RFoC hosts second NicKelly formal dinner

by Aaron Crossen
Vanguard Editor-in-Chief

April 16, 2007 —

Dining Services hosted the second-annual NicKelly Bistro Friday evening, turning the RFoC into a classy restaurant offering gourmet entrees like cilantro-crusted salmon in spicy vegetable basmati rice lettuce wrap. Dishes like that might cost upwards of $20 at a restaurant, but SVSU students were treated to a high-quality dinner for only $7.50.

Chef Manager Kelly VanConnet (the Kelly of NicKelly) and Executive Chef Nick Kole worked long hours to prepare the dinner.

"Nick and I cooked practically everything on this menu that day. We were in the kitchen for almost 14 hours," VanConnet said.

VanConnet and Kole were busy preparing several award-winning dishes, including the 2006 and 2007 Celebrity Chef Award winners: the grilled chicken breast stuffed with boursin cheese, fresh sage and prochuitto and the filet mignon with Swiss herb cous cous. The two entrees were picked as the finest of a group of dishes at the Horizons Celebrity Chef challenge, which pits local chefs against one another as part of a fundraiser for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. SVSU's chefs beat out 17 other restaurants, including representatives from Famous Dave's and Damon's.

"We won best entree. Last year, we won best entree too," VanConnet said.

This is the second formal dinner Dining Services has hosted. VanConnet said that the first dinner attracted more students, since it was during the school week, but that the second event was a bit easier to control.

"We served about 400 students. I think last year, we had at least 700 or 800," she said. "Friday seemed to work out a lot better. We still served a lot of people, but it was more manageable, instead of chaotic. Last year was pretty smooth, but this year I think was better. We were able to focus more attention, and give better service."

The formal dinner brought workers from several different areas together, and allowed Dining Services workers to exp eriment at different positions.

"We took our catering servers and our student workers that normally work in the RFoC - in the dish room, at the grill or wherever, and we put them in bowties and Tuxedo shirts and taught them how to wait tables," VanConnet said.

VanConnet and Kole were up to the challenge.

"It was like turning a buffet restaurant into a 5-star French restaurant in a matter of a few hours over the afternoon," she said.

"I can only see it getting better for our third time."

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