"During the Spring Festival of the Year of the Pig in 2019, a New Year menu - "leads the future"-designed by The Good Food Fund and its seven chefs, was brought to join the co-created Spring Festival dinner with five top universities in the United States, including Yale, Harvard, and the Culinary Institute of America, promoting the exchanges of an international sustainable diet. It is the first time that Chinese chefs have toured the world's top schools. The Good Food Fund will continually report the series of "World New Year Feast," sharing the interaction of cultural food from the East and West and bringing the most cutting-edge, sustainable diet dialogue and an exciting tour of famous schools to you.
February 1 New York, sunny
This is New York City photographed on a civil aviation plane yesterday. Yesterday was the coldest day in New York in 2019. The cold snaps of these two days have caused many deaths, mainly in the Midwestern United States. The five prestigious schools visited this time: Yale, Harvard, Culinary Institute of America, Massachusetts University, and the University of Connecticut, are all around New York. Among them, Connecticut, where Yale is located, is cold in the winter and has only about nine months a year during which it is suitable for planting. Therefore, in the words of Yale partners, if you look for "local seasonal" food, New Haven (Yale city) will only produce a lot of snow in the winter.
Note: To welcome the Good Food Delegation, including seven food chefs, journalists, and experts, Yale staff prepared this welcome board, shipped it to New York, and placed it at the hotel's door. (However, the Chinese translation is quite interesting)
This tour follows the 85% plant-based diet principle, which is a big challenge for a Chinese New Year's Feast because, in the past decade or two, New Year's Eve dinners have increasingly favored meat and high-fat diets, which are neither healthy nor environmentally friendly. Therefore, focusing on health and the future, we have invited 7 top chefs to design a New Year Feast menu with 85% plant ingredients. And 85% is the proportion of plant dishes that Yale canteen served. The 15% animal-based protein is kept on the menu to discuss an issue: we can do better when consuming animal protein.
Therefore, plant leadership, animal welfare, and ecological agriculture are the three main points that "Good Food" needs to consider when designing diets. Dr. Tim Ryan, the president of Culinary Institute of America (CIA), the youngest master chef in the history of the United States and the youngest president of the American Culinary Association, said at a speech in Yale Beijing Center and Peking University: "All scientific evidence (environmental science, nutrition, food safety research, etc.) points in one direction: Humans must have a considerable increase in plant-based diets.
Note: Dr. Tim Ryan, President of the American Culinary Association
Therefore, the Department of Nutrition at Harvard University and the Harvard School of Public Health jointly launched the "THE MENUS OF CHANGE INITIATIVE" to promote plant-based diets in universities and restaurants throughout the United States. This initiative has seen great results: Yale University has promised to double the plant-based diets on campus between 2010 and 2020. More than 100 top universities in the United States (and at the same time globally), including Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, and MIT, have joined the initiative. Dr. Ryan, famous in the American culinary world, also pointed out that the top chefs he knows are developing plant-based dishes to replace traditional meat-based dining methods. This new food culture trend is unstoppable. This New Year Feast event will last two days at Harvard. On the first day, the Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health and the Department of Nutrition head will have lunch and talk with participants.
Dr. Walter Willett, former head of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard University, is known as the "most cited" scientist in the world (all scientific fields, not just nutrition). His research shows that a substantial change towards plant-based diets must be promoted to improve public health. He is a staunch supporter of the "Plant-based" initiative. And as the grandfather of two children, he is further motivated to call for changes for our younger generation's survival on this planet. It's more urgent to change the catering structure for the environment than nutrition transformation.
Note: Dr. Walter Willett, former head of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard University
The universities that we visited this time have their advantages. Yale University has outstanding research on environmental science and sustainable development issues. And Harvard University's public health and nutrition majors have a more significant influence. The Department of Nutrition at Harvard University is undoubtedly the top school in the field of culinary art. You may be more familiar with the universities mentioned above. Still, many people may not know that the University of Massachusetts is also one of the five universities in this area.
1. The canteen of UMass ranks as the first in the United States, higher than Yale, Harvard, and Stanford.
2. The Department of Food Science at the University of Massachusetts ranks first in the United States and is truly a top professional.
3. Professor Decker, the chair of the Department of Food Science of the University of Massachusetts, who is about to attend the Good Food Dialogue, is one of the most cited authoritative scientists in the field of agriculture/food in the world and is also an expert of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
At dinner, Yale Hospitality Director Adam Millman told us that "Yale News" reported our upcoming activities. As a result, the Good Food New Year's Eve dinner had received more than 600 Yale students' applications within 2-3 hours, and until today, more than a thousand. But it's a pity that only 200 seats are available, and still, we need to reserve more seats for senior management, professors, Yale alumni, etc. Before the feast on the evening of Feb.4th, three top chefs from the United States, Africa, and India will speak with the Good Food Fund. Although none of these chefs are vegetarians, they are sparing no effort to promote plant-based diets.
Image source: Yale Hospitality Instagram
At noon on February 2 EST, several good food chefs, journalists, and entrepreneurs from Beijing, Shanghai, Xiamen, and Fuzhou arrived in New York. Next, more exciting parties and Good Food Feasts are coming.
2019.2.1 New York / Jian Yi
