Beginning Wednesday, Jan. 22, Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Courtyard Café will host a healthy food tasting in the dining area on the fourth Wednesday of every month, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
The Courtyard Café will be promoting both its “Mindful” program and the MyFitnesspal app, a free smartphone app and website that tracks diet and exercise for the user.
Sodexo’s cafes, located in corporate settings, government offices, colleges and universities, and health care facilities throughout the country, offer “Mindful” foods that balance nutrition with taste.
The Mindful approach focuses on transparency of ingredients, tasty food and satisfying portions.
The tastings will feature healthy selections from all of the cafeteria’s stations. The Jan. 22 tasting comes from the grill — BBQ honey chicken sandwich.
Ted Witczak, VUMC’s Retail Operations Manager, said that Medical Center faculty and staff have indicated through surveys that they would like more healthy options in the Café and more easily accessible nutritional data.
“Healthy foods are located throughout the cafeteria, Witczak said. “Many visitors and employees are under the impression that we only offer healthy specials at the Mindful station. This will provide them an opportunity to taste a variety of healthy options that we offer at each station.”
Some of the healthy options that will be available for the tastings include strawberry salad with chocolate vinaigrette, spicy shrimp and kimchi rice paper wraps, Tuscan grilled chicken sandwich and twisted turkey wrap.
