University of Virginia
OP-8: Sustainable Dining

UVA Dine hosts 3-4 farmers markets per semester with about 10 to 15 different vendors. The farmers market provides students with an opportunity to meet local producers and small businesses, and to learn about UVA Dine’s local partnerships. Students are able to use their Meal Plan (via declining balance) as well as traditional forms of payment at the market. UVA Dine’s “Green Dining” program provides Virginia-grown produce sourced from 4P foods at each market.

We host at least one Farm to Fork Dinner per semester where we offer a local menu featuring products from a variety of Virginia producers. Every Thursday during dinner service at Fresh Food Company dining hall, we host a Local Taste Cart. Chefs select a local ingredient and farm to feature each week, then students get to sample their creations and learn about the farm from which the ingredient came.
We have 1-2 Green Dining interns devoted to supporting Morven Kitchen Garden’s sustainable agriculture. These interns work weekly at the farm, managed by UVA staff and students, to help plant, harvest, pack orders and support the farm with administrative tasks. These interns also support the Babylon Micro-farm inside Fresh Food Co. This in-house, hydroponic farm was developed by UVA alumni local to Charlottesville, and grows microgreens, lettuce, herbs, and other greens for use in the dining halls. This farm additionally serves as an educational opportunity for students to learn about sustainable food production, agricultural methods, and local business.

Za’atar at The Castle: The Castle opened in Fall of 2018, and recently rebranded into Za’atar in Fall of 2023. The café features a plant-forward Mediterranean menu of salads, wraps and bowls. The Castle is a 3-star certified Green Restaurant for its 43 environmental steps related to disposables, energy, food, chemicals, waste and water.

Local Creations at Fine Arts Café: The Fine Arts Café, our flagship sustainability café, is located in the School of Architecture. The café has maintained a 2 Star Green Restaurant Certification for featuring a menu with local and organic ingredients, comprehensive waste reduction and diversion programs including recycling, composting and efficient energy and water appliances throughout the café.

We partner with 4P foods, a local food hub to regularly source food and beverages from local small and medium-sized businesses – local being defined as grown or produced within 250 miles of campus. We also regularly report purchases with SWaM vendors.

Vegan and vegetarian options are available daily throughout our dining halls, which has allowed UVA Dine to achieve an A rating on the PETA report card for plant-based dining options. In addition to different menu options, we provide information to students about both the environmental and health benefits of eating plant forward.

Through our Coolfood Meal options, we promote plant forward as a style of eating that shifts the focus away from animal products and instead emphasizes vegetables, whole grains, legumes and nuts. Coolfood meals are certified low carbon by the World Research Institute and are designated with a special badge on the menu at all dining halls. If the carbon footprint falls below an established per-meal threshold and meets nutritional standards, it is certified as a Coolfood Meal. In the United States, the threshold for breakfasts is 3.81 kg/CO2e/portion and for lunches and dinners it is 5/71 kg CO2e/portion.
Once a semester we have a “Veg Out” day where 1 dining hall will feature an all-Vegan meal period. We also regularly hold a plant-based milk sampling event, where we allow students to sample a variety of alternative milks, give feedback on their favorites, and let them know about their nutritional benefits and environmental footprints.

There is a designated vegan station at each residential dining hall. Vegan menu items are marked on menu ids using an identifiable logo. We also have signage marking whether plant-based protein is available at a certain station. UVA Dine received an A on the PETA report card for Vegan dining options.

We include signage throughout the dining halls about a variety of our sustainability initiatives. Some examples of signage include maps identifying locally sources ingredients and highlighting the farms they come from, information on how to eat sustainably and plant-forward around campus, information on Coolfood meals, and an overview of our sustainability program. We also receive student engagement through UVA Dine social media, our Green Dining website and newsletter.

We have a LeanPath system that tracks food waste throughout all three diing halls as well as Catering, Concessions and several retail locations. Through this system, we identify existing trends in back of house food waste so as to develop procedures to prevent waste in the future.
The Green Dining Zero Waste team hosts Weigh the Waste events, rotating through each dining hall weekly, where students can sort their leftovers into three bins – edible waste, inedible waste, and other (napkins, disposable utensils etc). This event serves as an educational opportunity to bring awareness to post-consumer food waste.
At The Castle, West Range, and Fine Arts Café, the Green Dining team visits monthly to conduct post-consumer waste audits. The interns will remove bags from the landfill, recycling and compost bins and identify which items are misplaced most frequently. This event helps to support our waste sorting signage and staff education.

Trays were removed from residential dining halls at the start of the 2008 - 2009 academic year and trayless dining is still in place today.

We are partner with the UVA student organization, Food Assist, to recover food from our dining halls, to be donated to the UVA community food pantry and other community organizations that are able to redistribute food. Student volunteers take unused portions of food (following health and food safety requirements) from staff at the dining hall and reapportion it into meals.

Recycling 100% of cooking oil. U.Va. Dining partners with Filta Environmental Kitchen Solutions to recycle our used fryer oil into biodiesel.

Pre-consumer food waste locations: All three residential dining halls – Observatory Hill, Fresh Food Company, and Runk Dining Hall – as well as retail locations – The Castle, Fine Arts Café, West Range, Fontana Bakery, John Paul Jones Arena, Scott Stadium, and 11 other dining locations. Compost is sent to Black Bear Composting in Crimora, VA, and some of this compost is used in our Student Garden. In 2022, over 312 tons of compost were diverted from the landfill.

All three of our residential dining halls – Observatory Hill, Fresh Food Company, and Runk Dining Hall have post-consumer composting. The following retail locations have post-consumer composting: The Castle, Fine Arts Café, and West Range Café.

In all three of our dining locations, we offer reusable plates and utensils for dine-in meals.

We offer a Reusable To-Go container program in all three of our residential dining halls that is free to all Meal Plan holders. Students redeem their first container and then return the box after using and we wash and sanitize the reusable to-go containers. The student picks up a clean container at the same time they deposit a dirty container.
We offer certified compostable to-go containers and service ware for to-go meals in all residential dining halls and retail locations.

We have an incentive program at coffee locations on campus, which aims to reduce waste across campus by offering students a discount for choosing to use a reusable. Incentives vary by location from 10-50 cents off per coffee order if using a reusable.

Green Restaurant Certification: All three of are residential dining locations are 3 star Green Restaurant certified, The Castle is 3 star certified, and Fine Arts Café is 2 star certified. The Green Restaurant Association is a third-party reporting tool for transparently assessing the environmental impact of a restaurant.

UVA Dine is a part of the Food Insecurity Resource Group (FIRG), which is a collaboration of university partners, UVA satellite food pantries, and pantries within Charlottesville, VA that meet to work collectively on advancing food security at UVA and in Charlottesville.

Every semester, we have a swipe donation drive called “Stock the Pantry”. Students can donate a meal swipe and then we will donate 1 pound of food to the UVA Community Food Pantry.

UVA Dine is a participant in the UVA Sustainable Food Collaborative (SFC). We work with SFC to create sustainable food goals and apply them to our operations. There are currently five goals focused on sustainable purchasing, waste, food security, increasing awareness about just food systems, and partnering with the community-driven food justice efforts.