a student newspaper of the university of tulsa
march 6, 2012 issue 20 ~ volume 97
Food for thought: under Sodexo, dining options evolving, still limited While Sodexo and the Pat Case Dining Center may be frequent targets of student complaint, TU’s contracted dining service provider touts an increased array of options. John Lepine Staff Writer
Sodexo, the exclusive provider of dining services at the University of Tulsa, has plenty of tricks up its sleeve. Sodexo serves a wide variety of brands and qualities of food at TU—from the basic corn dog and french fries option of the March 1 dinner in the Pat Case Dining Center to the “Black Pepper Crusted
Filet Mignon with Goat Cheese and Roasted Red Pepper-Ancho Salsa” served as the entrée at the SA Leadership Dinner on Feb. 29, from Halal meals to Chick-fil-A, from Seattle’s Best to Starbucks. TU switched from an in-house catering system to a contract with Sodexo in 2007. Since then, the Hurricane Hut has reopened, Chick-fil-A has come to ACAC and Benvenuto’s (previously known as Bonici Brothers and Delissimo’s) has undergone relocations and name changes, while always retaining its popular pasta dishes. In 2009, TU introduced McFarlin Library’s Cort & Martha Dietler Café, and in 2010 it added a Subway in ACAC. The university also renovated the Pat Case Din-
ing Center and the concessions facilities at the Reynolds Center, and took over management of the Gilcrease Restaurant. All these changes and improvements are just part of what sets TU Dining Services apart from other schools, said David Wagner, Resident Dining Manager. “This is my fifth Sodexo account,” he said. “We’re doing stuff that other schools aren’t touching.” Unique Sodexo work at TU includes a 75-foot sandwich sold last week to promote the new SimplyTo-Go Catering program and the laissez-faire approach to the student-run Dietler Café. “Everything that they buy (at Dietler Café) is exactly what is afforded to Whole Foods,” said Dining Services Director Mike Neal.
“No other account that I know of with Sodexo would have that kind of ability, and we actually turn that over to the students who run it. We let them shop their own products, and we found that by doing that ... students are extremely happy,” Neal said. Goods sold at the café range from organic sesame seed oil to stir-fry pans and loose-leaf tea. There are plenty of students who still have a bone to pick with Sodexo, though. “There should be more vegetarian and vegan options,” said sophomore Kimberly Poff, who is on a meal plan at the Pat Case Dining Center. Freshman John Yuan agrees. “There’s never any vegan options,” he said. Someone with special dietary
needs can call ahead with a request, Poff said, but she has “several friends who are gluten-free and have called ahead and ordered it and sometimes the chicken will have breading on it. Sometimes it’s not actually gluten-free, so it varies.” Poff says she noticed the difficulty of eating vegetarian in the Pat Case Dining Center after giving up meat for Lent. She says that her meal plan is “ridiculously overpriced” and that she will “be glad to be rid of it next year,” but admits that the Dining Center is “actually not that bad.” “Sometimes it’s really good,” she said. Yuan also thinks that some of
See Sodexo page 3