This weekend, two people were wed and declared their love
for one another in a beautiful display of mutual respect and love. I was much
more involved in the aftermath of the ceremony, however, which involved one
hundred and sixty hungry guests, apple pork loin, and pink champagne wedding
cake. Not a bad way to spend the day, in my opinion.
I was most comfortable in this rotation of all the ones I’ve
done so far because I used to work in the catering department at OSU. I’m quite
familiar with setting up and working events with a high degree of formality.
Setup was much the same as any other event. We set up the guests’ places in the
classical silverware style, distributed butter balls and salad dressings, and
filled water glasses with ice right before guests arrived. One major difference
from OSU is that all employees wear hairnets when setting up and working with
the plated foods. I appreciate that UNI takes their food safety so seriously,
and I almost forgot to take mine off before the guests arrived!
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| Food safety and fashion in the reception room! |
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| What a beautiful cake topper. |
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| The bride and groom! |
Overall, the serving staff takes on more kitchen-related
tasks at UNI, such as plating salads and cake slices and running the dish
machine for all our dishes instead of just the eatery. UNI also strives to
provide accommodations for those with food sensitivities and have a well-organized
channel of communication between the supervisors and the servers. I was a
server for the evening and enjoyed the well-orchestrated plate disbursement
system: you carried a tray to your tray jack and only began serving a table
when you had enough plates for that table. You always served the same person
first, and we utilized American style service in which servers serve and clear
from the left. The only annoying thing was running back and forth from the kitchen
to tables fetching different containers of water, tea, or coffee for the
guests. It would’ve been nice to have a few tray jacks in the dining room with
several beverage containers on them for our more convenient use. The wedding
dinner was pretty casual, so we didn’t really run into any issues with people
waiting too long for their drinks. Accommodations would definitely need to be
made for a larger guest count or for a more complex meal service plan.
One thing that is unique about UNI’s catering department is
that it operates as a service to the university rather than a profit generating
enterprise. The quality of UNI’s catering service is major positive PR for the
university as a whole. Thus, Dawnell has the ability to work with clients to personalize
menus, decorations, and service rather than trying to run the department as a
business with strict stipulations. She sets event costs 16-30% over food cost
so she can break even but still compete with other local caterers like HyVee.
Bills are generated via FoodPro and Outlook.
Overall, the wedding was quite enjoyable. I made a new best
friend in Natalie, one of my fellow servers, and had a great time observing the
guests. Many left after the meal was over, but many also stayed for dancing and
drinking after dinner. I obviously didn’t take much part in the celebration,
but Natalie and I might’ve been rocking out pretty hard to Maroon 5’s “Sugar”
while we were in the back polishing silverware.
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| Sugar, yes please! |
At OSU, we polished silverware
and then wrapped groups of 25 utensils in plastic wrap, while UNI stores
silverware on a rolling baking rack in tubs with saran wrap covering the top.
This is good when events are in house, but wrapped, pre-counted packages of
silverware make gathering the materials for catered events outside the main
building a lot easier.
Thus, the wedding party came, dined, danced, and departed. Sunday was my day off, so I decided to attend a community production of Young Frankenstein the musical at the Oster Theatre on Main street. The show was lighthearted and fun, but I was distracted the whole time by two smokin' hot babes in the seats next to me. In any event, the show was a nice respite from work, leaving me refreshed and ready to begin my next week of rotations! Ciao for now!
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| I still have no idea why these little old ladies were chilling on a bench outside the theatre's restroom. |
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