Replant Your Menu

Setting the Table of Tomorrow

What if climate change could be delicious? In 2020, Compass Group partnered with Arizona State University’s (ASU) Swette Center and Google Food to ask that question through an exciting culinary training for chefs.

RePlant Your Menu is a virtual training series focusing on sustainability and nutrition while connecting food choices to planetary health. The course explores how certain ingredients can be beneficial for both people and the environment, and that improving soil health through the food we grow draws down carbon from the atmosphere.

We have amazingly talented chefs at Compass Group who take diverse ingredients and make them simply delicious. Once training was complete, chefs went back to the kitchen to review menus and see where more plant-forward options and diverse ingredients could be incorporated.

Chefs at Compass Group are replanting their menus and creating a better tomorrow, starting today. “After the RePlant Your Menu training, we are featuring more plant-forward menu options,” says Morrison Healthcare’s Awo Amenumey. “I view it as more than just ingredients in a recipe now. I look at how the ingredients affect our planet and how they can potentially reduce our carbon footprint.”

“You look at plants, grains, and legumes from a whole different perspective,” says Chartwell Higher Ed’s Allison Trinkle. “Making them the star and thinking of exciting new ways to showcase some delicious yet diverse ingredients.”

“On Taco Tuesday we ran Black Turtle Bean & Sweet Potato Tacos alongside our weekly standards. Through training, sampling, and marketing, they out-sold options with animal protein,” says Restaurant Associates Bill Unterstein. “The guests were amazed by the flavor. We spent time training our staff on our goal, let them sample them, and that was it. They were off and running. Our staff and guests loved it, and our food cost was 16% lower than our beef tacos and 8% lower than our chicken tacos. I’d say it was a win, win, win.”