A hint of Italy
By John Ashley Menzies
Staff Reporter

An aroma of Italy filled the second floor of the Student Center Thursday night.

The scent led to the Chancellor’s Dining Room, where local chefs Zolon Wilkins III and Carl MacPherson prepared a demonstration and tasting.

A three-course meal, topped off with tiramisu, was served to invited attendees of the private dinner in the Chancellor’s Dining Room. Downstairs in The Main, Wilkins and MacPherson prepared chicken scaloppini and mashed potatoes to be served to the students.

The food featured will be served at his new restaurant Zoe-Italian.

“We came to TCU to do a couple of things — to look to TCU for a labor pool of bright, young, talented people to be servers and cooks in our restaurant,” Wilkins said. “The other thing that we want to do is to promote our new restaurant Zoe-Italian.”

Wilkins previously founded the restaurant Zolon, which is also located in Sundance Square in downtown Fort Worth, and came to TCU as part of the visiting chef program that TCU Dining Services has organized, said Rick Flores, general manager of TCU dining services.

“We want to share the community with TCU students,” Flores said. “We won’t serve the students every meal. So we want to give them other options.”

The program should bring a visiting chef to TCU twice a month in hopes of mixing things up, Flores said. However, Flores said he was unsure who will be the next visiting chef.

Flores said he felt the program was well received by the students.

Ben Schmitt, a freshman business major, said it was good to have some change in The Main.

“I hate the same food all the time,” Schmitt said. “(It) makes me not want to come here to eat.”

Christina Beeney, a freshman interior design major, said she liked the change.

“It was good,” Beeney said. “It’s better than the normal chicken.”