46 D e l i c i o u s L i v i n g S E P T E M B E R 0 5 D e l i c i o u s L i v i n g M a g . c o m 47

AN organicI never eat airplane food. Instead, I stock up on snacks at

the local natural foods store to tide me over until I reach my

destination. When I’m too rushed to go shopping first, I subsist

mostly on water and dream of my favorite quinoa salad.

I know I’m not the only one with this kind of dream—

and these days, that dream isn’t out of reach. Passengers

on Song Airlines, Delta’s low-fare air service, can now savor

organic salads and yogurt while airborne. And freshorganic food is beginning to curryfavor in mainstream institutions on the ground as well. Schools, hospitals,corporations, and restaurants nationwide are all exploring

organic options. Many would say it’s about time.

changeWhy some school districts, hospitals, corporations,

and even airlines are realizing the benefitof providing healthier food

!

B Y M A J K A B U R H A R D T

AN organic

PHO

TO:

LEFT

, CO

URT

ESY

OF

MAR

IN F

OO

D S

YSTE

MS

PRO

JECT

; RI

GH

T, B

URK

E/TR

IOLO

PRO

DU

CTIO

NS/

GET

TY I

MAG

ES

More than 40 percent of the U.S. pop-ulation uses organic products, accordingto the Organic Trade Association (OTA),and 73 percent of shoppers say their pri-mary grocery store carries them. “If peo-ple like the taste of organic products,they’re starting to look for that same tasteexperience outside the home,” says HollyGivens, the OTA’s communications direc-tor. “We’ve heard about more conveniencestores carrying organic products and base-ball stadiums looking into it.” Over thenext few years, Givens says she wouldn’t besurprised if we see a lot more organicproducts in unexpected places.

Achieving change in large institutionscertainly is not without challenges. Afterall, the mass-produced fare traditionallyserved up in hospitals and school cafete-rias is far from healthy or haute cuisine,and budgets are often a factor. But, as evi-denced by the popularity of the recent anti-fast-food documentary Super Size Me—aswell as initiatives banning soft-drink salesand more in school districts from Seattle toPhiladelphia—there’s widespread interestin turning this tide. After all, if anyoneshould be eating nutritious food, shouldn’tit be young children and sick people?

Across the country, enlightened par-ents, administrators, and managers are

working to bring healthier, fresher, moresustainable food to the people. Read onfor inspiring tales from the front lines ofthe organic revolution.

SchoolsGary Hirshberg, president of StonyfieldFarm and father of three, was appalledwhen his then 13-year-old son camehome one day and told him what he’d hadfor lunch: “Pizza, Skittles, and chocolatemilk.” Although served mostly organicfood at home, his kids were surroundedby junk food at school. Soon after,Hirshberg devised Stonyfield Farm’sHealthy Vending Machine.

With 32 machines now in Massachusetts,Illinois, Washington, Rhode Island, andCalifornia schools, students can choosenatural and organic food items rangingfrom yogurt and energy bars to pita chipsand fruit leather. Each school’s studentstaste-test products to customize the con-tents and use Stonyfield-provided fundsto create T-shirts and posters promotingthe healthy eats.

Run as a nonprofit, the program pro-vides the machines for free and asks ven-dors to discount items; profits go directlyto the schools. Although they typicallybring in about half the revenue of a tradi-

An organic change

48 D e l i c i o u s L i v i n g S E P T E M B E R 0 5

tional soft-drink machine, the healthymachines are outperforming expecta-tions. There’s currently a 940-plus schoolwaiting list for Stonyfield’s machines, andeven the U.S. Department of Agriculturehas expressed interest in getting one forits national headquarters.

Bringing healthy food into school cafeterias is an even bigger project, butseveral districts nationwide, particularly inCalifornia, are making progress. Perhapsbest known is Berkeley’s School LunchInitiative, serving the district’s nearly9,000 students. Inspired by Chez Panissefounder Alice Waters’ decade-old EdibleSchoolyard program, the newly adoptedinitiative not only provides healthylunches but is also developing a curricu-lum that demonstrates food’s critical rolein everything from history to science.Berkeley hopes schools nationwide willadopt the new curriculum. (One promis-ing sign: This summer, students inWashington, D.C., helped plant an EdibleSchoolyard on the National Mall.)

Across the bay in Marin County, morethan 6,800 public school students are noweating organic, thanks to Marin Organicand partner organization Marin FoodSystems Project. Acting as liaison betweenlocal organic farmers and schools, Marin !

An organic change

Eating enthusiasm: (Left) Students at Caruso Middle School in Chicago use Stonyfield Farm–provided funds to promote healthy vending machines that offeryogurt, energy bars, pita chips, and more. (Right) A healthy cafeteria tray from the Farm to School program.

Find out how to bring organics to your schoolFor more information, check out:

>> Stonyfield Farm’s Healthy Vending Machine:www.stonyfield.com/menuforchange

>> Farm to School program: www.farmtoschool.org>> Rethinking School Lunch: www.ecoliteracy.org/programs/rsl.html>> Edible Schoolyard: www.edibleschoolyard.org/howto.html –M.B.

PHOT

OS: T

OP R

IGHT

, CEN

TER

FOR

FOOD

AND

JUS

TICE

, OCC

IDEN

TAL

COLL

EGE,

AND

THE

COM

PTON

UNI

FIED

SCH

OOL

DIST

RICT

50 D e l i c i o u s L i v i n g S E P T E M B E R 0 5

Organic arranges for schools to receive“gleaned” produce (fruits and vegetablesthat would otherwise rot in the fieldbecause of slight cosmetic blemishes) forfree; schools purchase the remaining 40 per-cent to 60 percent. “Before the programlaunched late last year, 30 percent of the stu-dents purchased school lunches,” says Helge

Hellberg, Marin Organic’s executive direc-tor. “That number has already increased,generating more revenue for the schools.”

Further south in the lower-incomearea of Compton, Tracie Thomas has alsoseen a spike in her students’ interest infresh produce. During the past two years,the assistant director of nutrition servicesfor the Compton Unified School Districthas introduced salad bars at 24 elementaryschools. She estimates that about half thestudents—who normally have little accessto fresh produce—are now eating fruitsand vegetables from the salad bars.Students at one school even launched apetition in fall 2004 when they thoughttheir salad bar had been taken away. (Itwas just on temporary hold.)

The Compton program serves as amodel for the nationwide Farm to Schoolprogram, a partly government-fundedgroup that helps link schools to local, sus-tainable, and organic farms. The pro-gram—which also helps teachers integratefood and farming topics into lessonplans—is more than 400 school districtsstrong, and growing.

By college level, it’s generally the stu-dents themselves who are demandingchange. Yale University’s Sustainable FoodProject was spearheaded in 2001 byWaters, whose daughter, Fanny, was afreshman at the time. Today, produce fromthe student-run organic garden is sold at alocal farmers’ market, and organic milk,fruit, and grass-fed beef are offered cam-puswide. Princeton University, ReedCollege in Oregon, and Colorado Collegealso serve organic foods, and students atthe University of Wisconsin at Madisonrecently forced a switch to 100 percentorganic beef burgers.

Hospitals After educational institutions, U.S. hospi-tals buy the greatest amount of cateredfood: about $3.3 billion worth in 2004.Unfortunately, our health care institutionsoften serve food that’s unappetizing, mini-mally nutritious, or both. The irony doesnot escape Sara Gragnolati. As director ofmarketing for ADinfinitum, a NewYork–based group that’s part of theAlliance for Healthy Hospital Food,Gragnolati is spearheading a study of thestate of the nation’s hospital food. AfterA chef brings organics to summer camp

The Painted Turtle, a Hole in the Wall Gang Camp (founded by Paul Newman),

is a special place for children with life-threatening diseases. Opened in 2004 in

Lake Hughes, California, the camp’s mission is to inspire these children to reach

beyond illness to become their greater selves, by allowing them to have an

authentic camp experience while supporting their medical needs.

I spent that first summer season as the executive chef, creating the daily

meal program and serving healthy, organic, and great-tasting dishes that

children love and expect to eat in a camp setting. Working with the camp’s

medical director, Wendy Cook, I lowered the fats and sugars of traditional

favorites and created tempting menus for children who required special diets.

All this was done with organic ingredients.

I am proud that the Painted Turtle is probably the only camp in the world

that served organic, homemade cream puffs. Also popular wereorganic spaghetti, hot dogs with oven fries, garlic broccoli, chili andcorn bread, watermelon, and the weekly banana-split bar. It wasthe largest amount of food I have ever cooked, day after day. I loved the chance

to bring comforting organic food to these children who wanted so much to be

healthy. Since that inaugural summer, the Painted Turtle has established a menu

with healthy culinary standards that will function for many years.To learn more,

visit www.thepaintedturtle.org. –Donna Prizgintas

PHOT

O: B

OTTO

M, J

OHN

JOYN

ER

Healthy hospital food? The next hurdle.

The chef at work.

!

An organic change

Yahoo!, Oracle, Nordstrom, AdidasAmerica, the Seattle Art Museum, theGetty Center, the Massachusetts Instituteof Technology, American University, andthe catering operations at SBC Park,home to the San Francisco Giants.Companywide initiatives include buyingingredients directly from farmers withina 150-mile radius; purchasing seafoodaccording to Seafood Watch guidelines;buying only antibiotic-free chicken; andtraining all chefs and cooks to under-stand why local and organic food benefitshuman and planetary health.

Bringing the change to you Few of us are fortunate enough to laborfor employers with the foresight—anddeep pockets—to sponsor such nutritious,delicious fare. But more and more, you’llfind fresh, organic food in surprisingplaces: from catered vegetarian menus atweddings to Coleman all-natural beef atGood Times Burgers & Frozen Custard, aColorado-based fast-food chain. Want tobe pleasantly surprised more often? Startwriting letters to your local school boards,hospitals, and government representa-tives—and then give a nudge to yourfavorite restaurants and food service com-panies. Heck, you can even try your boss. "

Although the Oakland market’s pro-duce hasn’t yet made it into the hospital’skitchens, an onsite market does supply thesalad bar at the Kaiser Permanente inPortland, Oregon. The health organizationhas put together a steering committee tolook at the issue programwide; in themeantime, it hosts 22 markets nationwide,and plans to open more this year.

What’s the next step? Maring wouldlike to see farmers’ markets spread wher-ever people gather and work. “We need tobring markets to where the workers are,”he says. “Why not a market onsite at a fac-tory during shift changes?”

CorporationsIt’s hard to imagine a meal at the typicalcorporate dining hall inspiring fan mail.But it’s not uncommon for clients of BonAppétit Management Company, a PaloAlto–based food service provider that’scommitted to using local, sustainableingredients. At TBWA\Chiat\Day advertis-ing agency in Los Angeles, an employeerecovering from a cold wrote to BonAppétit chef Lisa Kurth, “The soup wasamazing. Not just because it really didmake me feel better (just like Grandma’s),but it tasted fantastic. With every bite youhad me carefully studying the flavors andtrying to figure out what was in it.”

Founded in 1987 by a devotee ofItaly’s Slow Food movement, Bon Appétitruns more than 190 cafés across thecountry; clients include Cisco Systems,

An organic change

52 D e l i c i o u s L i v i n g S E P T E M B E R 0 5

Organics to the people: (Left) Preston Maring, MD, with wee shoppers at Kaiser Permanente’s Oakland farmers’ market. (Right) Even corporate dining rooms are serving local and organic fare.

Turn to page 56 to find recipes for chef Donna Prizgintas’ favorite late-summer dishes,made with fresh, organic produce.

analyzing recipes for the healthiest optionon 28 hospital menus, she reports, “Themean fiber content was 1 gram, whichwon’t help a lot toward the RDA of 25grams. And several of the meals had a fullsupply of the recommended daily sodiumintake.” She adds, “Hospitals should takethe lead for healthy food.”

Some are trying. The Cleveland Clinicin Ohio recently booted a Pizza Hut fromits premises. In Iowa, Bartels LutheranRetirement Community buys antibiotic-and hormone-free beef, and it spent 14percent of its 2003 food budget locally.

Kaiser Permanente, the largest U.S.nonprofit health organization, startedhosting farmers’ markets in 2003 as a wayto bring fresh produce to staff, patients,visitors, and community members.Preston Maring, MD, associate physician-in-chief at Kaiser Permanente’s OaklandMedical Center, helped launch the firstmarket—now a year-round, 100 percentorganic Friday event. He also e-mails aweekly healthy recipe to nearly 5,000 peo-ple. Offering anecdotal evidence as to themarket’s impact on his hospital, he says,“Some people have noticed employeemorale has improved since the marketsbegan, and we suspect the recent declinein sick leave on Fridays has a direct corre-lation.” Laughing, he adds, “Colleaguesstop me in the hallway to talk aboutroasted asparagus with feta.” He alsoreports that many patients try to scheduleappointments on market days. PHO

TO: L

EFT,

KAI

SER

PERM

ANEN

TE