Tortellini Tuesday Revisited: An Insider’s View
Last year, one of my friends and fellow bloggers, Ryan, wrote about Tortellini Tuesday. In fact, he even mentioned me! It’s because I work for Vanderbilt Dining to fulfill my work study allotment.
Every Tuesday night during the semester, Rand shuts down its normal stations — burgers, sandwiches, Tex-Mex, etc… — to open the famous Tortellini Tuesday. The night opens at 4:30pm and goes until 7:30pm, and we are busy busy busy for the most part. We have 3 lines where a student worker chef will cook you custom tortellini from which you can choose to mix and match any of the following ingredients: tortellini, chicken, vegetables, garlic, marinara sauce, and alfredo sauce. We also open a 4th Express Line where someone just serves you the pre-heated food combined how you like. It still tastes good, but the custom touch is definitely preferred.
During the rush time, 6-7pm, lines are long. I’ve never understood as one of the workers behind the line why someone would wait in line for 15-20min. But then again, when I go on break I can prepare my food immediately.
The event is actually pretty fun to work at. I enjoy cooking and talking to people, so being one of the chefs is ideal! A lot of my friends always come to my line, which makes it even better, but I’ve definitely had long conversations with random customers just because I was cooking their food.