Newspaper Article: Feeding SDA General Conference Attendees

[Guest guest]

That's a lot of broccoli

 

BY JOE BONWICH

Of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch

07/06/2005

 

About 450 round dining tables, each seating 10 people, arranged in a neat grid.

A massive shopping list - perhaps 500 pounds of broccoli, 1,000 pounds of onions

and 1,000 pounds of celery per meal.

 

As the Seventh-day Adventists have found, there's not much time for rest when

you're making and serving more than 150,000 vegetarian meals.

 

With more than 70,000 members meeting in St. Louis - and because the religion

encourages the health benefits of a vegetarian diet - conference organizers have

spent months planning to operate what they call the " largest vegetarian

restaurant in St. Louis. " The venue is two combined, adjoining exhibition halls

at America's Center, 160,000 square feet of floor space covering an entire city

block.

 

The Adventists are here for a General Conference, which is held every five

years. It began June 29 and runs through Saturday.

 

Organizers are serving between 3,500 and 18,000 meals a day; attendees pay $9.99

for each meal.

 

A single, uniform meal - including entree, side dishes and beverage - is served

at each lunch and dinner seating. Most of the entrees are designed to appeal to

a North American palate, said John Walden, who is overseeing the effort.

 

With attendees from more than 200 countries, however, Walden and his crew also

have made specialty items such as a Madras curry and have tried to be sensitive

to the role of rice as a staple in many of the delegates' diets.

 

The reason for his concern was echoed in a comment Wednesday by Marlene

Corentin, a Seventh-day Adventist from Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean

off of Africa.

 

" We would prefer some rice, " she said as she picked up her lunch of vegetarian

Swiss steak, potatoes and carrots. " Each time they feed us, they feed us

American foods. We would prefer rice, African food, Indian food, or a mixture at

least. Perhaps we just need our rice? "

 

In addition to vegetarian entrees made with dairy products and eggs, three of

the entrees prepared during the convention are vegan. Walden said that for the

2010 conference in Atlanta, plans are in place for all meals to be vegan.

 

For a taste of the conference, we tested scaled-down recipes for Broccoli Cheese

Burritos and Asian Vegetarian Chicken Salad, two of the entrees being served to

convention delegates, and adapted them for home use.

 

Other offerings at the conference include Vegetarian Broccoli Walnut Chicken

Stir-Fry, Au Gratin Potatoes and Vegetarian Ham and Vegetarian Chicken

Cacciatore. Most of the entrees use meat substitutes, but Walden said the

recipes would work equally well with real meat.

 

Walden, managing director and president of Achieve Foodservice of Columbia, Mo.,

which specializes the marketing, brokering and distribution of vegetarian foods,

is himself a Seventh-day Adventist. He assembled a team of 30 managers and

workers from Adventist colleges, schools, camps and other institutions.

 

" The team is from across the country, as well as from as far away as Edmonton,

Alberta, and Vancouver, British Columbia, " Walden said. " We've got an average

experience here of about 11 years. " The executive chef is Gary Patterson,

food-service director at Sunnydale Adventist Academy in Centralia, Mo.

 

Walden started surveying industrial-size kitchens more than a year ago,

including public and private schools and colleges, industrial facilities and

even catering companies. " We were really impressed with many of the places we

saw, including Chaminade and St. Louis College of Pharmacy, " he said.

 

He selected Belleville West Junior High because of a reasonably sized cooking

facility, but more so because of the air-conditioned cafeteria space adjoining

the kitchen. That eliminated need to rent refrigerated trucks to store some of

the ingredients. (The cafeteria is used during the summer for an after-school

snack program, but the snacks are brought in, and the students only occupy a

small number of tables.)

 

Starting more than a week ago, the team turned the school cafeteria into the

staging area for production of entrees for the meals. Work on the convention

meals begins promptly each morning at 6 and lasts until 1 a.m.

 

The effort requires a well-choreographed dance of constant work and precise

timing. A menu last week featured Broccoli Cheese Burritos; at midmorning,

various team members were distributed throughout the kitchen, which was no wider

than perhaps 50 feet. A group of vertical carts in the middle of the room was

loaded fully with trays, and each tray was neatly but completely filled with

burritos - 1,000 burritos or more occupying little more floor space than would

be required by two or three people standing next to each other.

 

After the entrees are prepared in Belleville, they're placed in bulk in pans and

loaded onto refrigerated trucks, which can hold between 5,500 and 12,000 meals

apiece. Drivers bring the food to the convention center, where workers reheat

and plate the meals. Levy Restaurants, the caterer for America's Center, adds

side dishes and salads, using a fast-paced, assembly-line approach designed by

the Adventists for previous conferences.

 

As if producing up to 18,000 meals per day wasn't challenging enough, a

boil-water order that affected Belleville forced the team to bring in more than

1,100 gallons of bottled water for food preparation on June 28, the day before

the first meals were served. " That ended up taking between two and three more

hours, which meant that it added more than 100 person-hours to our workday, "

Walden said. The boil order was lifted June 29.

 

The church estimates that half of its members are full-time vegetarians,

although Walden notes that many who eat meat do so only occasionally, eating

vegetarian meals on Saturday, the church's sabbath, and frequently during the

week.

 

" We eat a lot of nuts, grains, fruits and legumes, " Walden said. " Our main

regimen is variety. We try to balance good taste with a thoughtful, well-rounded

approach to our diet. "

 

In fact, the church's manual cites a vegetarianism as a recommendation more than

as a doctrine. It couples that with a responsibility to obtain " optimal levels

of physical, mental, and spiritual health ... (by) the prevention of disease

through effective health education and leadership in promoting optimum health,

free of tobacco, alcohol, other drugs, and unclean foods. "

 

And a long-term study of 34,000 Adventists by Adventist-affiliated Loma Linda

University in California shows that the emphasis on health seems to pay earthly

benefits. According to the study, California Adventist men live 7.3 years longer

than the general California male population, and women live 4.4 years longer

than the general female population. When vegetarian Adventists were separated

out, their life expectancies were 9.5 years longer for men and 6.1 years longer

for women.

 

Participant enrollment for a follow-up study, funded by the National Cancer

Institute, began in 2002 and continues through next year.

 

 

Broccoli Cheese Burritos

Yield: 6 servings.

 

Nonstick cooking spray

6 (10-inch) flour tortillas

1 pound broccoli, coarsely chopped (see note)

1 1/2 to 2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese

1 large tomato, peeled, seeded and finely chopped

3/4 cup finely chopped onion

1 (10-ounce) can enchilada sauce

3/4 cup sour cream, divided

Chopped fresh parsley, for optional garnish

 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Coat a 9-by-13-inch pan with cooking spray.

 

Wrap tortillas tightly in foil; place in the preheating oven until tortillas are

hot, 10 to 15 minutes.

 

Steam broccoli or microwave with a little water until cooked slightly, about 3

minutes. Drain well. In a bowl, stir together broccoli, cheese, tomato and

onion.

 

Spoon about 1 cup broccoli mixture in a strip in the center of each tortilla.

Fold and roll the tortillas around the filling. Place seam-side down in the pan.

Top with enchilada sauce. Cover with foil; bake until heated through, about 25

to 30 minutes.

 

Transfer to plates; top each burrito with 2 tablespoons sour cream and a

sprinkling of parsley.

 

PER SERVING: calories; g fat ( percent calories from fat); g saturated fat; mg

cholesterol; g protein; g carbohydrate; g sugar; g fiber; mg sodium; mg calcium.

 

Note: You can use frozen chopped broccoli; thaw and drain before adding the

other ingredients.

 

 

Asian Vegetarian Chicken Salad

Yield: 4 to 6 servings.

 

3 cups (about 10 ounces) chopped vegetarian chicken or turkey (see tester's

note)

1 1/2 cups snow peas or snap peas, trimmed

1 (8-ounce) can pineapple chunks in juice

1 (8-ounce) carton plain yogurt (dairy or soy)

1/2 teaspoon garlic salt

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1 tablespoon prepared yellow mustard

1 cup thinly sliced celery

1 (11-ounce) can mandarin orange segments, drained

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 cup thinly sliced green onions

1 to 2 bananas

1 head romaine lettuce, cleaned and separated into leaves

1/2 cup coarsely ground or chopped lightly salted peanuts

 

Cook vegetarian chicken according to package directions; let cool. Cut into

small cubes.

 

Bring a pot of water to a boil. Add peas; cook just until they turn bright

green, about 1 minute. Immediately drain peas and transfer to a bowl of ice

water. Let cool, then drain well.

 

Drain pineapple juice into a small bowl. Add yogurt, garlic salt, ginger and

mustard; mix well. Set aside.

 

In a large bowl, combine drained pineapple, vegetarian chicken, peas, celery,

mandarin oranges, raisins and onions. Cut bananas into 1/4-inch slices; add to

chicken mixture and toss gently. Add yogurt dressing; mix lightly.

 

Divide lettuce leaves equally among serving plates; top with equal amounts of

chicken salad. Sprinkle with peanuts and serve.

 

PER SERVING (based on 6 servings): 355 calories; 13g fat (33 percent calories

from fat); 2g saturated fat; 2mg cholesterol; 18.5g protein; 41g carbohydrate;

22g sugar; 8g fiber; 545mg sodium; 151mg calcium; 779mg potassium.

 

Tester's note: We prepared this recipe with Veet. Quorn also makes a vegetarian

chicken product. Both are found in the freezer cases of many supermarkets. This

recipe can also be prepared with real chicken or turkey breast.

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Definitely a lot (but every meal has twice as much celery and onions as

broccoli?) .. but having taken many of their cooking classes, I would not

expect anything gf there. The recipe included had flour tortillas, but was

easily modified. Using wheat gluten as a meat substitute is often done (even

had classes on making your own), barley and wheat are eaten as daily

staples. And their conference apparently makes no allowances in their

meals -- all were exactly the same (and not what many of the attendees were

very happy with, it seemed ... and rice isn't that hard or expensive to

include).

 

>

>

>

> That's a lot of broccoli

>

> BY JOE BONWICH

> Of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch

> 07/06/2005

>

> About 450 round dining tables, each seating 10 people, arranged

> in a neat grid. A massive shopping list - perhaps 500 pounds of

> broccoli, 1,000 pounds of onions and 1,000 pounds of celery per meal.

>

 

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