Brockway Dining Center and The Tomato Wheel Earn National Awards

Syracuse University Food Services earned two prestigious national awards this summer, recognizing the renovations to Brockway Dining Center and the creation of  The Tomato Wheel in-house retail pizza concept.

The National Association of College and University Food Services’ (NACUFS) Loyal E. Horton Dining Awards are the highest honor in college and university culinary arts. Food Services earned a bronze award in two categories: Residential Dining Facility and Retail Sales/Marketplace for large schools.

“It is an honor to receive this recognition from NACUFS,” says Jennifer Uryniak, interim director of Auxiliary Services. “The creation of The Tomato Wheel and the renovations at Brockway were spurred by listening to the needs of our students. It’s humbling to receive awards, but our motivation comes from our desire to provide an outstanding student experience. We’re happy these changes are positively impacting our campus community.”

Developing a new retail food concept such as The Tomato Wheel is a difficult but rewarding task. It takes a team of professional, dedicated and hardworking individuals to develop recipes, establish standard operating procedures which emphasize speed and quality and to design the physical space and branding. The Tomato Wheel debuted in the Schine and Goldstein student centers and the Kimmel food court in fall 2018, taking the place of three Sbarro locations.

The improvements to Brockway Dining Center, which took place during summer 2018, were also a huge team effort, says Director of Residential Dining and Dome Operations Mark Tewksbury. “Food Services staff, along with the Office of Campus Planning, Design and Construction, put a great deal of effort into refreshing Brockway Dining Center with a new look and new services,” says Tewksbury. “Our goal was to improve the student experience. We are honored to have received an award from NACUFS, knowing that our design and execution was compared against many peer institutions.”

Brockway’s renovation also included the creation of a student lounge within the dining center. Food Services held a naming contest for the lounge in spring 2019. Mary Mik ’19 submitted the winning name, “Sunset Corner.”

Judging criteria for each award spanned categories such as menu and meal, facility design, merchandising and presentation, marketing, nutrition and wellness, and additional considerations. The awards submissions can be viewed on the Food Services website. An awards ceremony took place at the NACUFS national conference in Denver, Colorado this summer. This marks the 10th year that Food Services has earned recognition from the Loyal E. Horton Awards. With this latest honor, the total number of Loyal E. Horton Dining Awards earned by Food Services has risen to 14.