CREDIT: KERRA SEAY
Now you can get high-quality, student-made food on the go, thanks to the new Saffron's "to-go" option.

Saffron's, a dine-in restaurant run by the School of Tourism and Hospitality at Fanshawe, has created its first “to-go” menu.

The “to-go” menu was launched as a result of the large amount of success that occurred in the summertime this year. Due to the large number of students in the program who left for the summer, the technicians and part-time staff created a “to-go” menu thats purpose was to remain simple while still offering a service for students and faculty.

“It got really busy so something that we looked at was to try to keep that clientele because not everybody wants to come and sit down in a restaurant when it's really convenient just to grab it and go,” said chef Wade Fitzgerald, a culinary professor at Fanshawe.

The summer menu consisted of snack foods and lunch options including items such as daily specials, soups and salads, burgers, wraps, tacos and craft beer. Free flavoured ice water was also included with the lunch.

The “to-go” menu that will run throughout the fall, winter and spring term will be a separate menu that includes some of the lunch and dinner items off of the regular menu.

“We shortened up the menu a little bit and made it easy for our students to be able to facilitate it because we are a student-run facility,” Fitzgerald explained.

The menu consists of smaller portions compared to the actual lunch menu and offers gluten-free and vegetarian options. The menu is simplified, packaged and the price displayed is tax-inclusive.

Items on the “to-go” menu include frites, a soup of the day, Caesar or chopped salad, pork tacos, fried perch and barbeque chicken. Each meal comes with their own assortments of sides and sauces so be sure to check the menu out.

Alex Peat, a varsity player at Fanshawe in the dental assisting program, explained the main qualities she looks for when buying food on campus are things that taste good and have variety, but meanwhile are sustainable.

“Something that's relatively healthy, inexpensive and not too messy,” Peat said.

The restaurant hopes to implement daily “specials” and expand the menu once the school term has progressed further, in order for students to become more familiar in the kitchen.

“Some students have never even picked up a knife before and so it's just very daunting to expect too much but hopefully when this thing starts rolling they'll be doing a lot more creative work and maybe get the menu just a little bit bigger,” Fitzgerald said.

The students preparing food at Saffron's mainly comprise of those in the one-year basic chef training program.

“They have the opportunity to branch out into food and nutrition. Some of them will be going into a new bake program that we have running and then some of them will be going into culinary management and some will just leave it at that,” Fitzgerald said.

When it came to deciding when to implement the new “to-go” menu, Fitzgerald explained that there were many things that came into factor. One of these was being able to include the first-year students fulltime in the restaurant for lunch, as this is a new part of the program that was just implemented this year. Another reason was noticing that often people do not want to stay due to the formal atmosphere of the restaurant.

“They feel that they had to be dressed up which is not the case. You can come as you are. We're trying to get that stigma away from it,” Fitzgerald said.

With the convenient “to-go” option at Saffron's, students and faculty are able to pick up tasty, student- made food that's quick and easy to take back to their desk or on their way to class.

Santiago Alarcon, a student in the police foundations program, explained that he is now more likely to dine in Saffon's after having the opportunity to try the “to-go” menu.

Selena Pinto, a student in the general arts and science program, said that she is excited for the new “togo” option at Saffron's because it will allow students to get good quality food on-the-go.

“Students are always on-the-go and busy so adding the “to-go” option will allow more students to eat here,” Pinto said.

The restaurant is open from Monday to Friday, in mid-September until April 16 and offers lunch, dinner, dessert and bar menus. The “to-go” menu will be available through the regular offered lunch hours, which are 11:30 a.m. until 2 p.m. Regular dinner hours run from 6 p.m. until 8 p.m.