Mention that Dave Knowles, Director of Washington College Dining Services, brings his lunch from home every day, and students raise their eyebrows. Dave Knowles won't even eat the food prepared in his own dining hall?
Well, it's not nearly as bad as it sounds. "Yes, I do bring my lunch, for personal dietary reasons," Knowles laughed. It has nothing to do with the quality of the food or its preparation. He simply tries to stick to a diet that will not aggravate his intestinal condition.
"If I must confess," he continued, "today, in addition to my tuna fish sandwich [from home], I sampled all of the food that was served to you." In truth, there are times when he really enjoys eating at work: his wife is a strict vegetarian, and he welcomes the opportunity to eat meat on occasion.
At one point or another, almost all restaurants are subjects of rumors regarding their food preparation. Either fast food restaurants have flies in the milkshake machine, or food handlers don't wear hairnets, or chefs in fancy restaurants spit on the griddle to see if it is hot enough. Nonetheless, similar rumors about the WCDS don't seem to originate with students who work in the dining hall. Some student employees complain about the menu selection or their particular job, but no one seems to have major issues with food handling practices.
"Actually, it's a little surprising how neat it is back there," noted Tom Robbins, a student employee. "I mean, you hear about college dining halls and how they're horrible and have unsanitary conditions. But [when] I walk through there everything is done really professionally- it's really clean."
Employee Mary Bennett works in the dishroom, as she put it, "at the other end of that happy little conveyor belt that everyone puts their trays on." She explained, "Because I have to deal with scrapping all those plates with all those lovely leftovers on it, I generally do not eat anything before I work, especially the cafeteria food."
This doesn't really have anything to do with the quality of the food itself, though. "It gets pretty yucky back there dealing with the trash," she pointed out. "[It] makes you not want to eat anything ever again."
But, besides the unsavory aspects of the job itself, Bennett has no complaints about the sanitary conditions. She comments that she's seen nothing back in the kitchen or the dishroom to make her question the quality or safety of the food. "We are all pretty clean in the dishroom," she commented.
Nishantha Ruwanpura, another student employee who works in the dishroom, hasn't seen anything disturbing, either. "I think the food is very safely made, and the quality of the food is among the highest," she commented. "[The dishroom] is a very clean environment."
"It's very important for us to serve safe food," Knowles explained. He points out that he always strives for safe food handling, as incidents of food poisoning are bad for the people who get sick as well as for him, professionally.
He urges any members of the staff who witness questionable practices to come to a supervisor with their concern. "Lots of times, there's an explanation" for certain methods, he pointed out. Nonetheless, he doesn't want to take any chances. "We're very careful and try to go to great lengths to preserve the public health."
In addition, several members of the WCDS staff will attend a course in safe food handling in the coming months to receive additional certification.
All in all, it seems that there's not too much substance to the rumors of unsafe practices in the Dining Hall kitchen. Now, there's just the question of the menu items. "The one thing I won't eat," Robbins mused jokingly, "is the meat-free, dairy-free 'meat.' It just doesn't sound right."That, of course, is another issue entirely."
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