A New Executive Chef Brings Pasta-bilities to Macalester College
- by Peter Todaro
Bon Appétit at Macalester Executive Chef Joshua Hedquist with the team’s new pasta extruder
The Bon Appétit at Macalester team welcomed Joshua Hedquist, their new Executive Chef, to campus in February of 2020. Already he’s made many great contributions, including an inventive new addition to the dining program.
Despite joining the team at the start of the pandemic, Josh dove into his new role, learning as much about Bon Appétit as he could. After a career working in fine dining restaurants, he was surprised and excited by the level of creativity he was encouraged to express in his role.
“I think Josh realized he could be as entrepreneurial and innovative as he wanted to be” Amy Jackson, Bon Appétit at Macalester’s General Manager said. “He really embraced our from-scratch philosophy from the beginning”
A few months into the job, Josh approached Amy with an idea. If everything from sauces to soups were made from scratch at Macalester, why not pasta, too? After pitching the idea to their client on campus, the team purchased a new pasta extruder. Josh began churning out a wide variety of pasta, using a house-made dough of just semolina and water. The team has already experimented with rigatoni Bolognese, fusilli with fresh tomatoes, capers, and olive oil, and has even made their own macaroni and cheese! The pasta extruder even made a cameo in a video Macalester College created featuring Josh and the scrumptious meals he and the team serve up at Café Mac.