A big yabba dabba to-do at Caltech

In an outdoor event this past spring, the dining services team at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), in Pasadena, paid homage to the classic cartoon, “The Flintstones,” in a celebration fit for a caveman.

Nearly 1,000 students, faculty and staff were served buffet-style from stations hand-built to look like Flintstone mobiles. The menu included spit-roasted turkey legs, “Brontosaurus Burgers” and grilled vegetable kabobs. “It actually worked really well,” says Jonathan Webster, senior director of dining services. “Every one of our buffets was a Flintstone mobile.”

Inspired by Cocoa Pebbles cereal—the students’ favorite, decided through a spirited March Madness-style ranking event—students gathered on blankets around a smoke pit on the campus quad. “This whole trend of the caveman diet was very popular, so we went with somewhat simple food that we barbecued [on the pit],” Webster explains.

Students in a campus cooking class also participated, trying their hands at hospitality by preparing, saucing and serving chicken wings—dubbed Wilma’s Wild Wings for the event. “They were tossing them to order in six different sauces,” Webster describes. “They were serving their fellow students and getting the gist of what it’s like to work in foodservice.”