Staff changes at Vita Nova

Joe DiGregorio, executive chef and director of education for HRIM’s food service labs, will serve as general manager/director of restaurant operations. Photo by Duane Perry

2:01 p.m., Aug. 11, 2005--Vita Nova, UD’s student-operated restaurant, will have two staff changes this year, while Julie Fagan, general manager/director of restaurant operations, is on maternity leave, and other faculty are on sabbatical, Fred DeMicco, ARAMARK Chair and chairperson of the Department of Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Management (HRIM), has announced.

Steve Giardini, a 2004 HRIM graduate, is returning to UD as a member of the culinary team at Vita Nova, and Joe DiGregorio, executive chef and director of education for the department’s food service labs, will serve as general manager/director of restaurant operations. He and Giardini have worked together closely in the past.

Giardini comes to his new post with varied experience in the restaurant field, including spending the summer of 2004 at the ARAMARK Olympic Village dining facility, where he managed a team of Greek national employees and was responsible for a section of the athletes’ main dining facility.

As an undergraduate at UD, Giardini served as Vita Nova assistant manager in the spring of 2004, and after his Olympics experience that summer, he received an ARAMARK fellowship and returned to Vita Nova.

He also has worked for the Cedar Hollow Inn in Malvern, Pa., as the sous chef, assisting the executive chef in all aspects of restaurant operations, and he was a line chef at the Desmond Hotel and Conference Center in Malvern and a food and beverage intern one summer at the Ocean Creek Resort in Myrtle Beach, S.C.

Steve Giardini (right), a 2004 HRIM grad who is returning to UD as a member of the Vita Nova culinary team, and junior Thomas Tennant with an ice sculpture creation

Most recently, Giardini took part in ARAMARK’s management training program, Pathways to Leadership, which focuses on accounting and cash-management systems, and human resources and staffing procedures. He also was involved in management and catering in other ARAMARK facilities.

DiGregorio joined HRIM in 1996, helped develop the curriculum for Vita Nova and has served as its executive chef instructor since it opened.

Previously, DiGregorio worked for the Playboy Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, the Beanos Cabin in Vail, Colo., the Sheraton Hotel in Philadelphia and the Eaglesnest Country Club in New Jersey.

In 1995, as an executive chef for ARAMARK, he was chosen to represent the company in its International Guest Chef series in the United States, Belgium and Germany.

A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, DiGregorio has studied at Le Cordon Bleu School in Paris and is an active member of the American Culinary Federation.

Article by Sue Moncure

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