WWU Dining Services launches climate-friendly meal choices through Cool Food Badges

Western Washington Dining is making it easier for students and the campus community to choose climate friendly foods through the launch of Cool Food Meals this January. This program is part of Western Dining’s ongoing commitment to the environment and sustainability.

Last October, World Resources Institute (WRI) announced that its Cool Food Meals badge will appear on Aramark menus, as part of a 10-university pilot beginning in the Spring 2022 semester. The Cool Food Meals badge identifies dishes with a lower carbon footprint and will appear on more than 350 menu items.

WRI measured the carbon footprint of hundreds of Aramark recipes to identify items that meet the Cool Food Meals criteria, based on the ingredients from farm to fork and the land used to produce the meal. If a dish’s carbon footprint falls below an established per-meal threshold and meets a nutrition safeguard, it is approved as a Cool Food Meal.

Cool Food Meals can be found on campus at The Viking, Fairhaven and Ridgeway Dining Commons beginning on Jan. 18. Some examples of dishes that will be labeled as a Cool Food Meals include Potato Leek Soup, Buffalo Mac & Cheese Foods, Caribbean Style Coconut Rice, and Garam Masala Coconut Stew with Chicken.

As part of the University Sustainability Action Plan, Western strives to be a leader in sustainability food service practices, such as purchasing, production efficiencies, waste reduction, and energy consumption and monitoring.

“We are very excited to feature an increased variety of lower carbon footprint menu item to help align with Western’s Campus sustainability goals,” said Stephen Wadsworth, Resident District Manager for Western’s food service partner, Aramark.

Western strives to be a leader in sustainable food service practices through implementing goals and policies that keep ambitions high and progress continual in all service areas including purchasing, production efficiencies, waste reduction and energy consumption and monitoring. -- Western Washington University Sustainability Action Plan