Statler's student-run restaurant dishes out food with a global beat

By Linda Myers

"Fresh food with a global beat" is the concept behind Rhapsody, an entirely new restaurant in the center of the Cornell campus.

Hotel School student Meri Goldstein '04 passes with her tray of "fast casual" specialties -- among them a grilled portobello mushroom sandwich -- during the grand opening of Rhapsody, a new student-run restaurant at the Statler that is part of the school's revamped restaurant management course. Robert Barker/University Photography

Open to the general public Monday through Thursday evenings during the fall semester and located on the Statler Hotel's ground floor, Rhapsody offers a menu termed "fast casual" in industry parlance, with entrees priced in the affordable range of $4.95 to $6.95. The portions are generous, the menu is varied, with something for everyone, and the ambience is relaxed -- with the promise that guests can be in and out in under an hour.

Rhapsody is student-managed and is part of Restaurant Management, a required course at Cornell's School of Hotel Administration, with 110 students enrolled this semester.

The concept behind the restaurant, as well as the global-influenced menu, was done in consultation with Larry Reinstein '77, a Hotel School alumnus and "industry friend" who heads Fresh City Concepts, a successful multi-unit restaurant chain. "We developed the initial menu, and Larry offered his feedback on branding the restaurant -- the name, logo and tagline -- participating at all levels," said Lecturer Barbara Lang, who teaches the course.

Among the items featured on the menu are homemade black bean salsa, a salad of mixed greens with kalamata olives, blue cheese and roasted beets, a grilled portobello mushroom sandwich, Chinese don don noodles with roast chicken and fresh vegetables in a Szechuan peanut sauce, spanakopita (spinach and cheese layered in phyllo pastry), Cajun-influenced "Jambalaya" wrap (chicken, andouille sausage, shrimp and dirty rice) and the classic smoked salmon on a bagel. Also being served is Rhapsody's own blend of coffee, developed by the students in tandem with experts at Ithaca's Gimme Coffee. The Jambalaya wrap will be on the restaurant's takeout menu, still being developed, which also will feature rotisserie chicken and side dishes.

Between courses on opening night last week, dinner guests -- who included much of Cornell's ice hockey team as well as Vice President for Student and Academic Services Susan Murphy and Hotel School Associate Dean Leo Renaghan -- were treated to a lively performance by Cornell's Pep Band to celebrate Rhapsody's debut. Hockey players also gave high marks to one of the evening's specials: a huge bowl of linguini, pork tenderloin and kale nicknamed the "Howley load," for Cornell strength and conditioning coach Tom Howley, who stresses athletes' need for high protein and carbohydrates following a workout.

The special was developed with the athletes in mind, said Hotel School senior Margaret Timmons, a former Cornell swim team member, who along with classmate Doug Murray, defenseman on the hockey team, and Allison Hope, a junior, helped produce the restaurant's debut evening. "Athletes can work out as much as six hours a day," said Timmons "After practice your body can be so dehydrated that you need complex carbohydrates to refuel and reenergize." She and her teammates also are working with nutrition experts at Cornell to enhance the menu nutritionally for athletes and are planning a targeted marketing campaign that stresses the restaurant's proximity to Cornell's athletic facilities and succeeds at attracting more student athletes as customers.

That kind of initiative underscores the most important aspect of the course, said Lang -- that students can design their involvement to fit their academic interests, for example, marketing, facilities design or finance in addition to food and beverage management, preparation and service. "I want them to engage in creative and critical thinking," she said.

Lang also encourages each student to find a faculty sponsor and do a study with hospitality industry relevance, such as one being done by Hotel School Assistant Professor Alex Susskind to test for a correlation between customer satisfaction and staff satisfaction. She hopes that kind of tutelage will lead to students' producing "real research" that might qualify for the Hotel School's Center for Hospitality Research annual undergraduate competition and give them an advantage at job interviews with future employers.

Rhapsody represents a complete revamping of the Restaurant Management course, which in the past involved different teams of students producing different menus and themes each evening throughout the semester. The problem with that earlier approach, said Lang, is there was no opportunity for improvement. With the new "branded" menu, developed with attention paid to the dining market in the Cornell and Ithaca areas, students will be able to learn from their experiences nightly, point out what needs fine-tuning to classmates and continually improve on the restaurant to meet the dining needs of the Cornell and Ithaca communities.

Rhapsody's menu is accessible online at www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/rhapsody. For reservations, call 254-2500.