Week 1 at UC Berkeley!

Strawberry (Madeline) Snap Pea (Emily)

Hi everyone! We are Madeline and Emily, and we are the Cal Dining interns at UC Berkeley this summer! Some introductions:  

My name is Emily and I'm entering my third year of graduate school at Boston University to get my Masters in dietetics. I'm originally from NC, where I went to undergrad at UNC. This is my first time in California so I'm excited not only to learn about food service at Cal, but also to explore this awesome state. I currently working in dining services at Boston College, so I'm excited to see how other schools do food service as well - especially the sustainability portion. I'm considering a field in food service in the future, so I'm hoping this summer will help solidify my career goals.

Hi I am Madeline! I'm coming from THE Ohio State University and am about to enter my senior year in the Medical Dietetics program there. Like Emily, I have also never been to California before, so I'm excited about what the summer will hold for me and cannot wait to explore. I hope to learn a lot about the food service system in a large scale university, and everything that goes into the magical place that is a college dining hall. I also hope to do some recipe testing and learn how the menus are created as well. 


The first week at Cal was a busy one - with introductions and tours of the dining facilities, we did a lot of walking! Our first day we were introduced to Jaylene, our internship supervisor who is the dietitian on campus. We learned a little about the campus and were introduced to our projects for the summer: converting Cafe 3 to a plant-forward dining facility with a Kosher section and brainstorming "healthy hacks" for the dining halls. The Berkeley campus is beautiful and has many lovely buildings and plant life. 
       

TUESDAY -  We toured a chicken processing plant at Foster Farms in Fresno, CA (a potential source of chicken to be used in the dining hall). It was quite an eye-opening experience to say the least! The 3 hour drive through the California countryside wasn't bad either. :)

Posing with Foster the Imposter!

WEDNESDAY  -  We shadowed the sous chefs and managers at Crossroads (an all you can eat dining hall) to learn more about what their day consists of, including receiving, inventory, and operations. We also got to attend Summerfest, a staff appreciation day that included various delicious food trucks!


THURSDAY - We learned about sustainability on campus, which includes a ton of local produce and meat, as well as composting and recycling bins all throughout campus. Cal Dining implements many strategies to help eliminate waste (they hope to be waste-free by 2020): eliminating single serve sugar packets, using metal spoons instead of wooden coffee stirrers, eliminating single serve peanut butter, condiments,etc, and using reusable mugs and plastic containers for to-go items. All dining facilities on campus are green restaurant certified, which says a lot about UC Berkeley's commitment to sustainability. Cal is very prideful of their sustainability efforts, and with good reason! We are constantly impressed with their efforts to help the environment here. 


FRIDAY -  we reviewed SOPs (standards of practice) for dining and then toured the AirBnB headquarters in San Francisco! To say the least, this facility was the coolest place we had ever been in. It must be a dream to work there! And the food service was nothing short of amazing. AirBnB feeds 1600 employees 3 meals a day (and snacks and drinks) 5 days a week using mainly local ingredients and plant-forward menu. They even have an employee whose sole job is to make beverages for the employees since they don't contract with any other drink companies! We got to try some:

Christopher "Walk-in" freezer

  


Besides their stellar dining facility, AirBnB also just have a really neat office that has about 4 floors full of beautiful rooms that are designed after real rooms in houses all over the world.



                     
                     

For the weekend, we explored San Francisco via bike, which was both exhausting and awesome! We've packed a ton into just one week here, I can't believe how much we are already learning and experiencing. Thanks for a great 1st week at Cal!