Stanford Pitches Sustainability

FM Staff

Stanford University Dining recently conducted The Eat Local Celebration, a week long sustainable food awareness campaign. It featured a series of dinner events highlighting the local and seasonal foods that are purchased from surrounding farms, ranches and fisheries and served in Stanford Dining facilities across campus.

Throughout the week, each residential dining hall hosted a different Eat Local event with special menus and appearances from area farmers, ranchers and fishermen. More than 300 students visited the Eat Local booth to meet the special guests, taste the local foods that they provide to campus and get educational information. There were also giveaways, raffles, interactive games and prizes.

The Eat Local Celebration was planned by Stanford Dining's Sustainable Foods Coordinator Emmett Hopkins with the support of Stanford's residential dining managers. "We were excited that so many students showed such a genuine interest in learning about local foods," says Hopkins. "Meeting the guest food producers and sampling their food were the highlights of the week."

Currently, about 40 percent is of the food served by Stanford Dining is purchased from local farmers, says Executive Director Rafi Taherian. With the success of the inaugural event, Stanford Dining aims to make the Eat Local Celebration an annual tradition, Taherian adds.