“The times they are a changin’,” sang Bob Dylan. Indeed they are, and it’s no different at Canadian institutions where food — historically tasteless and uninspired — has been refreshed. The bland meals have been replaced with quality dishes, a new paradigm and heaps of passion as non-traditional foodservice operators feed diners at hospitals and universities a local-food mandate. It’s about growing vegetables, preserving and canning them for off-season, instituting local food days and offering special dietary options.
But, it’s been an upward climb to success. “Ask your friends about hospital food,” begins Anne Marie Males, vice-president, Patient Experience, The Scarborough Hospital – General Campus (TSHGC), in Toronto. “People liken it to airline food; it doesn’t have the greatest reputation. People make jokes about hospital food,” says the champion of from-scratch cooking who’s creating a TSHGC food program based on simple food with a modern twist. It’s meant changing the seven-day menu cycle and reducing what was 40-per-cent patient food waste. “We had the seven-day cycle, because we were relying so much on frozen foods that it allowed us to make the same meal day in, day out, year in, year out and control the costs,” says Males, who spends as little as $6.50 per patient, per day. “It [didn’t] allow us to add fresh produce, which was the major problem with that approach.”
The new approach wasn’t without its hiccups either; it spurred changes with kitchen equipment. “Our gas-fired cooking line was replaced; we have new steam kettles, we’ve got a range with eight burners — we’re now able to do small sauce preparation,” says Susan Bull, manager of Nutrition and Foodservices for TSHGC. “We’ve eliminated an old conveyor line used to do tray assembly and replaced it with efficient B-Lean pods from the Burlodge company,” explains Bull. The pod system frees up staff to prep food. “Every bit of time we save through the pods, we reinvest in production,” Males adds. It’s that redistribution of labour that made it possible for TSHGC to swap frozen food for fresh food. “We used to have one cook who came in and did the prep for the food we were going to put on the belt line,” says Males. “With pod assembly we can easily deal with different orders; we don’t have to do every tray the same.”
In TSHGC’s case that means focusing on fresh comfort foods. For example, instead of buying frozen lasagna, it will be made fresh; even the chicken stock is being made and banana bread is being baked. “We’ll be bringing in roast beef — we haven’t done that for years. We’ll bring in turkeys, [but] we won’t be using the rolled turkey breasts,” says Bull, of the new program that will also include vegetarian and ethnic options.
Cooking from scratch sounds good, but it’s a huge undertaking at institutions. Just ask Barry Telford, senior VP, Education and Healthcare, at the Burlington, Ont.-based Sodexo contract-catering company. Usually, re-therming food is a big part of cooking for large groups, but, the senior vp isn’t a fan of re-thermalization, which can result in “a poor product.” So, it’s not surprising that Males has also moved away from re-therming at TSHGC, but her issue with the cooking technique differs from Telford’s point-of-view. “The issue is most people who are re-therming are buying food in large bags. How you heat it up isn’t the issue, it’s the quality going in that varies greatly.”
Like many, Telford believes fresh is best. “[At Sodexo] food is prepared onsite by certified Red Seal chefs who use fresh ingredients. The advantage of cooking from scratch is we have flexibility and complete control of our recipes,” says Telford. “For example, we can control the sodium content of our food.” At many Sodexo client locations ‘just-in-time’ cooking means each meal is cooked à la minute. “Your pasta, for example, is cooked right in front of you,” says Katherine Power, vice-president of Communications, Sodexo Canada. “At Brock University you feel like you’re going through a market,” she adds, offering a client example.
Institutional cooking has earned a new reputation, but it takes a lot of effort to realize change. “We’re constantly working with manufacturers to create new products and working with our culinary team to create recipes that are tasty, diverse and acceptable,” says Anne Marie MacKinnon, director, National Food and Nutrition Operations Excellence at Aramark, which provides foodservice to more than 50 Canadian school campuses and 200 healthcare operations. Part of the culinary inspiration at Aramark came when chef John Cirillo was hired as a contract consultant. “John understood our needs and patient expectations. His culinary expertise has inspired us to put some pride back into hospital food.” His chef-inspired recipes will soon enter the testing phase as the Aramark team seeks patient feedback.
The institutional foodservice story isn’t much different at McGill University in Montreal where local food, cooked simply is the mandate, too. “Montreal is a food city,” says Mathieu Laperle, director, Food and Hospitality Services, McGill. “So we wanted to create the flavour of Montreal on campus.” And, the answer was a lot closer than one might think; in fact, it was across the field on the university’s 191-year-old farm, which had never supplied food to the school’s foodservice program. That changed when Laperle took the reins with the help of his new executive chef, Oliver de Volpi. “We started from zero; the first year we bought more than 5,000 lbs.; three years later, it’s now more than 45,000 lbs.,” says Laperle. “We have to be realistic; it’s not a five-star hotel. The clientele is not sophisticated like a fine-dining restaurant.” He adds: “We have to be careful with costs — the department is a self-financing unit, so we make sure our [prices] pay for expenses.” Laperle’s food cost averages 36 to 38 per cent, while the food from local suppliers costs close to 50 per cent, depending on the season.
It’s tough, but McGill is already reaping the benefits. Now the new food program is supporting the campus, student research, employment and McGill’s reputation. “We have 2,500 students a day, [eating] three times per day; that’s a lot of cooking — a big operation,” Laperle says. “Just imagine, with the staff and professors, we’re talking between 42,000 and 45,000 people. So, if 45,000 people start buying a coffee per week — the potential is amazing.”
The potential profit is equally inspiring at the University of Guelph in Ontario, where the home-grown theme continues. “We try and showcase all local food. Even things like the University of Guelph honey we use exclusively on campus — it’s from the apiary here. We use that across campus, too,” says Mark Kenny, purchasing co-ordinator, Hospitality Services, University of Guelph. “We try to buy as much local product as we can. Right now our produce is about 45-per-cent local. I can tell you exactly what items come from within a hundred miles of the campus. Things like grape tomatoes and peppers and cucumbers … things we put into our salad bar,” says Kenny. “Our students, faculty and staff have voted with their forks for our support of local food on campus.” He adds: “The quantity of local and regional food we purchase each year continues to increase and many positive comments from students pop up on a weekly basis.”
“It has come a long way,” says Sodexo’s Telford, speaking of institutional food, which continues to evolve. “We’ve landed a model that works for the client and is tasty and nutritious for the customer.” Today, Sodexo provides fresh foods prepared on site by Red Seal chefs, and there’s a plan to focus on sustainability and wellness. “For our Expressly-For-You program, we order food from approved suppliers with [a] focus on buying locally produced products. It’s delivered to our kitchen, cooked fresh daily on site and plated and delivered hot.”
Non-traditional foodservice is transforming as local, quality food sourced and prepared sustainably becomes the norm. But, it’s going to take continued effort and a shift in people’s beliefs to effect permanent change. “I hope we’re moving to a place where good food in a hospital becomes an expectation not an oddity,” says Males. “That’s my hope — and with the whole-food movement and the slow-food movement building steam, I’d love to see that happen.”
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