New bagel offerings continue fresh trend at Ruby Cafeteria

There’s no mystery surrounding the success of one of Nutrition Services’ latest initiatives: The story of the fresh, new products available in the Ruby Cafeteria can be told in numbers.

One of the cafeteria’s latest additions is a new line of bagels, baked in-house daily. The bagels are selling like … well … proverbial hotcakes.

“We were making 75-80 a day and people were complaining because they’d get in at 9 a.m. and all the bagels would be gone,” Stephanie Juristy, catering/vending manager, said. “We sell out just about every day.”

Nutrition Services will continue to provide enough bagels to meet the demand. Meanwhile, the new line boasts enough variety to appeal to just about anybody. Along with plain bagels, the most popular new bagel flavors are: French toast, blueberry, wheat, cranberry, onion, and jalapeno.

Each morning, Nutrition Services bakers steam and bake the bagel dough in house, guaranteeing freshness by the time the cafeteria opens at 6 a.m.

“It’s just a fresher, better product,” Juristy said.

Nutrition Services has also created a line of Greek yogurt-based cream cheeses to serve as toppings.

The fresh trend doesn’t stop at breakfast.

One of Ruby’s most popular lunch features, the Burger Bash, offers fresh, all-natural beef burgers, along with turkey burgers and black bean burgers made to order. The cafeteria is also serving all-natural chicken.

The trend will continue in the future.

An expanded salad bar will debut in 2017 and plans for a new line of desserts are in  the works.