Executive Sous Chef David Friendlich joined the staff of the Fresh Food Café (FFC) on Feb. 13 and is working to improve the service and increase the variety of food it serves in order to accommodate as many as students as possible.
“We want [students] to enjoy coming here to dine,” Friendlich said. “We want it to be as good as you would get in a restaurant.”
Friendlich previously oversaw the operations of Nolan’s and the Charles Street Market, including its catering division. A year and a half ago Friendlich began working full-time at Nolan’s as executive sous chef after the head chef resigned. Friendlich transferred to the FFC last month in order to ensure that its operations are more in accordance with Bon Appétit guidelines.
“The purpose of coming over here is to help improve speed of service and quality,” Friendlich said. “We have what’s called our GE-3, ‘great expectations three,’ which is our version of Bon Appétit’s standards that we get graded on. It’s to make sure we’re adhering to our standards and making sure we [use] all fresh products.”
Friendlich said he is working to standardize the preparation of the FFC’s staple offerings by making official recipes that employees can use. He said the FFC will also be providing more varied meal options, including flatbread pizza, strombolis, calzones and batter-dipped zucchini fries.
Friendlich said he is also working to better accommodate students with dietary restrictions.
“We’re going to try to have a few different gluten-free options that we make that are being stored in [the freezer]. We try to just accommodate as many people as we can, any dietary restrictions that they have — just increasing the variety of what we have for them, so it’s not just, ‘I can get two things and that’s it,’” Friendlich said.
He said he encourages students with dietary restrictions to contact him.
The FFC also intends to serve more ethnically diverse food and has scheduled four Cultural Nights spread throughout the semester. These are being sponsored by the freshman class council. The first Cultural Night, held Feb. 25, featured Latin American cuisine. Wednesday’s Cultural Night featured dishes from East Asia such as sushi, dumplings, noodles and a variety of Asian desserts and attracted many students.
Sophomore Elissa Mardiney said she appreciated the range of options available.
“I already love the food here, but it’s better [when there is] more variety because nobody likes to eat the same thing,” Mardiney said.
Freshman Grant Welby also applauded the unique meal options.
“It’s neat. You get to eat a lot of food that you don’t normally get exposed to,” Welby said.
The final two Cultural Nights, featuring Mediterranean and African cuisines, will be held on April 8 and April 29, respectively.
Friendlich said he is also planning new events for the next school year, including chef demonstrations where students will be able to ask questions.
“We’d just do a meal that we’re having, a meal that we might have or a meal you could do in your dorm room,” he said.
Friendlich also stressed the importance of helping students become more environmentally conscious with take out boxes.
“Everything we use is compostable, but because it’s compostable still doesn’t make it good for the environment. We have lots of people that will take to-go boxes and then dine in with them,” he said. “The best thing to do is really eat on a plate.”
Friendlich also described changes he is making to improve employee-student relations.
“We’re making sure [employees] stay in their uniform. We want [students] to be able to identify who they are,” Friendlich said. “We’re trying to make sure we [give] everybody a name tag. We want to know who we can recognize for doing a good job and have people in uniform take pride in what they’re doing.”
In a February 2014 report, The News-Letter revealed widespread staff discontent with Bon Appétit management. The subject of staff members’ criticism, the FFC’s executive chef, has since been replaced.
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