Day Trip: Eating Our Way Through The Culinary Institute of America

How we spent a day in Hyde Park, NY

Everyone seems to want to try Culinary Institute of America – it’s one of the most common requests since we started arranging tours in 2019. Back during Covid lockdown, the campus and all its’ restaurants were closed to tours and guests, but that has changed. Now all of the restaurants – including the student dining halls (!) – are open to the public.

Before my recent visit, when I was obsessively trying to plan, I must say that I found the CIA dining options very confusing, so here is what I hope will be a helpful breakdown….

Considered the Harvard of cooking schools, CIA is a full-on college, where students can actually earn a bachelor's degree in all aspects of hospitality, from becoming a chef to running a brewery or farm to restaurant management to food science. There are six restaurants right on campus, all completely run by current students.

Last week, since I planned last minute and there were no reservations available at Le Bocuse or American Bounty, the more famous restaurants, I decided to book a ”Campus Tour and Tasting” with my friend Niki.

We arrived 90 minutes early, hoping to figure out lunch when we arrived. Turns out we had several options:

Apple Pie Bakery: This is a proper bakery, so these student bakers start the day earlier than anyone else (4:30 am!) and most items sell out before they close at 6:00 pm.. You can find sweet pastries like Citrus Mocha Craquelin or Yuzu Matcha Cheesecake Mousse, which look almost too beautiful to eat, along with savory breads like Sriracha Cheddar Scones and Feta Sourdough. The Bakery also has a small selection of grab‘n’go salads and sandwiches. We were just about to split a Cranberry Squash Salad with an Eggplant Milanese Wrap, when a cancellation came through right across the courtyard at the Post Road Brew House.

The Apple Pie Bakery: Treats and the kitchen

The Post Road Brew House: What feels oddly like a conference center restaurant at first, we were welcomed by a more-than-happy-to-help front-of-house trainee and an abundance of eager servers. Because it was early in the semester, this may have been most students' first week in rotation. Everyone was super nice, super helpful and maybe a little bit not super experienced. But, unlike at a established restaurants (where we might’ve gotten annoyed), it just added to the charm of our experience.

The menu is English gastro pub meets craft brewery. I had Shirred Eggs with Kale and Mushrooms, and Niki ordered Beet Bourguignon. The food was excellent. Next time, I will make room for the Rosemary-Garlic Fries, and an IPA from the on-site brewery.

After lunch we headed back to Anthony Bourdain Hall (yes) for check-in. We took our seats in a lecture-style auditorium for the “tasting” portion of the tour. We first had to learn the difference between the words “taste” and “flavor.” In case you didn't know, either, “taste” takes place solely on the taste buds which is then processed by the brain, but “flavor” also encompasses texture, smell and memories.

The tasting portion of the tour led by Alan

We were given a tray of sliced grapes to experiment adding combinations of salt, sugar, lime and hot sauce. Sprinkling a bit of salt on a grape makes it sweeter, while adding sugar makes it feel almost mushy. And just a small squeeze of lime elevated the whole grape-ness of it all. It was fascinating, and made me realize why I always reach for a lime when I'm eating a taco.

The tour itself was led by a very charming third-year student, Alan who is majoring in Food Science and hoping to secure a job with Delta Airlines after graduation, where he can develop airplane menus. Apparently, our taste buds and sense of smell behave differently in the clouds!

Alan snaked us around long hallways lined with big glass windows, so we could see for ourselves the workings of the many of the kitchen classrooms. My favorite was the Asian kitchen, which seemed to have one of every bottle from H-mart (no photography is allowed so you’ll just have to leave it to your imagination). Another kitchen was devoted to banquet-style dining (think: weddings, galas and corporate catering) and another just for whole animal butchery.

We walked by the other campus restaurants, but because they are working restaurants we only got a peek. Every student at CIA rotates through all the stations in each of the kitchens and most of the restaurants, including their famous student dining hall, The Egg. Which we found out is open to the public. Every day.

Our stop at The Egg after our tour felt like a total surprise bonus. I was able to pick up that night’s dinner – Southern fried chicken thighs, pickled cabbage, chipotle corn salad and roasted sweet potatoes. My friend took home the jerk chicken, pickled fennel and triple-onion mashed potatoes. Everything is prepared and served by students here, too. The Egg also features The CIA Brewery, a brewery classroom, and a student market. This is certainly the only college store I’ve been to that sells squid ink fettuccine and ten different varieties of Thai curry paste.

If you want plan ahead and make a sure you get reservations, make sure to check out these places:

Bocuse Restaurant: The oldest and most famous of the CIA restaurants, serving fancy French food like escargot and Duck Leg Confit.
American Bounty Restaurant: Features innovative American dishes, like Quail & Waffles and Hudson Valley Vegetable Miso Pot Pie.
Caterina de’ Medici: Like authentic Italian, the menu consists of antipasti, primi and secondi. I would definitely order the Bucatini Cacio e Pepe.

But if you wing it like we did, The Egg is an awesome place to land. And bonus – we spotted Alan again loading up his plate with fried chicken.

Help me plan my group outing!

GOLOVENY TIP:
You can easily spend a good portion of a whole day on the CIA campus. But since there is so much to do in the area like The Walkway Over the Hudson and the multitude of historic sites in Hyde Park, a trip to CIA makes a great stop in a bigger day trip. Reach out to me at GoLoveNY if you would like us to plan your group outing.