If you’ve been among the many Cornellians missing the smell of good coffee in the Mann Lobby over the summer weeks, we’ve got some great news to share. On Monday, August 23, the new Mann Café opened its doors (off of the Mann Lobby) to offer a welcoming array of hot and cold drinks. By Thursday, August 26, the café will be open and on track for a full service menu—and a lively gathering spot featuring refreshing beverages and healthy food will again be part of the upper campus landscape. There’s lots to be happy about with this new development. Among the features that has Mann Library staff particularly delighted:
- Coffee – The new Mann Café will serve locally roasted Copper Horse coffee, a top quality brew that’s become popular among Ithaca’s java aficionados since it first entered the local coffee roasting scene in 2014.
- Tea – Not to be outdone, the discerning tea lovers among us are loving the fact that the café will feature fine organic tea by Teatulia, a company committed to regenerative farming and investing in the health, education and livelihoods of the community working in their tea garden.
- Menu – In addition to the standard grab & go fare for hungry-but-short-on-time customers, Chef Chloe Greenhalgh (who also serves as managing chef for Martha’s Café in MVR) has prepared a menu of hand-crafted breakfast, lunch and dinner food that has something for every type of foodie—from peanut butter & apple-blueberry butter bagels and breakfast burritos (egg or scrambled tofu) to hot ham & cheese panini and vegan (also hot) bbq jackfruit sandwiches.
- Local Sourcing – Thanks to Cornell Dining’s partnership with the food service vendor Performance Food Group, whenever possible, ingredients for the food prepared on-site will be sourced from within a 250 mile radius of Ithaca.
- Hours – The café will be open 8am-5pm for the first couple of weeks of the semester, but as the semester gets underway, it will then shift to extended evening hours (we’ve heard as late as 10pm, matching the hours of Mann Library…yay!!) —a boon to those late-working students we see in the library. After Labor Day Weekend, the café will be open seven days a week.
- Forms of payment – In addition to credit and debit cards, as part of Cornell Dining’s network of campus eateries, the new Mann Café will accept Big Red Bucks for students, and Meal Choice for Cornell staff and retirees.
- Last but not least, composting and recycling! As with all other dining facilities on campus, a well-honed system of sorting for composting and recycling will be in place, and we’re hoping y’all will use it well. (And by way of refresher for getting our recyclables right: current guidelines from Sustainable Campus Cornell).
In short, we say: What’s not to like about one more way that the Cornell campus community can enjoy some good food and drink together while also taking well-deserved pride in continuing to push the campus sustainability envelope? We hope to be running into you at this fun Ag Quad hot spot soon!