Have you ever heard of an undergraduate independent-study project evolving into a full-fledged and viable business — one that’ s owned and managed by full-time students?

We have just such an enterprise more or less right in our own backyard. And it’ s even a co-op! Temple University’ s Rad Dish Co-op Cafe started out as an independent-study project in 2011. By January 2015, Rad Dish was up and running, sourcing mostly local ingredients for their offerings. With weekday-only hours that are basically 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Rad Dish serves breakfast and lunch, and lots of coffee all day long. The menu is vegetarian/vegan and mostly gluten-free, while the atmosphere is – well – what you might expect at a campus like Temple: Relaxed as can be, laptops all around, an eclectic music mix (no commercials) playing on a decent sound system. Customers can even bring their own food into the substantial lounge area, from home or from the many vendors that line the campus streets.

I had not been on Temple’ s main campus for quite a while, and my impression was that it has changed enormously for the better. It helped that I happen to visit on one of those perfect sunny winter days. Rad Dish Co-op Cafe is located in a splendidly light-loaded corner of the ground floor of Ritter Hall, with an entire wall of floor-to-ceiling windows that looks out on campus walkways and shrubbery. The mailing address, 1301 Cecil B. Moore, is not much help in finding the place, but I asked a random student for help and he was delightful. “ Oh — you mean the Cafe?” And with that he led me on a winding path through the building (home of Temple’s School of Education) to the Rad Dish space.

On staff the day I visited were Ben and Sam (short for Samantha), who managed to answer all my questions in between serving customers and whipping up sandwiches (yam burgers, apple-butter toast, hot tempeh). Rad Dish is serious about local sourcing, to the extent that they distinguish between local and what they call “ hyper local.” Local means that an ingredient or food is produced within 150 miles. “ Hyper-local” (such as Wild Flour Bakery in the Northeast and Greenstreet Coffee Roasters in South Philadelphia) is even closer.

Bestsellers are the coffee and the hummus grilled cheese, which also happen to be made with products sourced from hyper-local Temple alum businesses. Rad Dish receives financial backing from Temple’ s Office of Sustainability, and co-op board positions change on a regular basis. Adding to the community focus, Rad Dish Co-op is a dropoff location for Philly Foodworks, a CSA and online market that has its roots in West Philadelphia’ s Urban Tree Connection. (More info on these two fabulous grassroots organizations can be found at phillyfoodworks.com and urbantreeconnection.org.)

Rad Dish is open during spring and fall semesters (they reopened after 2016-17 winter break on Jan. 23), and the public is welcome. Visit the website at templeraddish.wordpress.com, or follow Rad Dish on Facebook at www.facebook.com/raddishcoop.