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SHOP AT RIK

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A global feast
anzibarbrings exotic flavors to A2
By Megan Jacobs, Daily Staff Writer
Offering a refreshing variety of global textures,
spices and menu items Zanzibar is a State Street
venture worth trying.

In Morris's opinion, corporate contracts are one of the
many ways Michigan gets the revenue it needs to sup-
port 25 competitive varsity sports teams. And in that line
of thought, he has some company.

SHUBRA OHRI/Daily
Zanzibar offers many exotic dishes, such as Caribbean seafood stew.

izza, burgers, chicken strips,
Easy Mac - such is the
weekly pattern of many a
coIlege student. But one sip from a
tall emerald blue glass at Zanzibar,
home of North African and island
cuisine on State Street, transports
a diner from campus to the Carib-
bean. It is a restaurant often passed
by, occasionally admired, but rarely
frequented by the average student
who may feel more comfortable
at the more wallet-friendly Mr.
Greek's or chicken-happy Buffalo
Wild Wings, both situated across
the street from Zanzibar. Four hun-
gry souls in pursuit of finer dining
set out to discover what this mys-
tery had in store.
Though the bamboo furniture and
palm-patterned upholstery bring to
mind memories of dinner with the
grandparents in their Boca Raton
retirement center dining room -
and the dinner crowd does little to
change that impression - Zanzibar
is as upscale as any Main Street res-
taurant.
Spanish-style "black and whites,"
littleneck clams in a spicy ham broth,
are an appetizer not to be missed.
The clams are succulent, with a
hint .of garlic; generous chunks of
ham accompanies the broth, which
doubled as an excellent dipper for
the petite loaves of in-house baked
bread. Another fine complement to
the bread was grilled cypriot hallou-
mi, a sheep and goat's milk cheese,
which arrived warm and melty with
sides of salted green olives, pickled
grapes and a sweet shredded carrot
salad.
Specialty salads included a farm-
er's market tomato salad, whose
mild tomato base was enhanced by
feta and lemons. Though flavorful,

the heirloom tomatoes were soggy,
detracting from the overall enjoy-
ment of the dish.
Neither of the day's featured
soups, shrimp bisque and a black
bean and bacon, were worthy of
raves, but our server was honest in
telling my companions and me of
their shortcomings ahead of time.
He was also prompt and attentive,
never leaving water glasses empty.
A perk for the food-sensitive: leave
the Epi-Pen at home, as Zanzibar
features a detailed recipe list of
every item on the menu.
Zanzibar's entree list brings an
entirely new dimension to the table,
offering vegetarian, seafood and
meat dishes boasting flavors from
all corners of the world. The seafood
stew was exotic; chunks of mango
infused the sauce without mak-
ing it too sweet, adding to the large
chunks of salmon and scallops. The
orzo was perfectly cooked and was
harmonious with the steamed spin-
ach accents. As a vegetarian option,
we found the eggplant and zucchini
purses delicious, filled with a creamy
cheese center in an Italian-style
tomato sauce. Though the entrees
are expensive, ranging from $14-22
per dish, they are big enough to be
shared by at least two.
No meal would be complete with-
out dessert, and Zanzibar is happy
to oblige with a variety of choco-
late and fruit options. The peach
ice cream sandwich left much to
be desired; the cookie was hard,
almost inedible, and the ice cream
was more of a barely flavored sor-

bet. Chocolate pave, however,
made up for it. Beautifully plated,
it arrived as two sticks of satiny
rum fudge and a chocolate-almond
cookie, an excellent after-dinner
sweet tooth satisfier.
As if to further its claim to be
unlike all the other area restaurants,
Zanzibar delivers the bill accompa-
nied with chocolate-dipped chunks
of candied white ginger. They taste
good, but not quite good enough to
take the sting off the total.
Zanzibar is famed for its Sunday
brunch, especially its eggs bene-
dict a la Zanzibar; the dish fea-
tures sweet potato biscuits, topped
with crab cakes, poached eggs and
a jalapefo hollandaise sauce. For
those less inclined toward spicy
breakfast fare, Zanzibar recom-
mends the lemon-ricotta pancakes
or flank steak salad. Though unusu-
al with its fried onion crisps and
thin potato pancake atop romaine,
our server insists that "people come
back for it."
Offering a refreshing variety of
global textures, spices and menu
items as well as a nice all fresco din-
ing option, Zanzibar is a State Street
venture worth trying.
Zanzibar
Where: 216 S. State
Hours: 11:30-2:30 p.m. daily
for lunch, 5-9 p.m. Sat.-Wed.
for dinner, 5-10 p.m. Thurs.-
Sun. for dinner, 10:30-2:30
p.m. Sunday for brunch.

After years of interviews, sur-
veys and discussion, the commission
released its first report, Keeping
Faith with the Student-Athlete: A
New Model for Intercollegiate Ath-
letics, which detailed the most seri-
ous problems facing intercollegiate
athletics at that time. These prob-
lems included recruiting and boost-
ers, academic eligibility and, of
course, commercialism. The report
explained that America believed
intercollegiate athletics had gone off
the deep end.
According to the report, three of
four Americans believed that tele-
vision dollars controlled college
sports and most thought that colleg-
es were guilty of a double standard
on admissions of athletes. Eighty
percent of all those polled believed
that intercollegiate athletics were
out of control.
"All of the positive contributions
that sports make to higher education,
however, are threatened by disturb-
ing patterns of abuse, particularly in
some big-time programs," the com-
mission wrote in that first report.
"These patterns are grounded in
institutional indifference, presiden-
tial neglect and the growing com-
mercialization of sport combined
with the urge to win at all costs."
Morris, the Nike executive with
the autographed field hockey photo,
was actually the first staff director
of the Knight Commission. Like the
commission, which was supposed
to be around for a year and a half,
Morris was planning on spending
just 18 months outlining a plan for
collegiate athletics. But it wasn't
long before 18 months turned into
six years.
Ironically, Morris, who describes
himself as "a recovering (athletic
director)," spent most of his life
working in higher education, help-
ing the people who Duderstadt
claims are being most directly hurt
by commercialization in collegiate
athletics. He was an English major
at Mississippi and a teacher in Fair-
fax, Va., before going to Harvard to
get a masters degree in education.
While continuing his education at
Harvard, Morris got a job as the
assistant to the athletic director with
the Crimson, and, after a few years,
he got another job offer - this time
with Yale. At Yale, he was respon-
sible for the scheduling and details
of Yale's varsity sports programs,
and he spent four years with the Ivy
League school before becoming an
athletic director in 1985 for David-
son College - where he stayed until
the Knight Commission came call-
ing four years later.
"It was on the different side of the
table," Morris says now, his slight
southern drawl still slipping into his
speech occasionally. "Obviously, I
didn't have the same kind of rela-
tionship (with Nike that I do now)."
Morris left the commission in

1995 when Nike offered him a job
as the director of NCAA relations
- where he oversees all of Nike's
contracts with colleges around the
country. At the time, Keith Peters, a
Nike representative, said that hiring
Morris would help improve Nike's
relationship with the NCAA. "That's
not to say that on occasion we won't
continue to challenge the establish-
ment," Peters said in a public state-
ment in 1995. "It's the nature of
doing business."
Tom Goss, athletic director at
Michigan for nearly three years
between Roberson and current Ath-
letic Director Bill Martin, had noth-
ing but praise for Morris. Goss dealt
with the Nike executive regularly
while renegotiating with Nike.
"He's a good guy," Goss said.
"(Nike is) fortunate to have him
because he has brought some bal-
ance to where they were. They were
off the chart."
Morris doesn't see his new job as
a contradiction with the man he used
to be pre-1995, but rather he thinks
of it as more of a balance between
the two sides. And he disagrees with
Duderstadt's - and the commis-
sion's - claim that intercollegiate
athletics are being poisoned by com-
mercialism.
"A higher education is something
that I take very seriously," Morris
says. "And the way that we imple-
ment our business plan is out of
respect for higher education and to
try to help. If I felt I was damaging
it, I would either work to correct it or
I would go somewhere else."

In Morris's opinion, corporate
contracts are one of the many ways
Michigan gets the revenue it needs
to support 25 competitive varsity
sports teams. And in that line of
thought, he has some company.
The future of the
contract
ven though the Athletic
Department didn't need
money when Roberson
was athletic director from
1993 to 1998, the same
can't be said for his suc-
cessors. Though Roberson would
never publicly criticize a Michigan
athletic director - "every day you're
out of that job brings you further out
of the loop," he says - the fact is
that more recent Michigan athletic
directors have oftentimes had trou-
ble making a profit.
Tom Goss took over for Roberson
in 1998, and, financially, the pro-
gram went dry. Increasing costs and
a few years in a row of just six home
football games had the Athletic
Department looking for new ways to
make money.
"You always looked for new rev-
enue streams because, when you
have 800 scholarship athletes, there
is never enough money," Goss says.
"There's still not enough today."
Goss and then-University Presi-
dent Lee Bollinger had a contract
extension pretty much worked out
with Nike, but the negotiations

The University's current contract wi
2008, pays Michigan nearly $30 mul


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Zanzibar's palm-patterned upholstery serves as an oasis from the harsh Michigan weather.

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6B - The Michigan Daily - Thursday, September 22, 2005

The Michigan Daily -