Gruezi! Welcome to Switzerland!

Why Switzerland?
People often think of Swiss army knives, ski resorts, and watches when it comes Switzerland. Instead we decided to draw attention to Switzerland's diverse cuisine. Switzerland is a landlocked country in Europe surrounded by France, Italy, Germany, and Austria. Over the years, those four countries have all contributed to create a special Swiss cuisine.

We came upon Switzerland for its hearty meat dishes, Swiss cheese, pretzels, and of course fondue! All components of our menu were recognizable by the residents of Riderwood but at the same time unique to the Swiss culture. When it came to desserts, Elizabeth was the expert as she worked in a Swiss Bakery in high school. 

The menu included four main entrees, four sides, a soup, a bread, and dessert. Below you can see our full menu.

Preparation
Two weeks leading up to our meal we started testing recipes. We tested the pretzel rolls, Linzer cookies, and chocolate fondue. Testing the recipes beforehand allowed us to get the perfected product we wanted and made us more comfortable working in the kitchen. With all the Linzer cookies we baked during our testing, we used them to help market our meal by passing them out to residents outside of Windsor along with a reminder handout to attend our lunch. 

The week leading up the our meal we hung up posters throughout the different buildings of RIderwood and posted a menu in front of the restaurants. During dinner services we rotated through the different restaurants conducting table touches informing the residents of our meal. On the tables of Windsor restaurant we put out table tents. The front side of the table tent highlighted a city of Switzerland and the backside provided the when, where, and what about our meal. The rest of the week was spent in the kitchen prepping food. By Thursday we were in good shape and spent our last few hours (late) Thursday night decorating the dining room.

The day had come! 
The morning of I could say we were more excited than nervous but there was still a lot of work that needed to be done. The Windsor kitchen staff was extremely helpful and we truly could not have pulled it off without them. They took on our meal as one of their own and were more than willing to help any way they could.

As residents started arriving, we made ourselves available to greet our guests and thank them for coming. The servers took over from there allowing us to make rounds at the tables thanking them again, asking for any feedback, and reminding them to fill out our surveys.

The feedback we received from the residents after our theme meal was so rewarding and validated all our hard work for the past five weeks. However, we could not have done it without the help of both the management and kitchen teams from the Windsor. We’d like to thank everyone involved in making our theme meal a success!