On February 1st in New York, ET, the Good Food team and Adam Millman, the Head of Food and Beverage at Yale University continued to discuss about the next two weeks ‘agenda. The five famous universities to be visited are Yale University, Harvard University, the Culinary Institute of America, University of Massachusetts and University of Connecticut.

In line with the sustainable food dialogue created by the Good Food New Year's feast, the partners from the five universities tried to consider environmentally friendly and carbon reduction options while choosing ingredients.

Winter is cold in Connecticut, where Yale is located. Only about nine months of the year is suitable for planting here. In the words of Yale friends, "if you insist on finding Local and Seasonal food, New Haven (the city where Yale is located) produces nothing but snow in the winter."

Choosing an 85% plant-based diet for the 2019 New Year feast is a big challenge for a Chinese New Year feast. Because Chinese New Year’s Eve dinner is more and more inclined to be a meat-based, high oil and fat diet, neither healthy nor environmental protection. We invited seven top chefs to create New Year's menus with more than 85% plant ingredients from a healthy and futuristic perspective. 85% is the proportion of plant dishes in the entire Yale dining room.

As the principal of Culinary Institute of America(CIA)-a premier college in the cuisine field of America and the youngest master chef in American history, Dr. Tim Ryan said in 2018 at the invitation of the Good Food Fund in Yale Center Beijing and Peking University, all scientific evidence (environmental science, nutrition and food security research, etc.) points to one direction: human must increase plant-based diets a lot.

Under this idea, the Culinary Institute of America and the Public Health School of Harvard University launched Changed Menu together to promote plant-based diets in universities and restaurants across the US.

The initiative has been successful. Yale pledges to double the plant-based diet on campus between 2010 and 2020. More than 100 top U.S. (global) universities, including Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, MIT, etc. have joined the initiative.

Dr. Lane, one of the most influential people in American cuisine, also noted that the world's top chefs he knows are using their best talents to develop plant-based dishes to replace traditional meat-based diets. The new trend of food culture is unstoppable.

There are two days for the event at Harvard. There is a lunch and conversation with the Dean of the Public Health School of Harvard and the Head of the Department of Nutrition on the first day.

Dr Walter Willett, the former Head of Nutrition Department at Harvard, is said to be the world's "most quoted scientist" (in all fields of science, not just nutrition). He is a strong supporter for plant-based initiatives. His research shows that a major shift in plant-based diets is quite necessary to promote public health. As a grandfather of two, he called for the change for environmental issues for young generation to live on this planet, which is more urgent than nutrition issue.

We didn’t choose a 100% plant-based menu for Good Food's 2019 New Year Feast. 15% of animal protein is present in addition to 85% of plant-based dishes, which provides a window for dialogue on we can do better with animal protein.

Good Food Fund needs to lead the public to consider the following aspects when making choices: plants leading, animal welfare and ecological agriculture. Each university of the five has its own advantages.

Yale university is good at research on environmental science and sustainable development. Public health and nutrition at Harvard are influential. The Culinary Institute of America is unquestionably a pantheon in culinary institutions.

You may be familiar with the famous universities mentioned above. Many of you may not know the University of Massachusetts, one of the five universities in this activity,

The restaurant of University of Massachusetts ranks as the nation's top restaurant, ahead of Yale, Harvard and Stanford.

The Department of Food Science at the University of Massachusetts is number one in the United States.

Professor Decker, head of the Department of Food Science at the University of Massachusetts, who will join the Good Food dialogue, is one of the world's most cited leading scientists in the field of agriculture/food and an expert in the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Decker is very professional in food oils, as well as omega-3s, antioxidants, the relation between cardiovascular health and Carotenoids, etc. and how to incorporate them into foods.

Adam Millman, Supervisor of Yale Food and Beverage said that Yale News reported on the upcoming Good Food event over dinner. As a result, more than 600 Yale students signed up for the Good Food Feast on New Year's Eve within 2-3 hours and the number had exceeded 1000 today. There are only more than 200 seats. These seats are reserved for the school's top management, professors, Yale alumni, etc. So many students are on the waiting list. Everyone is looking forward to the feast.

That's all for today. Several Good Food chefs, journalists and entrepreneurs have flown to New York from Beijing, Shanghai, Xiamen and Fuzhou and will arrive at noon or in the afternoon on February 2, ET.

(Photo credit: CBCGDF Good Food Fund)

Original Chinese article:

http://www.cbcgdf.org/NewsShow/5023/7499.html

By / Cynthia