CALEB NICKERSON
SHAWVILLE Jan. 20, 2021
Due to the numerous restrictions placed on local eateries, this past year has been a tough one, but one business is making the most of their new contract providing lunches for the elementary school in Shawville.
Café 349 owner Ruth Hahn said that due to the shutdown of indoor dining and the general slowdown due to public health guidelines, she’s grateful for acquiring the contract for school lunches at Dr. S.E. McDowell Elementary School, which has allowed her to . . .
keep her staff working. With no events to cater and diminished sales, the new gig has been a boon.
“It’s kept my staff [busy], you know, instead of having to let everybody go, or almost everybody, two girls work about five hours a day,” she said. “We have good takeout but … it was very sad the week before Christmas when we had to close in-house dining. It was just the nicest week to serve people, right before Christmas, because everybody’s happy and everybody’s excited, and then all of a sudden it was just like, nope, you can’t serve anybody in your dining room.”
With the help of a grant from the MRC, Hahn was able to upgrade the café’s point of sale system to be able to accept online ordering for both regular customers and parents purchasing their children’s lunches in advance.
“The parents can go on our web page and click on the cafeteria menu and fill out a whole ordering form there, where they can order for the week or for the day and they can e-transfer the money,” Hahn said, emphasizing how convenient the new system is.
The shift to catering for children was definitely an adjustment according to Hahn, noting that they sometimes have orders of up to 65 grilled cheese sandwiches in a day, as well as mountains of chocolate chip cookies. She said that while she has to keep the fare kid-friendly, she has her ways of sneaking in healthy, nutritious ingredients.
“I don’t want to blow any of those secrets,” she said with a laugh.
However, the tradition of pizza day on Friday, which was started by the staff that previously operated the kitchen, stuck around.
“Apparently the kids used to just line the halls when they were going into the cafeteria,” Hahn said. “Obviously you can’t fight it, so we just go with pizza every Friday.”
Since students aren’t able to assemble in the cafeteria, everything is packaged separately and has to be made to be easily transported.
“So our first year’s been kind of up and down because of just not having them come through the cafeteria, I think really affects sales because they don’t see it. There’s no impulse buying,” she said. “Maybe it’s been a good way to start, a little slower and ease into it. So hopefully by next September they can be coming through the cafeteria.”
She noted that they added “bacon bunnies” (a bun with bacon and cheese) to the menu as well, since it was one of her childhood favourites.
“We’re trying to do well rounded, comfort food I think [that] is what everybody needs right now,” she concluded.
