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Push For Fresh Food Makes its Way Into St. Francis University Dining Hall
Altoona Mirror

LORETTO - Students at St. Francis University now know where their food comes from.

That's because the school's chefs have taken steps to make the Torvian Dining Hall better for the students' diets, the environment and the local community.

The initiatives were launched after Executive Chef Terry McMullen and Executive Sous Chef Michael Passanita attended a conference that introduced them to local producers and products, as well as new preparation techniques for incorporating more fresh, local foods into their menus. Now, students can ask the name of the man who grows the lettuce in their salad or the potatoes from which their fries were made, and the chefs can tell them.

"It's important to know where your food is coming from, from a health standpoint," Passanita said about the benefits of buying local. "It helps the community, it helps out the farmer and our quality is much better here."

McMullen said local produce also has a cheaper pricetag, which could sometimes come out to a 50-cent difference in just one head of lettuce.

"When we buy from our local farmer, it's cheaper and we know it's a good product," he said. "It comes in fresh, too, which is great."

Though they are only buying local vegetables right now, the chefs hope to eventually switch to local, grass-fed beef so that they may use healthier cuts of meat for students. This would advance their hopes of someday having everything they serve to students be of the freshest and healthiest quality.

"With them shooting [the cows] up with steroids and hormones and all that stuff, its part of the problem that we're facing with obesity, diabetes and all that," Passanita said. "I just feel like if we can get back to the basics of how food should be raised and grown, it's going to help overall."

So they can have fresh, local produce year-round, the chefs are also looking into providers like Snow Country Farms in Belsano. The farm grows lettuce using hydroponic technology, a method using water and nutrients to grow produce instead of growing them in soil. Because there is no soil contamination and no pesticides or herbicides used, owner Lance Weand said, the Bibb lettuce he grows is healthier, more nutritious and keeps fresh for longer.

He added that having buyers like the chefs at St. Francis saves the farm transportation costs.

"At the same time, it benefits the local community," Weand said. "They're guaranteed a much safer and fresher product."

Unlike most venues that regularly cook for hundreds of people, the chefs at Torvian are focused on providing healthy, fresh and unique options to enhance their students' dining experience.

The soup you find in the dining hall is now made from scratch. The fries, chips and pickles are all made by hand in the kitchen. Those same hands bread chicken and fish and smoke other meats.

"They're eating better here than they do at home sometimes," said Amanda Drumm, assistant marketing director for St. Francis.

The students certainly don't seem to disagree.

Kevin Douds, a 21-year-old senior at St. Francis, said he notices more variety in what's being served now compared to what was available in his freshman year. He said there are better specials and more ethnic food.

Bryelle Quirin, a 20-year-old sophomore from Altoona, also said she likes the new variety.

"There are new options [of foods] that I'd never heard of before," she said.

Devon Courtney, a 19-year-old sophomore, said there are many more healthy options, including more options in the salad bar, frozen yogurt instead of ice cream and a superior fresh fruit supply.

"Sometimes last year they would run out [of fruit] or it would go bad," she said.

Beyond going green in the kitchen, Torvian Dining Hall also got rid of trays as a way to cut down on potential wasted food, as well as the threat of gaining the "freshman 15." Now, students have to get up to carry multiple plates of food to their tables instead of loading up lunch trays. The chefs said losing the trays cut out about 200 pounds of waste in just one meal.

"They have bigger eyes than they do stomachs," said Passanita. "They go and they say they're 'having that pizza,' and 'those sandwiches look great' - then they get a bowl of soup and a dessert. They eat half of it and the rest is going in the trash, so I think it was a great call to go trayless. You don't have to wash them, which helps the environment that way, and it helps [the students] watch their figures."

Along with recycling everything from cardboard and coffee grounds to donating fryer oil to biofuel production, Passanita said all of these green efforts don't really make the job any harder.

"We do what we need to do to make the environment better, and it's worth it," he said.

McMullen said other colleges, big or small, could look into similar initiatives.

"If other colleges were doing what we're doing, the price of this stuff would come down, I'm sure," he said.



View original article here
Push For Fresh Food Makes its Way Into St. Francis University Dining Hall
Altoona Mirror

LORETTO - Students at St. Francis University now know where their food comes from.

That's because the school's chefs have taken steps to make the Torvian Dining Hall better for the students' diets, the environment and the local community.

The initiatives were launched after Executive Chef Terry McMullen and Executive Sous Chef Michael Passanita attended a conference that introduced them to local producers and products, as well as new preparation techniques for incorporating more fresh, local foods into their menus. Now, students can ask the name of the man who grows the lettuce in their salad or the potatoes from which their fries were made, and the chefs can tell them.

"It's important to know where your food is coming from, from a health standpoint," Passanita said about the benefits of buying local. "It helps the community, it helps out the farmer and our quality is much better here."

McMullen said local produce also has a cheaper pricetag, which could sometimes come out to a 50-cent difference in just one head of lettuce.

"When we buy from our local farmer, it's cheaper and we know it's a good product," he said. "It comes in fresh, too, which is great."

Though they are only buying local vegetables right now, the chefs hope to eventually switch to local, grass-fed beef so that they may use healthier cuts of meat for students. This would advance their hopes of someday having everything they serve to students be of the freshest and healthiest quality.

"With them shooting [the cows] up with steroids and hormones and all that stuff, its part of the problem that we're facing with obesity, diabetes and all that," Passanita said. "I just feel like if we can get back to the basics of how food should be raised and grown, it's going to help overall."

So they can have fresh, local produce year-round, the chefs are also looking into providers like Snow Country Farms in Belsano. The farm grows lettuce using hydroponic technology, a method using water and nutrients to grow produce instead of growing them in soil. Because there is no soil contamination and no pesticides or herbicides used, owner Lance Weand said, the Bibb lettuce he grows is healthier, more nutritious and keeps fresh for longer.

He added that having buyers like the chefs at St. Francis saves the farm transportation costs.

"At the same time, it benefits the local community," Weand said. "They're guaranteed a much safer and fresher product."

Unlike most venues that regularly cook for hundreds of people, the chefs at Torvian are focused on providing healthy, fresh and unique options to enhance their students' dining experience.

The soup you find in the dining hall is now made from scratch. The fries, chips and pickles are all made by hand in the kitchen. Those same hands bread chicken and fish and smoke other meats.

"They're eating better here than they do at home sometimes," said Amanda Drumm, assistant marketing director for St. Francis.

The students certainly don't seem to disagree.

Kevin Douds, a 21-year-old senior at St. Francis, said he notices more variety in what's being served now compared to what was available in his freshman year. He said there are better specials and more ethnic food.

Bryelle Quirin, a 20-year-old sophomore from Altoona, also said she likes the new variety.

"There are new options [of foods] that I'd never heard of before," she said.

Devon Courtney, a 19-year-old sophomore, said there are many more healthy options, including more options in the salad bar, frozen yogurt instead of ice cream and a superior fresh fruit supply.

"Sometimes last year they would run out [of fruit] or it would go bad," she said.

Beyond going green in the kitchen, Torvian Dining Hall also got rid of trays as a way to cut down on potential wasted food, as well as the threat of gaining the "freshman 15." Now, students have to get up to carry multiple plates of food to their tables instead of loading up lunch trays. The chefs said losing the trays cut out about 200 pounds of waste in just one meal.

"They have bigger eyes than they do stomachs," said Passanita. "They go and they say they're 'having that pizza,' and 'those sandwiches look great' - then they get a bowl of soup and a dessert. They eat half of it and the rest is going in the trash, so I think it was a great call to go trayless. You don't have to wash them, which helps the environment that way, and it helps [the students] watch their figures."

Along with recycling everything from cardboard and coffee grounds to donating fryer oil to biofuel production, Passanita said all of these green efforts don't really make the job any harder.

"We do what we need to do to make the environment better, and it's worth it," he said.

McMullen said other colleges, big or small, could look into similar initiatives.

"If other colleges were doing what we're doing, the price of this stuff would come down, I'm sure," he said.



View original article here