{"id":1658,"date":"2011-03-05T14:13:09","date_gmt":"2011-03-05T19:13:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/?p=1658"},"modified":"2012-03-14T14:55:47","modified_gmt":"2012-03-14T18:55:47","slug":"feeding-dickinson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/feeding-dickinson\/","title":{"rendered":"Feeding Dickinson"},"content":{"rendered":"

Feeding Dickinson<\/a>
\nDickinson Website
\nBy MaryAlice Bitts
\nPhotos by Carl Socolow ’77<\/p>\n

Ask ten people to describe the perfect meal, and you\u2019ll likely receive ten different answers. How, then, does Dickinson’s dining-services staff\u00a0manage to feed so many people every day, each with individual tastes and dietary needs?<\/p>\n

Some of the folks who make that happen offered answers during a March 8 panel discussion, Feeding Dickinson.<\/p>\n

Panelists Jennifer Halpin, director of the Dickinson College Farm; Keith Martin, director of dining services; Jay Myers of Feeser\u2019s Inc.; Scott Wagner of John Gross & Co.; and Ben Riggs \u201986 of Four Seasons Produce Distributors\u00a0discussed the challenges inherent to planning, coordinating, preparing and serving thousands of meals each day for students and employees.<\/p>\n

Martin noted that\u00a0planning and timing are\u00a0key to\u00a0preparing food in mass quantities and\u2014serving\u00a0all of those entrees, side dishes and desserts at the\u00a0desired temperatures. The biggest challenge, however, lies in the menu-planning process, as staff works to create varied, nutritious meals that are both palatable to a large, diverse population and<\/em> meet\u00a0individuals’ expressed special-diet needs and preferences.<\/p>\n

To meet these diverse needs, the\u00a0Dining Hall has more than 20\u00a0stations<\/span><\/a>, including the Local Produce Stand,\u00a0The Kove (certified-kosher and vegan), the whole-grain bar, Wok bar, local-produce stand, panini station\u00a0and carving station. Dining Services also runs\u00a0four snack bars on campus and caters\u00a0many special events throughout the year, including\u00a0the annual Holiday Banquet<\/span><\/a>. And, as Halpin noted,\u00a0the certified-organic<\/span><\/a> Dickinson College Farm and Dining Services work together to incorporate fresh, organic College Farm food into the Dickinson diet; Dining\u00a0Services also uses other local food vendors whenever possible and observes sustainable practices such as composting.<\/p>\n

Clearly, Dining Services\u00a0staff has a lot on its plate (yes, pun intended).\u00a0However, Martin stressed,\u00a0feeding Dickinson well is not only an important task, but also a labor of love.\u00a0\u201cMy mantra is, \u2018This isn’t food. It’s life,\u2019 \u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Feeding Dickinson Dickinson Website By MaryAlice Bitts Photos by Carl Socolow ’77 Ask ten people to describe the perfect meal, and you\u2019ll likely receive ten different answers. How, then, does Dickinson’s dining-services staff\u00a0manage to feed so many people every day,… Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1256,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44383],"tags":[44404,22061,22064],"class_list":["post-1658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-press","tag-center-for-sustainability-education","tag-dickinson-college-farm","tag-sustainable-agriculture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1256"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1658\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/farm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}