The Current Online

New LV cafe manager focuses on healthy foods

by Jordan Lee and by Edith Erickson

Monotony’s not on the menu this year. A new manager and staff have taken over at the Longview Café with hopes to add some variety to students’ meals. The Café welcomed new manager Linda Harp, as former manager Kristin Parvin headed to the Independence School District after spending five years at Longview.
Parvin reflected on her time at Longview saying, “It’s been a wonderful ride, I will miss everything. But I will take it all in my heart.”
Harp is bringing a lot of experience with her as well as a passion for helping students. Since she has two daughters in college, she understands the need for healthy food options as well as the need for an affordable lunch.
Although she may be new to Longview, she definitely is not new to the food industry. Her background consists of 15 years in the business compiled of owning her own restaurant and catering businesses, managing local franchise restaurants, and spending the last five years working for Treat America at Powell Gardens. Harp remains as manager of Café Thyme at Powell Gardens and continues to work there on weekends as well as during major events.
With all of this background, she is excited to introduce some of her old recipes to our Lakeside Café. For starters, Harp wants to integrate more healthy food options.
Harp said, “Healthy conscious is something I focused on at my previous restaurant, and this is something I want to work on here…We’re trying to make these items quick and easy.” She also wants to have more fruit and cheese plates available.
For those concerned with healthy eating, Harp described some food options: “There are weight watchers, and the wraps are low in carbs and fat. The meats are low fat and the dressings are low fat. The onions, tomatoes, and cucumbers at the salad bar are locally grown.”
To help students with a tight budget, there is a special each day for 99 cents. In addition to the current features, Harp added a new item starting this week, listed as “Healthy Choice.” They are offering a different readymade salad every day.
She knows that a lot of students are crammed with classes during lunchtime and scarcely have any time to eat. The cafeteria has a “grab-and-go cooler” which is located just inside the cafeteria door. This contains sandwiches and other quick food options.
In addition, Harp is hoping to change up the menu on select Fridays by creating action stations where dishes can be created and prepared right in front of students. With the introduction of some variety she anticipates feeding up to 500 people during lunchtime hours later on in the semester.
Harp looks forward to the challenging job of feeding hungry people while adding variety into the menu, “The toughest part is food ideas that appeal to the age group,” she said.
Managing the Lakeside Café is more than just a job for Harp. She has a heart to help the students and meet their needs. Harp is looking for feedback from customers via email and is considering the possibility of comment cards for convenience. Currently, she is exploring options for being able to e-mail the student body the menu of the week as well as the possibility of using Blackboard to post the menu and the prices.
Harp said, “I would like input from students so I can provide what the students want.” Feel free to drop Harp a line at Linda.harp@mcckc.edu.
Of all the changes, the one constant that remains the same is Arline Arel who has been on register for the past three years and cooked another 21 years here previously. After spending over two decades at Longview, Arel has known plenty of students through daily conversations, providing help, or just giving a smile to brighten their day.
Getting to know students has always been her priority and after years of personal relationships, students begin to feel like family as Arel refers to students as “her kids.” This is all common to her as she is a mother of five, a grandmother of nine, and a great-grandmother of five.
Other faces that you may not recognize on the Café staff are new additions Tami Trasper and Kelly Hall. Both are new to Longview this semester but are used to the environment as both are mothers who have taken care of children of their own. Trasper was asked to come to Longview personally as she had worked with Harp catering at Powell Gardens. After being a dental assistant for 10 years, Tami prefers being here and getting to know hundreds of faces much better. In addition to working at a dance studio and Arrowhead on game days, Hall sees this as an opportunity to interact with a variety of new people.
Before Parvin departed, she made sure she left in style as she prepared 700 burgers for the hungry crowd that gathered at the school’s resource fair, Aug. 27.
She said, “I’ll miss the people here. They are outstanding; this was my home away from home.” She spent plenty of early hours and late nights preparing menus and making sure all nutritional needs were met.

by Kellen Shiel

At a time in one’s life when food isn’t always on the front burner, the Longview Campus Center is always a bustling center of student life. The Lakeside Café and JaMocha Gold establishments cater to the needs of the student body.

Paul Harris, owner of JaMocha said, “We usually get 50-60 people per day. Our location is a good spot for business, probably the best in the café area.” Cashier Arlene Arel said, “Oh my gosh, the rush goes from 9:00 on.”

Harris attributes his business success to the demographic in which his product, gourmet coffee, is sought after most-younger, college-age individuals. “I believe I’m set up to serve the needs of the best demographic possible. The campus has a full range of students which falls into the demographic of people between the ages of 18-35. That’s the ages of the most consistent buyers of this type of coffee.”

While JaMocha Gold thrives in the Campus Center, students also enjoy the several types of food offered at the Lakeside Café. Freshman Gabe Weger, 18, was interviewed while eating a slice of pizza offered at the Lakeside Café.

“I like pizza,” Weger said, “it’s like $2.00, it’s good here, and I think that that’s fair.”

While some students use their time in the Campus Center to unwind from their busy day, others use the Lakeside Café as an opportunity to get a quick bite in the middle of their fast-paced day. “I eat here because I have no time or money, and I plan on eating next much later (5:00) this evening,” said Tiffany Copeland, 19, “the pricing is fine, but they could use a bigger selection of food.”

Pricing and selection were the biggest concerns about the cafeteria at Longview, but that doesn’t keep the regulars from coming back.

“The combos are by far the most popular items, especially the chicken strips and chicken sandwiches,” Arel said, “but we do sell lots of cheeseburgers and hamburgers. It’s really only the fish we have trouble selling.”

For the overall student body consensus, the Lakeside Café and JaMocha Gold establishments are modern conveniences for the busy lifestyles of today’s college student.

by Janette Mitchell
Missouri College Media Award: Third Place, Special Section

November is the month that marks the beginning of the holiday season. On the fourth Thursday of November, mother across the country strategically plan the picture perfect Thanksgiving feast.

That’s right, the very same mom that established the “fend-for-yourself” night once a week in a desperate attempt to reclaim her sanity. On Thanksgiving, we feast, and are grateful for the harvest that we purchased from the grocery store.

It is undeniable that turkey is a Thanksgiving icon, a giant inflatable turkey meandering in the streets of New York, cartoon turkeys, turkey napkins, Tofurkey (tofu turkey), fried turkey, smoked turkey, barbequed turkey, golden roasted turkey, wild turkey, just to name a few. Some people have turkey, some have duck, and some have chicken, and then there are those who stuff a chicken into a duck and the duck into a turkey, which they call Turducken. Ninety percent of American homes serve turkey for Thanksgiving dinner. The death toll is 45 million birds and 768,000 tons of green beans, an American tradition with the fowl taste of excess.

The majority of the population is lethargic by sundown, and one has to wonder whether Thanksgiving could be considered a national security risk. The post-feast nap has in recent years been blamed on Tryptophan, an amino acid in turkey that helps the human body produce B vitamins that in turn produce serotonin, a calming agent. Tryptophan supplements were banned by the FDA almost 20 years ago due to an outbreak in 1989 of eosinophilia-myalgia syndrome (EMS) that caused 37 deaths. Recently a new and improved supplement has been allowed on the market aimed at controlling appetite, mood and sleep. The real culprit, though, is not Tryptophan but a huge meal packed with carbohydrates.

Remember safe kitchen practices: avoid cross contamination by washing everything that comes into contact with the bird, especially hands. If stuffing the bird, do so immediately before cooking and make sure the internal temperature of the stuffing reaches 165 degrees. The turkey should cook until the thickest part of the thigh is at 180 degrees, and only use the leftover meat for up to 4 days. So the following week stop with the turkey sandwiches.

Turkey is sometimes served at Christmas dinners as well but throughout the rest of the year, turkey’s popularity tends to fall. The turkey could have been a national icon of a different sort when the Continental Congress of 1872 was deciding on a design for the nation’s great seal. The eagle won his place on the seal, and the turkey won a place on the table.

In comparing the two birds in a letter to his daughter Benjamin Franklin wrote this befitting statement, “…For the Truth the Turkey is in Comparison a much more respectable Bird, and withal a true Native of America….”

Special Section: It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

by Amanda Rose
Missouri College Media Award: Third Place, Special Section

We’ve all heard the old tale about how Thanksgiving came about. Yes, that’s right, the pilgrims and Indians gathering together in 1621 at Plymouth Plantation. This misconception has led Americans for years to believe that this is truly how Thanksgiving all started.

Interestingly enough, the pilgrims did not celebrate Thanksgiving the following year after meeting with the Indian tribe Wampanoag’s. It was not until Abraham Lincoln was president in 1863 that he declared Thanksgiving a national holiday.

The first Thanksgiving was simple. They gathered together to share their beliefs and traditions which were customary to both the pilgrims and the Wampanoag Indians. Sharing and giving, harvesting and fellowship took place during this first Thanksgiving.

Food eaten today at Thanksgiving meals was not the same food found around the table in 1621. Today’s traditional food that was not partook in 1621 includes ham, sweet potatoes and yams, corn on the cob, popcorn, cranberry sauce and, surprisingly, they did not have a pumpkin pie. What is Thanksgiving without pumpkin pie?

Most of these foods today are an American tradition, but that does not mean that every American family still makes a good home cooked meal every Thanksgiving. Some families go out to eat and celebrate on Thanksgiving Day, or got out and eat because mom or dad burnt the turkey. Others order a Honey Baked ham, already cooked and ready to serve. Then there are those families who still traditionalize and spend countless hours preparing for the feast of the year just as the pilgrims and Indians in the first Thanksgiving did. Although, we have electricity and they hade none at all.

The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade which is one of the most popular parades of the year is packed with flying high balloons, dancers, loud marching bands, and tons of floats. The parade takes place in New York and airs live on almost every local television station. Everyone in the city and people at home gather together to watch this spectacular parade come to life every year as part of an American tradition to celebrate the holiday season.

This, while being very far fetched from the first Thanksgiving still relates similarly by the way that the whole city of New York and all across America, people are gathering together with their families and loved ones to celebrate even if it’s over a parade.

Society has come along way from the first Thanksgiving. Granted, we now have technology and there was no such thing as an oven to cook a turkey in the 1600s. The one thing we still have in common with the pilgrims and Indians is that is brings the family together when they might not get together otherwise.