University of Utah to serve ‘real food’

On a slow summer day at the University of Utah's athlete dining hall, executive chef Peter Hodgson labored over a bit of beef.

With grill marks just so, Hodgson served filet mignon with Muir Copper Canyon Farms microgreens and mushroom sauce to Jeff Rudy, the U.'s football-operations director.

By 2020, the school has pledged to have such fresh, local meals — if homelier ones — for anyone eating in campus cafeterias or sandwich joints, not just athletes and their coaches.

Twenty cents of every dollar in the school's dining budget, President David Pershing and his staff vowed, will go to "real food."

"They're definitely aware that this is a generational shift," said David Schwartz, campaign director for the Boston-based Real Food Challenge, "not just a momentary blip on the radar screen."

U. administrators announced the pledge a few months ago, heeding national calls from student advocates.

And the school is making progress. But real food is a big bite.

This year, the U. spent $2 million on food and drinks alone. With roughly 30,000 students, Utah's flagship university is the largest school to join the challenge so far. Even so, Schwartz noted, the commuter school pays less to feed students than other state schools such as the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Joining the challenge is a matter of school leaders doing "due diligence" for roughly 2,200 U. students with meal plans and up to 8,000 others buying coffee and meals on campus each day, said Reggie Conerly, dining services director. Students in the U. chapter of the national group credit Conerly for leading the push.

The definition of "real food" is somewhat slippery. To qualify, ingredients must fit at least one of the following criteria: They must be local, meaning they travel less than 150 miles. They must be "fair," meaning workers are paid livable wages. They must be ecologically sound, or in other words, organic. And they have to be humanely raised, such as cage-free chickens or pastured cows.