch and 1,300 for dinner [at Café 3], and these are all-you-care-to-eat facilities, so students can come have as much as they like. Dinner service is from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., but generally everyone comes between 6:30 and 7:30. It’s busy."

That meant that Pham’s pho couldn’t be prepared in 5-quart batches, as she was used to making, but in 5-gallon quantities instead. Shen says that Pham also had to adjust to the fact that students might not eat her dishes as she would prefer, with pho as a first course. "She felt you’d lose the subtlety of the soup if you eat pizza or pasta first," says Shen. Pham also instructed staff on how to correctly eat bun so they could teach students.

"A lot of this [food] has been new for the staff, but they love it and are excited. They want to do well for Mai, and many have worked 12- to 14-hour days to make it all work," Shen adds.

Although no shortcuts that falsified flavors or textures were necessary, changes such as using precut vegetables and prefried tofu have helped Star Ginger meet what was immediate and strong demand. The concept was swamped when it opened, Davies says. "When students find something they like," he says, "they send a text message and more come running."

Veggies and Indian Meatloaf

The recipes offered by Deborah Madison and Mollie Katzen—who work with Cal Dining as consulting chefs—call for the use of some vegetables and grains not previously offered by Cal Dining, but with its extensive organic salad bars, the dining department already had ready suppliers.

"The idea with Deborah Madison is to create a community in the Clark Kerr dining hall, which is older, was recently renovated and has the look and feel of a boutique dining location," Davies says. Clark Kerr also is UCB’s smallest dining facility, serving as many as 600 at dinner but half that for breakfast and lunch.

Madison is providing vegetarian recipes and helping create alliances between Cal Dining and family-farm organizations. "We’ll be purchasing their produce, and the farmers will be coming to farm-to-table events," says Davies. Madison will sign cookbooks at an event later this month and talk to students about the slow-food movement and sustainable farming.

Katzen’s vegetarian recipes are being included in menu cycles at the Crossroads dining hall, which averages about 2,000 dinners a night. But Katzen has expressed interest in creating a standalone Mediterranean concept, "and that’s something we’ll look at for next year," says Davies.

Indian Chef Suvir Saran’s American Masala concept is expected to open in December. It will feature authentic Indian and Indian-influenced comfort foods. "He has recipes for Indian fried chicken and an Indian-style meatloaf," Davies says. Still a work in progress, this concept also may involve some sourcing challenges and will require more staff training.

"They’re all icons in the business, but they’re very humble and easy to work with," Davies says of the chefs. "They’ve been new sets of eyes to help us think creatively and to inspire the staff."