Last day... :-(

I can not believe today is our last day here at UGA. This summer went by so fast. I will be sad to leave, I feel like I was really getting use to it here and enjoying myself. Our last week went by even faster than I thought it would. We started the week out on Monday with our closing banquet for freshman college. We received a lot of positive feedback for the event and I was very pleased with how it turned out. The attendance was over 300 people which was great!

Tuesday we presented our chemical project to Jeannie and a couple other managers. The project was cumulative of what we have done all summer so it was exciting for us to finally share it with Jeannie.

Wednesday we had the taste testing for Five-Star dinner. I thought all the food was really good and I can tell the students will really enjoy it in the fall.

Thursday was our last day. We had a farewell brunch, and had a chance to say goodbye to all of the people we had met this summer.

I learned a lot at UGA this summer and really felt as though it was a beneficial way to spend my summer. If I could start it all over again I would do it again. I now have a different take on University/Collegiate food services and plan to consider it when i graduate.


Thank you everyone at NACUFS and special thanks to the Food Service staff at UGA I will remember you all forever!

Leaving...

• This was our last week here at UGA. We got to tie up a lot of loose ends before leaving.
• Monday night was our Greek banquet for Freshmen College. We spent a lot of time getting everything set up before the event. Everything ended up looking really good and was what we had wanted. The event itself was also a success. There were over 300 attendees which was an impressive turnout. The food got a lot of compliments despite a couple of snafus. We managed to keep from overwhelming the menu with feta cheese in every dish, but the lemons snuck past us. Hopefully everyone else had as much fun with the event as we did.
• Tuesday Julia and I made our presentation on our chemical presentation to the Director of Food Services and several management people. We narrowed all of our recommendations down to 2 options for the university. It was really successful and there is now an action plan in place for UGA to follow through with the project now that we're leaving.
• Wednesday was another fun day. We got to go to the taste testing for the 5 Star Dinner menu that we put together earlier this summer. A few of the recipes had been swapped out, but the menu was still mostly intact. Each of the dining halls was asked to make several of the dishes. Then the chefs brought the food to the tasting. We got to hear about the changes that they had already made to the recipes and what other alterations were going to be necessary. Then everyone got to eat. There were a couple of crowd favorites and a few of the dishes still needed improvements, but overall it was a fun time.
• We also did the final revisions on the article that was written for NACAS. It is now completely done and has been turned in. Hopefully it is accepted for publication sometime in the next year.
• On our last day, everyone threw us a good-bye reception. Chef Bryan put together some fresh fruit and pastries for us. We got to say good-bye to everyone. Then Kris gave us our final evaluations and our summer internship was over.
• I have to say that this has been a great experience. Not only did I have a ton of fun and meet some great people this summer, but I also got a lot of hands-on training in areas that I hadn't before. The projects that we completed were really worthwhile and I'd definitely recommend for anyone interested in food in any way to consider applying for this internship.

Getting so close!

I started off this week with office time. Monday was spent with a lot of time getting everything ready for the banquet next week. I moved all the decorations from Bolton over to Summit. The rest of the day was spent tying up all the loose ends for the dinner the following Monday. Tuesday and Wednesday were spent at the retail operations. Tuesday I assisted Tamala at Red Clay cafe. I choose the specials for the first two weeks of school, I really enjoyed having the freedom to make a managerial decision. On Wednesday I shadowed Chris at Barberitos which is located in the Tate Center.

Thursday we took a field trip to Zaxby's corporate office. I found this very interesting, we toured with Chef Paul's wife who works in R&D at corporate. We did a taste testing for new gravy's that they would be selling at different Zaxby's locations. We also toured one of the Athens Zaxby's and got to eat lunch there. Friday we did banquet prep and did all the flower arrangements.

One Week to Go

I went back over to Red Clay Cafe on Monday. I followed around Tamala the unit manager. She had me working the cash register again. I also wrote the weekly specials for 2 weeks. I saw how FoodPro was updated daily to get supplies for the next day. In the afternoon we also went out to one of the eatery units to help out with the parent's orientation for the freshmen.

Tuesday I was scheduled to follow Chef Paul around the retail center at Tate II. He sent me to do inventory with the stockroom manager. Standing around in the freezer for extended periods of time is no fun. The stockroom manager and I also rearranged the stockroom so that all the products used by specific retail units were grouped together. Paul also showed me how to do forecasting and he had me update some of the patron counts in FoodPro.

Wednesday was spent with Chef Bryan at Bolton. The executive chefs at the dinning halls have things very different from the retail operation. Bryan also showed me forecasting and price checks. The number of items and the volume of product moved though was significantly higher.

Thursday we took another field trip. This time we went to Zaxby's corporate headquarters. Zaxby's is a quick casual chicken place that is based out of Athens, but has over 400 units from Texas to Virginia. We spent some time in the R&D unit hearing about how they test new products. Then we were in the test kitchen and got to try some new gravies that they are in the process of adding to their menu. After that we got a tour of one of the local units and got to eat some of their food.

To round the week out, we went out to Summit and did prep work for the Freshmen College closing banquet that is on Monday. There were a lot of little details that had been handled all summer, but they're finally all coming together for the final event. All of the flowers that we ordered came in yesterday. Arrangements had to be made for each of the tables and center pieces were put together for the banquet tables. Flower arranging isn't something that I do all that often, but most of the arrangements look really good. The white and green color scheme goes well with the blue and white table cloths. Also, all of the signage that we designed came in and looks really nice. This event is going to be worth all of the effor that went into planning it.

Katie and I started out this week shadowing Mr. Floyd. We got to see what an "average" summer day is like for the Executive Director of Food Services. The day started at orientation where we greeted parents and incoming freshman. We saw that no day for Mr. Floyd is average and he talked to us about what his work week is like in the summer verses what he does in the fall. Katie and I got to sit in on a conference call with a woman from R&I (Restaurants and Institutions). She wanted to learn more about the day to day life of the director of food services. Our day went from 7am to 7pm. We interacted more with orientation and then finished our day at the orientation tailgate.

I spent both Tuesday and Wednesday following around Chefs. On Tuesday I shadowed the retail chef, Paul. On Wednesday I shadowed Chef Bryan. Chef Paul and I spent the day doing inventory. The units do a weekly inventory of everything on hand in the stock room. Wednesday Bryan and I did the forecasting for the next three weeks and put all the information into Food Pro.

Thursday I spent the day with Bambi who is the assistant manager at Red Clay Cafe. Bambi showed me how to make sandwiches and I was on the register during the lunch rush. At the end of the day we closed out the registers and I learned how to shut down the entire cafe.

On Friday we attended the assistant manager workshop. We had been given materials prior to the workshop to have our coworkers complete with questions about who we are as workers. The main idea of the workshop was for us to learn about our management styles and to understand how to work with other personalities. I really found this helpful and felt as if the questions helped me to understand others and myself.

Only two more weeks of internship! I can not believe it has gone by so quickly!!

The Retail Side of Things

This week was different from other weeks since I spent most of it on the retail side of UGA's food services. It was a change from the dining halls.

Monday we shadowed the executive director of food services around campus. We got to help write a press release and sat in on a phone interview for R&I magazine. Of course Mr. Floyd spends a lot of his time in the summer trying to sell the meal plan to the parents of the incoming freshmen so we also spent a lot of time doing orientation things again. It was a really long day, but I got a broader perspective of the whole food operation at UGA. A lot of the little things that I'd been told by different people took on new meaning after talking to Mr. Floyd about it.

Tuesday I was out at Red Clay Cafe, one of the on-campus eateries. It was a totally different atmosphere working the retail side of things. I manned the cash register for several hours. And learned to do many things at the same time while still smiling at the customer. I also sat in on their debates over new menu prices that are going into effect in the fall. Then I got to be creative and make new labels and price tags for the bakery items.

Wednesday I worked in another of the retail eateries- Barberitos. It's one of the newest units that's only been open 6 weeks. They are really popular with the students are it's pretty steady business all day. I got to see how they dealt with not having the correct produce order come in.

We also met with the last chemical company this week. They brought us a proposal that we had to add several things to. But now we can really start to analyze what we think UGA should do in the future. Which is a good thing since we now only have 2 weeks left here and the presentation that we're making is coming up fast.

Friday was different from other days in that we attended an assistant manager training seminar. The day revolved around knowing your management style and using it to interact with others to get the best results. I've attended other seminars similar to this, but not quite the same. It was interesting to hear how each style thought that they should be dealt with in a high stress situation. Hopefully I can apply what I learned in the future.

Half way through!

As time goes on we are getting closer to the end of our internship. At the beginning of this week we marked the half way point.

To start this week we worked the Freshman College arrival banquet. We helped set up for the banquet right after lunch. Doing this event really helped us understand more what we have to do for our closing banquet. We now know how to do general setup for the closing banquet. I think everything ran very smoothly and all the freshmen really seemed to enjoy their dinner.

Tuesday we met with two different chemical company representatives, after that Katie and I worked more on our chemical project. On Wednesday morning we went flower shopping to Flowers Inc. with Janet. Katie and I picked out the flowers we wanted for our table arrangements and flowers to put in Grecian urns for center pieces.

Later that day we had a production run with Stuart learning how Food Pro really works. I can see how it is a full time job just to understand the program. That night I shadowed Chef Paul for a catered dinner that was for 35 people at the Village Summit. It was really cool to get to see how he does dinners like this. I also got to work with the "Tiny Intern" and help prep the food and plate it up on site.

Thursday morning I had office time to work on our entry for the NACAS magazine. Later that day we had a mock health inspection at TATE II. I thought it was really interesting to see all the little things that go into a health inspection and everything they look for. I hope to retain everything the inspector taught us so I know what to look for while I'm walking through the dining halls.

Friday we had the day off. On Saturday Kris, Katie, and I went to an organic farm called Dancing Sprout. We started the day at 10am and I planted seeds for a local farmer with Kris. The farm was run by a local teacher from Athens and his wife. He told us that his kids are always interested in helping out. I really learned a lot helping them and it also felt good to know that helping this man for two hours cut out on so much work for him. He is not a farmer for a living, but I think if he could be he would be.

I am looking forward to the next couple of weeks. We are becoming much more comfortable here in Georgia and really starting to get the hang of things in Athens.