Fresh, Fast and Affordable: City College’s Eateries
by Kate Malch
It’s lunchtime, and the smell of garlic and chili fills the room as a warm plate of fried cauliflower with a side of white rice lands in front of me. It’s today’s special, cooked by Elizabeth, a student chef. The dish is perfectly cooked. The cauliflower is golden and crisp, covered with a sweet and spicy chili sauce, topped with shredded onions and sesame seeds – yet another savory meal from the cafeteria at Ocean Campus.
Chef’s Table is not just any ordinary dining spot. It’s a culinary adventure curated by the Culinary Arts and Hospitality Studies students at City College in the Ocean Campus cafeteria.
In the heart of Smith Hall, the cafeteria is open to everyone: students, faculty, staff and the local community. Four days a week, culinary program students prepare breakfast and lunch meals and serve them to the public, creating an ideal training ground for students pursuing culinary degrees. Along the way, faculty guides them on how to cook meals to perfection.
The Restaurants of City College
City College is home to both Chef’s Table and Pop-up Bakeshop. The culinary department has created eateries at Ocean Campus and Downtown Campus, offering well-prepared meals at affordable prices. Students make delicious food available to everyone.
Chef’s Table is a unique classroom laboratory operated in collaboration between students and staff from the Culinary Arts and Hospitality Studies department. It is located at Ocean Campus in Statler Wing near the cafeteria. They commit to sourcing high-quality, organic and local products while emphasizing support for small producers and responsible growers around the Bay Area. In their third semester, students learn how to serve and communicate with guests, use an espresso machine and decorate desserts.
From Monday to Thursday, savor breakfast delights from 8:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m., followed by a lunch menu from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. The menu caters to all tastes, including specialty vegetarian and vegan options.
“People genuinely relish our offerings because it’s all about fresh produce, not frozen. We only resort to frozen in emergencies, like using frozen vegetables,” explained Culinary Arts Department Chair Keith Hammerich. “Our commitment to fresh produce shines through every dish. The main entrees testify to our dedication to freshness and culinary creativity.”
The Pop-up Bakeshop has grown in popularity after an article in SFGATE. Every Thursday, students from the Baking and Pastry program at City College transform the vacant Educated Palate space on the Downtown Campus into a bakeshop. They have chocolate croissants, golden baguettes and other baked delights. But this opportunity is a once-a-week affair, exclusively available on Thursdays from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. The Bakeshop has close to 30 different pastry options.
SFGATE’s article mentions that prices for baked goods are more than affordable. Pastries cost $1 for a baguette, while danishes, croissants, cakes and other delicious baked goods cost $2-$3 per piece. They keep the lowest prices because they are all student-made and only need to cover the cost of ingredients.
The cafeteria’s prices are notably affordable. For example, a breakfast of scrambled eggs, potatoes, fresh fruit cups and coffee costs $11.45, while breakfast at any other cafe in San Francisco can cost up to $25 without tips.
Patrons mentioned the excellent, fast service of well-prepared food and low prices in the cafeteria.
“The prices are great compared to how expensive everything is in SF. I don’t have any complaints,” said Wendy Owens from the Library and Learning Resources Center.
A Palatable Program: City College Culinary Department
“It’s a fantastic training ground for students,” Hammerich said.
Culinary Arts and Hospitality instructor Vince Paratore said approximately 60 students work in the kitchen or serving area.
First-semester students learn how to make dressings, prepare various types of salads and learn different cooking techniques. They also produce food for the food pantry on campus. Second-semester students create all bulk production for the hot side of the cafeteria during lunchtime, while third-semester students run Chef’s Table.
Students must order ingredients for their specialties or dishes by filling out a request form and handing it off to the appropriate chef instructors to order the necessary products.
“We would like to offer a few more vegetarian and vegan items, and once we get more students in here, we can expand our menu to include them,” Hammerich said.
The Culinary Department’s quick-service eatery, City Streets, reopens every fall with a different concept. There have been 13 different concepts, including a pizzeria, chicken wings, roasted chicken, barbecue, Asian noodle bar, and American diner.
Instructor Paratore has also opened the curtain to future concepts in City Streets. I’m dabbling with the idea of doing a Native American concept here,” he said. However, he is concerned that there is not much information about Native American food, so creating a menu would be tricky.
The idea behind a quick-service restaurant is to provide more experience for students being inundated with hundreds of people.
City College also has a kitchen at the Chinatown campus, but Hammerich said they can’t afford to use it “due to cut faculty and enrollment issues.”
According to Paratore, the faculty, classified staff and students are not paid through the sale of food. Every year, the college allocates a certain amount of funds to purchase products, and the money from sales in the eateries covers the costs of food and beverage supplies, cleaning supplies and paper goods.
Depending on the day, Chef’s Table and the cafeteria’s sales are approximately $1,600 and feed around 200 people daily. The top five product sales are sandwiches with meat, entrees, pastries, desserts and soups.
“The Culinary Program at City College is great,” recalled Emma Emmerich, a former student at City College. “The croissants they made in the morning were to die for – you had to be sure to get one before they sold out.”
The Chef’s Table opened its doors on Jan. 27, and the Pop-up Bakery will preheat its ovens on Feb. 13.