The ‘ground-breaking’ Healthy Plate Healthy Planet event brought together stakeholders from key industries and academia to elevate the conversation around food in the hospitality industry, as well as in schools, hospitals, care homes, prisons, and B&I catering.
Dr Sumi Baruah, chief executive of Culinary Medicine, welcomed attendees to the ‘pivotal event’, praising the ‘incredible culinary students’ from Westminster Kingsway College who prepared the canapes and bowl food. In fact, the food served was chosen to showcase the themes developed with the ‘healthy plate healthy planet’ concept.
The canapes included fava bean & mint bruschetta, pressing of confit sustainable game, butter bean and sun-dried tomato bruschetta, roulade of home smoked salmon with pickled cucumbers & wild mushroom quiche.
The evening included networking opportunities to connect with decision makers, healthcare professionals and industry leaders, and to forge potential collaborations.
The idea of Culinary Medicine was started in 2018 by Dr Rupy Aujla to teach doctors and medical students the foundations of nutrition as well as helping them learn how to cook. This was because about 70% of doctors receive only two hours or less of nutrition training whilst studying.
Lord Karan Bilimoria, the patron of Culinary Medicine UK, noted that the non-profit organisation had ‘huge potential’ in taking doctors back into the kitchen and hoped the Government got behind the initiative.
WKC culinary lead Vince Kelly, who has 30 years of experience within the hospitality industry, acknowledged that Culinary Medicine had ‘made great strides’ in putting nutrition on the curriculum for doctors.
He went on to tell the event ‘our food system is broken’ and ‘unsustainable’. He said by 2050 the world would not have enough meat to feed the growing population and 60% of the food consumed in the world was provided by just three crops - rice, wheat and maize.
He said he was also proud to be a Guardians of the Grub ambassador, alongside several others in the audience, explaining that 1.1m tonnes of food is wasted by the hospitality and foodservice industries every year. Not only was that a waste of £3.3bn in costs, but 75% of the food was still usable.
Despite these challenges Kelly said ‘it isn’t too late’ to adopt more sustainable menus. He encouraged attendees to embrace plant-forward dishes and to make vegetables the star of the dish.
He concluded that everyone at the event had been invited for a reason and he encouraged them to collaborate with Culinary Medicine UK to help accelerate change.
Phil Shelley, senior operational manager and national lead for net zero food at the NHS, told the audience: “I want to share a few things about what we are doing in the NHS. We are seeing some momentum around the education of our food teams and I thoroughly believe that chefs should be at the centre of food in the NHS.”
He described the 2022 Hospital Food Review that he led as a ‘catalyst for change’, saying the NHS was starting to receive data on how hospital trusts were doing and he was pleased to report that up to 85% of hospital trusts were in a good position.
“I think we are actually right at the beginning of massive change in the NHS. It’s about raising our game,” he said, adding that hospital caterers ‘should be proud of what they are serving’ and that he wanted to see more hospitals use local produce on their menus.
He also spoke about the importance of the NHS Chef competition because it shone a light on hospital chefs and when they returned to their respective hospitals they shared what they have learnt to ‘inspire’ their colleagues.
He concluded: “Don’t let this fall away it has been a really good evening out, meeting people and talking about what could happen. This is a line in the sand tonight, we need to take this message out into the public sector [and] into healthcare to say you can make a difference. We can put food back into the centre of training and we can elevate our chefs into being proud of what they do.”
Dr Tetyana Rocks from the Food and Mood Academy from Deakin University in Australia shared insights on the gut-brain connection as well as the role of diet in mental health and how this translated into menu designs. For instance, she recommended we eat all of the plants we grow for food, including the skin and seeds where possible.
She spoke about the importance of following a Mediterranean-style diet that includes a variety of plants and fibres, good fats, fermented foods polyphenols and phytochemicals. This contrasted with a typical Western diet that included salt, additives, red and processed meat, low quality fats and refined carbohydrates.
A panel discussion on the barriers and solutions to innovative sustainable menus was hosted by Sandra Kelly, skills director at UKHospitality. It involved Alex Hall, culinary director at Impact food Group; Lucy Vincent, chief executive of Food Behind Bars and Phil Shelley, NHS England.
Hall said Impact Food Group worked with 600 schools and food cost and getting students engaged were the biggest challenges they faced. He spoke about taking marketing ideas such as the wrap of the day from McDonald’s, but making the meal healthier for schoolchildren. Vincent noted the challenges facing prison catering with a budget of £3 per person to feed a prisoner, saying staff shortages were another barrier to serving healthy food as prison kitchens often relied on people who weren’t trained chefs.
Shelley explained that for him it had never been about cost and he encouraged hospital caterers to be brave in instigating change. He highlighted that NHS exemplar sites across the UK as doing a great job on a limited budget.
And he encouraged hospital chefs to go up to ward level and speak to patients as well as asking for feedback. He told the audience ‘don’t wait for someone to tell you what to do’, encouraging them instead ‘to make the change happen’.