As more and more Americans strive for a healthier diet and living pattern, University Dining Services and Penn Students for Animal Rights are joining together today to sponsor an entirely vegan meal at the King's Court/English House dining hall.
This vegan specialty menu will recognize the international observance of Meat Out, a day that began in 1985 and is sponsored by the Farm Animal Reform Movement.
The purpose of this event, held at the beginning of each spring, is "to expose the public to the joys and benefits of a plant-based diet, while promoting the availability and selection of meat and dairy alternatives in mainstream" restaurants and stores, according to the Meat Out official Web site.
Last fall, PSTAR sponsored a similar vegan meal for Thanksgiving, drawing around 160 students for the non-traditional holiday dinner.
As a result of FARM's efforts, more than 30 million Americans have experimented with a meatless diet.
More importantly, as obesity will soon become the No. 1 preventable killer in the United States, "plant foods don't have cholesterol and tend to have much lower amounts of fat in them, especially saturated fat, so a vegan diet is one way to take a proactive step to improve your health," said fourth-year Ph.D. student Ian Ross, who is also a PSTAR member.
As the nation as a whole is moving toward a more plant-based diet, so are many Penn students.
"I have been a vegan for four years now and a vegetarian for nine, and I don't find it difficult to find plenty to eat," College senior and PSTAR member Randi Sokol said.
The Penn community has positively responded to students' requests for a wider selection of vegan products.
"For example, 1920 Commons has recently introduced a line called MonCuisine that has food like barbecue ribs and chicken nuggets. The great thing about these products is that people don't even realize they are eating the vegetarian version," Sokol said.
Ross, who is a graduate associate in Ware College House, said that "last year, a number of my residents ... were fooled by the veggie nuggets."
Therefore, PSTAR and Aramark have joined together today to provide students with the option of having both a vegan lunch and dinner.
Timothy Zintz is the district chef for the Philadelphia area and has helped PSTAR produce this day of vegan celebration.
Prior to coming to the Philadelphia area, Zintz worked at New York University, where he catered to a large vegetarian and vegan population.
"We started Vegan Festival meals at NYU, and they [became] quite popular,"Zintz said. He added that this prior experience enabled him to help run such events at Penn.
"I composed the Meat Out menu based on research, student suggestions and product availability in the area," he added.
Today's lunch and dinner menus at King's Court/English House feature a wide range of vegan specialties. For lunch, students can enjoy a baked potato bar with all the extras, fresh pasta and pizza, and even Tofutti deli selections.
For dinner, the grill will be on, cooking sesame nuggets, veggie burgers, french fries and onion rings. There will also be soup and a wide variety of salads. To top it off, Zintz has helped prepare an array of desserts from carrot cake to rice pudding.
Sokol said that it is important to try these foods because "vegetarians also make an impact on others besides themselves. Each vegetarian saves an average of 83 animals and one acre of rain forest each year."
