CMP Series

Farm to Fork to F&B

As an advocate for local, seasonal, organic food providers, the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association places unique demands on its own F&B suppliers.

Which is how the menus at its 2011 Sustainable Agriculture Conference came to be ‘as local as you could possibly get for an event this size.’

Imagine walking into a hotel or convention center and telling the sales team that you’d love to have a meeting at their venue, but there’s just one catch: You want to bring in all of your own food.

That’s what the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association (CFSA) does every year during the site-selection process for its annual Sustainable Agriculture Conference, which this past Nov. 11–13 attracted a record 1,200 attendees to Durham, N.C.

“It’s a major request. It’s the make-or-break piece of our negotiation, and oftentimes hotels or venues will refuse our business,” said Fred Broadwell, program manager for the Pittsboro, N.C.–based organization. “We typically say that we are going to be holding an organic-farming event, so we want to walk the talk. We want to have local, seasonal, and organic food to the extent possible,… and we’re looking for the hotel to be flexible.

“Will they allow us to purchase our own food and bring it in and have them prepare it? Or will they allow an outside caterer to be involved? If we sense there is flexibility, we can start a dialogue. But the devil is in the details.”

The Freshest Ingredients

If Broadwell and CFSA Executive Director Roland McReynolds don’t sense much flexibility, they move on to another property. “That’s what happens 100 percent of the time, because we don’t want the venue to call up their wholesaler or distributor and say, ‘Switch out the regular chicken breasts for organic, and we’re done,’” Broadwell said. “Our attendees expect very high-quality food, locally sourced and organic. They expect us to say the chicken came from this farm, and they more than likely know that farmer. The expectation is that some of the celebrated farms and foods end up on the menu. They would be disappointed if nothing that was familiar to them was served.”

Broadwell and McReynolds hit the jackpot when they walked into the sales office at the Sheraton Imperial Hotel and Convention Center in Durham in February 2011. “We said we wanted to talk to food-and-beverage and assure ourselves that they are on board. So they came to the meeting and sat down with us,” Broadwell said. “The food-and-beverage director [John Walsh] was very supportive. Essentially he said, ‘I agree with what you’re doing and I’m a big supporter personally, so I’ll do everything I can to help you.’ He really came through and helped us make it happen. And the chef was fantastic to work with. When you get both of those people on board, that’s Well Fed “Our attendees loved the food,” said CFSA’s Fred Broadwell, “and appreciated all of the effort that went into sourcing and preparing it.” really a great situation. You’ve got to have the cooperation of both. That’s a key part of our negotiation.”

The two parties ultimately agreed on a per-person, per-meal “service charge” for the property to prepare and serve the food that CFSA sourced. “This is typically difficult for hotels, because they are in uncharted territory,” Broadwell said. “There is concern that they won’t meet their profit goals. But if the hotel wants our business bad enough, they will venture into this uncharted territory.”

And uncharted territory it was for the Sheraton. “But with markets changing, you have to think outside the box to bring business in,” said Teresa Palmieri, the hotel’s director of sales. “And it didn’t hurt that there were quite a few rooms over the weekend. We are not a big weekend destination since we’re in a business park. We do a lot of associations on weekends, so it worked out well. It was also a relatively short-term booking. We started negotiating in February, they signed in April, and the conference took place in November.”

Once the contract was signed, it was time to start planning the menus and purchasing the food – for 3,700 buffet-style meals (two seated lunches, one seated formal dinner, three breakfasts, and one beer/wine reception) along with another 1,600 people for breaks. Enter Kris Reid, an executive chef from Charlotte who has worked as CFSA’s food coordinator for the past four years. “When Kris came in, I had a little anxiety, because I was getting a good feel for exactly how much food we were talking about – how many meals,” Walsh said. “But Kris was great. She and [Sheraton Executive] Chef [Elhaj Tayouga] developed a rapport, and I let the foodies do what they wanted to do.”

Reid and Tayouga spent two months negotiating the menus, with Tayouga and his team creating around 80 percent of them. “The chef was really excited and engaged, and cared a lot about the event,” Reid said. “I would say, ‘This is what I have available. Here are some menu ideas that I’ve drawn up. Use them as guide. I’d like you to email me your ideas.’ Then I would look at their suggestions and say, ‘This is a great idea,’ or ‘It doesn’t include enough local ingredients,’ or ‘I like the idea for this menu, but there aren’t enough vegan options.’ ”

When the menus were finalized, 85 to 90 percent of the food ended up coming from local sources. “The hotel purchased olive oil, seasonings, and things that we couldn’t possibly get locally,” Reid said. “But the flour was local and milled locally. The sweet-potato chips were from a local bakery that made them with sweet potatoes from a local farm. It was as local as you could possibly get for an event this size.”

‘Truth in Menu’

Logistically, the Sustainable Agriculture Conference presented some unique challenges for the hotel – including staff training. “All the standard cooking techniques need to change with fresh, organic products,” Tayouga said. “They’re more delicate. Some cook quicker. Most of the natural meat needs a little bit longer time to cook … and more braising than sautéing or grilling.

“It was good training for my staff, and it was fun for us. It was the first time we did an event like that – dealing with the farmers directly. It gives you a different perspective on the food chain. We’re usually dealing with a middleman, which is kind of sad. You get [the food] off the truck from the distributor and cook it.”

The Sheraton also had to handle multiple product deliveries. Instead of one big delivery from a company like Sysco or US Foods, there were 28 separate deliveries representing 67 purveyors, thanks to the services of two local distributors – Leading Green and ECO. “There are [distributors] that can take produce and meats and cheeses from local farms and consolidate it into a single delivery so that we don’t have 100 farmers bringing their pickup trucks to the back gate,…[although] there was some of that,” Broadwell said. “I’m amazed at how many new companies are on the scene that will do small- to medium-sized consolidation of foods. It’s not exactly the way the hotel typically does it, but we work with them to make it as streamlined as possible.”

Once the food was delivered, it was kept separate from the rest of the food in the hotel, and Reid began to take inventory. “I went into the coolers and dry stock and made sure everything was there and labeled all the products – ‘spinach for Friday lunch,’ for example,” she said. “Sometimes I use three farms for one meal, and the menu for each meal has the names of the farms on it. So you have to make sure you’re using the right products. There has to be truth in menu.”

At the end of the conference, there were rave reviews all around – from attendees, CFSA, and the hotel. “We were very pleased with the local and seasonal food served by the Sheraton,” Broadwell said. “Our attendees once again loved the food and appreciated all of the effort that went into sourcing and preparing it.”

Tayouga also appreciated the farm-to-fork experience. “The group was so nice to work with – from the organizers to the attendees. I wish I could deal with groups like that on a weekly basis,” he said. “I spent about 13 years in France, where I used to work for small restaurants. You would go to the market with a bag and select what you want and shake hands with the farmer and put a face on the product. This event was the closest I’ve gotten to that.”

CFSA’s conference also “worked out [for the hotel] from a dollars standpoint,” Palmieri said. “It was a great group. They had a great room pickup. It was a win-win for both. They had a successful meeting. We were able to prepare and serve the food. It worked out well that they and we were open to see how we could do this as a win-win for the association, hotel, and attendees.”

Palmieri, Walsh, and Tayouga all look forward to CFSA returning to the Sheraton in 2013. “We are in negotiations and hope that we can make it happen,” Broadwell said. “We are planning to return.”

Meanwhile, the Hyatt Regency Greenville – site of this year’s Sustainable Agriculture Conference – has a tough act to follow.

6 Tips on How to DIY

You don’t have to work for a sustainable agriculture association to incorporate local, seasonal, and organic food into your meeting or convention. A meeting professional from any type or size of organization can – and should – be able to do it, according to Fred Broadwell, program manager for the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association.

“Sourcing from local farmers and local food artisans is the future,” Broadwell said. “It creates a connection between the location of the event and the food and the attendee. It creates a unique event – an event that could not happen anywhere else. That really resonates with people today, as opposed to going to another big city with basically generic food. People are more demanding than that.”

Here are six tips from Broadwell on getting started and making it work:

  1. Plan far ahead “If you’re going to propose this, propose it early in the process so that the hotel has time to wrap their mind around it.”
  2. Point out the positives “It would be an incredible learning experience for the staff … and there is a way to make money on it. If the property is going to offer the service, they should be compensated for it.”
  3. Get F&B on board “Salespeople may say no because they think it would upset the chef. But chefs and food-and-beverage directors typically enjoy doing this. They enjoy doing something different and using local and seasonal ingredients. You need to bring F&B into the conversation early on.”
  4. Hire a coordinator “To do this type of food, someone needs to be paid to handle all the logistics. You could pay someone working for the hotel or convention center, an outside consultant, or a staff person. If you want that higher quality, that experience for your event-goer, you need to spend the money.”
  5. Make it easy “Logistics are tricky, but are getting easier all the time. There are companies out there that can take produce and meats and cheeses from local producers and consolidate it into a single delivery. That makes all the difference.”
  6. Take it slow “For large associations, I suggest taking one piece of an event and making it local and seasonal. Try doing a reception that’s all seasonal and local introduce it, become familiar with it, and see how it goes.”

Bon Appetit

One of the meals served at the Sustainable Agriculture Conference was a seated formal dinner, presented buffet-style. Here’s what was on the menu – along with the local provider of each ingredient:

Chilled Tatsoi and Spinach Salad With Sesame-Ginger Dressing

Tatsoi: Cottle Organics; spinach: Jackson Farm; ginger: Ol’ Turtle Farm

Salad Bar

Lettuce: Don Boekelheide Incubator Farmer; radishes: Coon Rock; tomatoes: M&M Plant Farms; cucumber: Johnson County Organics; sprouts: Sunny Creek Farm

Pork BBQ

Pork: Wells & Jenkins

Vegan Collards

Collards: Cane Creek

Low-Country Purple Rice and Peas

Rice: Clyde Valley Farm; sea-island peas: Anson Mills

Hush Puppies

Cornmeal: Peaceful Valley Farm

Hot Keenebec Potato Salad

Potatoes: Mountain Valley Organics

Ice Cream With Berries and Pecans

Ice cream: Homeland Creamery; berries: Strepps Farm; pecans: Greene Family Farm

More Resources

Learn more about the Sustainable Agriculture Conference.

Test Time

Here’s how to earn your CEU hour. Once you finish reading this CMP Series article, read or watch the following material:

  • A list of basic tips for offering sustainable F&B from BlueGreen Meetings.
  • A video of San Diego Convention Center Executive Chef Jeff Leidy on site at Suzie’s Farm, explaining the produce planted specifically for F&B functions at PCMA 2012 Convening Leaders.

To earn one hour of CEU credit, visit cma.org/convene-cmp-series to answer questions about the information contained in this CMP Series article and the additional material.

To earn additional credit, you can take more more tests in our series here: pcma.co/ConveneCEUs

The Certified Meeting Professional (CMP) is a registered trademark of the Convention Industry Council.

Carol Bialkowski

Carol Bialkowski is a New Jersey–based freelance writer.