New Ways to Dine at Cornell University
2020 has been full of changes and discoveries of new ways to do things. Companies discovered the pros and cons of working-from-home, campuses around the globe reopened with hybrid teaching models, and F&B outlets looked for creative ways to adapt to the pandemic. Ways and places to dine at Cornell also changed and adapted to minimize the risk of Covid-19. While some presented challenges, as all new initiatives do, the Ithaca campus has created dining options for students amidst the pandemic. Below are a few adaptations.
Dining Halls
Many of the dining halls around campus are available for students. Cornell Dining has focused on five key initiatives:
Contactless payment
RSVP for dine-in and takeout
Satellite locations for meal pick-up
Reusable containers
Mobile ordering.
A Cornell Dining student employee expressed that Cornell has implemented many safeguards, such as wearing gloves and masks during the entire shift, sanitizing high touch surfaces every 30 minutes, and disinfecting tables and chairs between each guest. With frequent sanitation and strict social distancing rules, the dining halls are able to foster environments where both employees and guests feel safe to be in. Individuals have also been following the rigorous checks and mask-on-campus policy to help maintain safe spaces and keep the dining halls open for dine-in.
To help manage flow, Cornell Dining partnered with OpenTable, a reservation system used by many full service restaurants in the industry. While students have reported an inconvenience with the reservations through OpenTable for dine-in (partially due to some dining halls enforcing OpenTable for students to reserve seats, and some dining halls don’t) Cornell is minimizing the risks with table reservations.
Besides dining in, a pick-up option is also available and seems to be operating efficiently as students usually don’t experience any waiting time.
The decrease in the food options in general, was unavoidable. Due to the pandemic, students can no longer serve themselves to plates and plates of all-you-care-to-eat buffets. While some may argue that because of the reduced servings, the meals are not worth swipes, but I guess the silver lining is that now I don’t overeat for my meals.
Overall, Cornell Dining has been able to adapt and provide a quality and safe dining experience. For more information on Cornell Dining, please visit http://www.scl.cornell.edu/residential-life/dining!
The Terrace Restaurant
As a Hotelie, the Terrace Restaurant has always been one of my favourite dining options on campus. Thankfully, the Terrace Restaurant is opened this semester with extended hours from 11:00 am - 6:30 pm every day! The usual favourites are still available: Salad, Burrito, Tenders & Fries, Pho & Rice Bowl, Curry… and they’ve added a new Gyro Station and brought in Mac’s smoothies! My personal favourite is the Orange Chicken Burrito Bowl that is available on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Remember the burrito line that usually extends out to Uris Hall when you really wanted your orange chicken and all you wished is that they have an order-ahead option? Now that’s available :). You can now avoid that by using the GET app and pre-order for pickup. Walk-in for pick-up or dine-in options are also available.
Terrace Restaurant has been receiving positive reviews from the students for both pick-up through GET order and dine-in. The food is always ready and heated for pick-up on time. Social distancing at Terrace Restaurant is strictly maintained by reducing the number of seats in the dining room and sanitizing the table between each guest. There are also signs on tables that indicate whether the table is available and sanitized or not.
Visit https://www.facebook.com/macscafeterrace/ for more information, updated hours, and special menus that are available on certain days of the week!
Establishment to go.
Establishment, or the “student run” polished casual dining restaurant in The Hotel School, is a milestone course for all Hotelies. Students view their management night as a semester-long project, but also their ‘big celebration’ for almost completing their studies at Cornell.
While the restaurant is not able to operate for in-person like past semesters, it adapted to what many restaurants are doing in the industry by switching to a to-go model. Welcome to Establishment to go.
Students in the course still have the opportunity to propose and design daily specials for their management event around a theme, but all items are prepared by chef instructors and managed by instructors and TAs to keep the experience safe for both students and guests. The management teams are still expected to manage the operation. They are able to observe the kitchen and pick up process through zoom and communicate orders to the kitchen as they are received through the GET app.
Establishment is a great opportunity for you to enjoy a refined casual dining experience at an affordable price point and support fellow Hotelies! Next week will be the last week of management night. Visit www.facebook.com/cornellESTB to see the management night specials and stay tuned for next semester’s offerings.
Despite the impacts of Covid-19 pandemic, the outlets have strived to create safe and fun options for the Cornell community. I hope you can maximize your dining experience at Cornell with these options.
Yours in service,
Alice and The 180 Team