Phoenix Balances Your Options

The Phoenix Restaurant on NUI Maynooth’s North Campus is part of the Compass Group global food service company and, as such, has  the advantage of being able to avail of the services of Compass’ very own dieticians. These dieticians make a  positive contribution at the Phoenix with their most significant impact being the role they play in promoting health, wellness and nutrition.

Nutritional labelling plays a big part in the Phoenix’s strategy as it continues to roll out their healthy eating framework ‘Balanced Choices’, providing healthy food choices across the various menu offerings. This gives their consumers the nutritional information that they need to make informed choices.

This year, Compass also launched a new healthy eating programme, ‘Whole+Sum’. This innovative programme enables consumers to select a healthy and balanced meal by adding together calorie controlled food options to the value of 600 calories or less per meal. ‘Whole+Sum’ reflects consumer trends by combining popular world cuisine flavour profiles and comfort foods, with enough variety that adds to people’s enjoyment on their visit to the ‘Whole+Sum’ station every day.

As a demonstration of their commitment to the initiative, Phoenix constantly strive to improve the nutritional labelling at their Restaurant, including the introduction of calorie counts and improving knowledge and awareness of the benefits of a balanced nutritional diet. The Phoenix will also strive to reduce the levels of salt and artificial trans fats in the food they serve each day.

So all of the above is good news for those who may feel that they have over indulged during the Christmas break, as a carefully planned out daily calorie intake combined with the right balance of foods should get them back on track and NO it does not mean you don’t have to exercise as well!

The Management at Phoenix Restaurant

Linda Brophy - General Manager at the Phoenix Restaurant

Linda Brophy is the General Manager at the Phoenix Restaurant. Linda started her career in the catering industry as a Chef, attending DIT, Cathal Brugha Street to study Professional Cookery for 3 years.

After qualifying she worked in various restaurants around the country which involved “long hours, split shifts and no life” before settling into industrial catering. Linda started working for Compass Catering in 1999 as a Chef and soon fell into a Supervisor’s role. It was from here that she became interested in Management and slowly moved up the ladder to her current position as General Manager.

Linda has now been working with Compass Group Ireland for 13 years; 12 years in the corporate giant, Microsoft and the past year here at NUI Maynooth. She has thoroughly enjoyed the working experience on-campus and the following statement sums it up in her own words:

“Life in Maynooth has been great, very different to the corporate world that I have been involved with for so long, but so much fun. The students are young, energetic and full of life. We are adapting everyday here to make sure we can give them the best food and service at competitive prices. Our first year on campus has gone well, but we still have lots to give. Watch out for next year’s new additions to the Phoenix. It will only get better!”

Anna Szyszkowska is Linda’s “right hand woman” at Phoenix in the role of Assistant Manager. Anna moved from Poland to Ireland in September 2004 at the age of 18 and “from day one” she was working in the catering industry. As she recalls, she tried “every angle” in the business including cheffing, waitressing and bar work. In January 2006 she started working with Compass Group as a Supervisor, also at their Microsoft operation in Sandyford and subsequently got promoted to Assistant Manager under Linda who was the General Manager there at the time.

Anna Szyszkowska - Assistant Manager at the Phoenix Restaurant

In 2005, Anna enrolled at DIT, Cathal Brugha Street street on a 3 year part-time BA in Hotel and Restaurant Management. She graduated in 2008 with a distinction and a student excellence award.

Anna left Compass Group just after graduating college and worked as an Assistant Manager in Tenors Grill Room in Donnybrook (now closed). She remained there until January 2011 but then decided to go back to industrial catering because (in her own words) “the long hours and weekends in the restaurant were starting to bother” [her].

She returned to Compass as a supervisor of a small cafe situated at the Four Courts in Central Dublin, the Friary Cafe. In September 2011, she found an internal vacancy advertisement for a position at the Phoenix and decided to go for it because it was an opportunity to work with Linda again.

Anna is “very happy with the job” because she is “learning an awful lot”. She thinks that “every client base is different, the courts were very interesting” [but] “the college is completely different again so it keeps my job entertaining”.

Anna Szyszkowska busy working on the tills at Phoenix Restaurant

Aside from Linda and Anna there are no other management staff on-site at Phoenix.

The other staff include:

• Head Chef – Andrew Fitzgerald.
• Second Chef – Alan Kelleher.
• Other Chefs – Anton, Ryan & Denise (and they also serve the food at lunch time).

In Linda’s words “These guys prepare all the food and treats on offer from the Phoenix”.

At Phoenix we can also find on duty:

• Jana – the beautiful Coffee Barrista in the Costa Cafe.
• Anne Marie and Catherine – the till operators who greet customers every day.
• Joan, Adelaide & Donal – the servers who, according to Linda, “might give you an extra scoop of chips if you are nice to them”.
• Daire & John – who keep the kitchen clean and the plates stocked up. They are not seen but are “crucial to the operation”.

In summary there are a total of 13 staff employed at Phoenix, expertly managed by Linda and Anna, providing an excellent array of services to the restaurant’s patrons.

Phoenix Risen From The Ashes

It was Benjamin Franklin who once said that “out of adversity comes opportunity” and this was certainly true at NUI Maynooth. In the case of the University this adversity took place on the 28^th of November 2008, when extensive damage was caused by a fire in the students restaurant of its North Campus (see picture below).

The fire service was alerted at 11.27am on that morning and four units from Leixlip and Maynooth fire services were sent to the scene. There were several thousand secondary school students on the campus at that time for an open day and they stood with staff and under-graduates in shock and disbelief,as the restaurant was destroyed.

The easy option for the management at Maynooth would have been to rebuild/restore the original building to its former glory; life would return to normal, status quo would be restored. To their credit the management decided to take this opportunity and transform the existing site. They decided that the new restaurant, which would be named the “Phoenix”, would rise just like the mythical creature, from its own ashes and live on for years to come.

The Phoenix Restaurant, as pictured above, was the finished product delivered after two years of hard work. The building is a wonderful example of modern architecture, with its state of the art facilities, which has won the approval of all the students and staff at the university. As for the prospective students who were there on the day of the fire, well, they returned in large numbers to attend the university.

Maynooth had the largest number of college applications for 2012 which is a vote of approval for a management team, who, when faced with adversity used the opportunity to instigate change and became all the stronger for doing so.