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International Cuisine

Dubuque Serves

Up Authenticity

n order to give its international students a taste of home,
and to provide a culinary learning experience for its local
Istudents, the University of Dubuque in Iowa prides itself
on offering a variety of authentic world cuisines.
The school, which has students from more than 40 states to 10 sauces, and every day at least three different proteins.”
and 14 countries, offers a rotation of international cuisines in A similar concept is available in Heritage Center for
its venues. “In our Heritage Center, which is our venue that Mexican cuisine. “Students come up and they have a choice
is more geared toward made-to-order items, we have a sec- of pork, chicken or beef as a protein, as well as beans, rice
tion specifically geared toward Asian cuisine,” said Andrew and cheese,” he said. “We put it together in a burrito, taco or
Mettert, executive chef and foodservice director of Dining salad. We have a handful of different salsas made in-house.
Services, which is managed by Aladdin, which is part of the There is a black bean avocado salsa. There is a roasted corn
Elior North America family of companies. “The students will and chili pepper salsa, salsa verde and picante sauce. They
come up, pick their vegetables and hand the bowl of vegetables have a bunch of different options to put in there.”
to the cook behind the glass. They will tell us what protein and In the university’s more traditional cafeteria, there is a
sauce they want and we will make it for them. They will tell rotation of international cuisines. “We have a line that is set
us if they want rice or noodles. We do as much as we can from up to run as a bar so to speak like a pasta bar or taco bar,”
scratch. We do all of our sauces from scratch and offer eight said Mettert. “Internationally, we will rotate through different
cuisines. We might do a curry bar. We have done South Korean.
We have done Irish, different — more authentic — Chinese.
We want it to be as real as we can get it with what we have
available here in the Midwest.”
Mettert wants the cuisines to be as authentic as possible,
“to a point where I couldn’t get lemongrass, so I went out and
bought a lemongrass plant a few years ago. We keep it; and
whenever we need lemongrass, we pick a few leaves at a time.”
Many times, the staff turns to its international student
population for authentic recipes and cultural touches. “We
have students here from China working on their Master’s,” he
said. “They will tell us, ‘I miss this’ or ‘I miss that.’ We did
a Chinese New Year celebration one year. They explained to
us what the Chinese New Year was and how it was celebrated
in China, because they were here and couldn’t go back. We
did a steamed whole fish and long rice noodles, which is sup-
posed to represent longevity. The whole fish was supposed
to represent prosperity, that if you were able to have a whole

AL KABSA (TRADITIONAL 2 pinches ground pepper Preparation:
SAUDI RICE & CHICKEN) 8 cups chicken stock Melt butter in a large stockpot or dish. Add chicken,
4 ½ cups basmati rice (Do not rinse or soak) onion, garlic and sauté until onions are tender. Stir in
Ingredients: ½ cup raisins tomato purée and simmer for several minutes. Add
½ cup butter ½ cup toasted slivered almonds chopped tomatoes, carrots, cloves and all of the
6 pounds whole chicken (Cut into 8-9 pieces each) spices. Add chicken stock. Bring
2 large onions KABSA SPICE MIX to a boil, reduce heat, cover and
12 cloves garlic Ingredients: simmer for 30 minutes. Add rice
½ cup tomato purée 1 tablespoon saffron and stir gently. Re-cover and sim -
28 ounces chopped tomatoes ½ tablespoon ground green mer for 30 minutes. Add raisins
6 medium carrots, grated cardamoms and continue to simmer until rice
4 whole cloves 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon is tender. Place rice on a serving
2 pinches nutmeg 1 tablespoon ground allspice platter, top with the cut chicken
2 pinches cumin ½ tablespoon white pepper pieces and garnish with almonds.
2 pinches coriander 1 tablespoon ground dried
2 pinches salt lime zest Yield: 20 servings

12 | NOVEMBER 2017 ON-CAMPUS HOSPITALITY