Merton Champagne, the man who runs the pizza station in the Usdan Marketplace, has worked at the University for 13 years. Known for the eclectic selection of pizzas he offers to students, Champagne has recently introduced a new element to the pizza-making job: he is now taking orders.
Last year, Bon Appétit asked students to give feedback on their favorite pizzas. In response to the report, Champagne took it upon himself to run two of the top-choice pizzas every day.
Champagne also takes note of the dishes that students most enjoy. He begins by observing their preferences at the neighboring Mongolian grill station.
“I’m sure it must get boring, the same thing every day,” Champagne said. “I kind of hang around Mongol and I see that there are different things people like, and I’ll approach them and just see if they want to mix it up.”
Champagne offers students different kinds of specialized foods, such as stuffed breads with rosemary baked into the dough, and for students observing Passover, chicken parmesan made with crumbled matzah. Initially, Champagne baked special dishes for the students whose preferences he had observed, but now that the word has spread, he has begun to carry around a notepad.
“I will take special orders from anybody,” Champagne said. “As long as I have it and I have the time to do it, I would be more than happy to do it for anyone.”
Bon Appétit Resident District Manager Michael Strumpf applauds Champagne’s creative cooking for accommodating the desires of hungry students.
“Mert, along with a great number of other employees, has a great positive attitude and on a day to day basis makes a great attempt to go above beyond,” Strumpf said. “It is that above and beyond mentality that makes the food service work.”
For many freshmen, the thought Champagne puts into their meals helped shape their first impressions of the Usdan Marketplace. Lizzie Greenwald ’12 affectionately calls him “the Pizza man.”
“He always knows exactly what we need and exactly what we like to eat,” Greenwald said. “For example, he knows my friends and I are vegetarian so he made us a vegetable calzone that I continuously ate for weeks and weeks. I hoarded it my room. It really hit the spot each time.”
Helen DeKorne ’12 described similar positive experiences. She remembers enjoying Champagne’s stuffed bread with rosemary dough, which served her entire group of friends.
“The Pizza Man is one of the friendliest people I have ever met,” DeKorne said.
Champagne lives in West Hartford with his wife, two children and two step-children. Before the Usdan University Center opened, he worked in Summerfields. Champagne first worked as a line server in the “classics” station, but was switched to the pizza station when another colleague requested a move.
“I love it,” Champagne said. “I love getting up every morning and coming to work. I’m having such a blast. I enjoy meeting the students. I enjoy knowing what they start to like and being able to do special things for them. I hate not coming to work, the summers kill me.”
Champagne is more than a father, husband, and “pizza man”—he is also a student himself at Central Connecticut State University where he is completing his second year as a senior. He is working towards a degree in history, his ultimate goal being a masters degree in public history. Although he hated history in high school, Champagne was inspired by a professor whose class started early in the morning.
“At Central I would look around at classes on a Saturday morning and I saw that a professor could get students involved in history at 8:30 in the morning on a Saturday,” Champagne said. “If he could do it, I could do it.”
The professor who caught Champagne’s interest continued to motivate him, acting as a mentor and giving him course advice. He has helped Champagne move closer his dream of teaching and researching at a local museum—Champagne is currently interning at the Old Statehouse in downtown Hartford.
When he isn’t in school, at work, or spending time with his wife and children, Champagne can be found in the garden, a passion he recently discovered. This hobby combines his love for both the outdoors and working with his hands. Champagne also enjoys mountain biking—he said he has a tendency to go off-road.
“I get daring,” Champagne said. “I am sort of like [the] I’m-not-going-to-get-hurt type thing. When I ask people to go with me they say, ‘You’re crazy, no way.’”
Champagne acquired his culinary skills not through formal training, but rather by observing the cook at a restaurant where he was a dishwasher. He judges his culinary success by the reactions of the students. Taking special orders is his way of making the University feel like home.
“I know that you guys are away from home, and my job is not only to feed you but my job is to also make you feel comfortable, happy,” he said. “Hopefully this will feel like your second home. Then I’ve done my job.”