Sodexo chooses Alcorn dining facility to train university and college chefs
Sodexo chooses Alcorn dining facility to train university and college chefs
Alcorn State University hosted 25 Sodexo college and university executive chefs and general managers from Mississippi, Arkansas and Louisiana for a district-wide culinary excellence training on July 25, 2013.
“This training was designed to create operational excellence in the areas of new menu offerings and marketing, as well as a tour of our dining facilities,” stated Terry L. Woodard, district manager at Sodexo. “Alcorn was chosen as the training site because its Dr. Clinton Bristow Jr. Dining Facility has a lot to offer. We gathered our team here for networking and idea sharing, giving them a chance to get away from their campuses and encourage thinking outside of the box.”
Darcy Woodward, Sodexo’s retail director, agreed with him and added, “We wanted to show off Alcorn’s phenomenal facility with a great kitchen and talented staff to our other members, and to demonstrate Sodexo’s standards that are in place here at Alcorn.”
Solon Pietila, executive chef at the University of Arkansas, Little Rock, said that he had visited Alcorn in the past and was glad to come back to this beautiful campus and its state-of-the-art dining facility. Pietila enjoyed the training that “brought the chefs back to fundamentals that we need to re-institute at our universities and colleges.”
Nancy Wood of Jones County Junior College in Ellisville, Mississippi, said, “During this training, we talked about adapting to changing tastes at our institutions. We need to accommodate our students with food allergies, provide gluten-free, vegan and vegetarian dishes.”
Alcorn President M. Christopher Brown II and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost Samuel White took time out of their busy schedules to greet the group and thank Sodexo for providing a wide variety of choices for students’ dining experiences.
Hands-on training.
Provost White (back row, center) and President Brown (back row, right) greeting the group.
