Food service menu trending: University of Florida partners with local Cuban restaurant; new food hall

This month, new concepts in Florida and Illinois made some news.

In Gainesville, local restaurant Mi Apa has been a longtime destination for Latin food, voted year after year as the city’s best during 17 years of business. The success has been translated into a college sandwich concept at the University of Florida (UF), where the foodservice team has partnered with Mi Apa to offer a succinct menu of the restaurant’s most truly succulent sandwiches.

Cuban restaurant Mi Apa operations manager: "We love the Gators and the Gators love us," provides four distinctively Cuban signature sandwiches for campus community.

And in Chicago, Dr. Murphy’s Food Hall in the refurbished, 106-year-old Cook County Hospital building features a dozen distinctive stations serving a diverse array of cuisines to staff and visitors in the surrounding healthcare institutions, biotechnology hubs/incubators and a new Hyatt Hotel.

To better serve the surrounding businesses and institutions, the 10,000-square-foot food hall offers spacious seating areas, modular tables, an 800 sq. ft. outdoor dining space, a designated takeout/pickup area, integrated online ordering technology, contactless payment systems and a food delivery service that is expected to debut shortly.

See what else was trending in food service menus this month.