✨Dining

We are a relatively small CCRC, 259 IL units and 350 residents. We have a formal dining room, a café and a bar. The main kitchen serves our Care Center as well (SNF, AL, Memory).

All residents are entitled to one meal per day as part of their monthly fee; other meals can be purchased a la carte.

The Café serves three meals a day: B 7:30-10, L 11-1 and D 5-7. Lunch and Dinner are available for pick up and delivery. Delivery is free in our outlying duplexes and costs $7.00 in the main building unless you are confined due to illness. Lunch order by 9AM for pickup after 11. Dinner by 2, pickup after 5.

The main dining room is only open for dinner (we tried lunch, but few attended – dress code identified as deterrent). Hours are 5-7. Reservations are required for the main dining area, walk-ins okay for café. Order by 2 for pickup after 5. There is also a small bar that serves small plates 5-7.

The takeout menu is a subset of the full menu. The café has one special everyday with many other lighter fare (salads, sandwiches, omelets) made to order.

There is a Sunday Brunch as the only meal of the day available in person or as takeout.

David

Scottsdale

I have seen several replies in the dining thread about an increase in take out meals. I am a person who does prefer take-out most of the time. For those of you who do get take out meals, can you tell me if your CCRC lets you order any item off of any menu at your facility? If you have multiple restaurants, can you get take-out meals from all of your restaurants? Are the hours limited for getting take-out (for instance take out for lunch pick-up at 11:30 AM and take out for dinner pick-up 4-4:30 PM) or can you get take out at different times of the day? Do you have any restaurants that are open all day?

Our facility is somewhat limited with how they handle take-out orders. I look forward to hearing from other facilities about how take-out orders are accommodated. Thanks

We at GHBC in Virginia have a long history with recyclable containers. We have a very active Green Team that support recycling and conservation of resources. As Chair of the Dining Committee, I offer the following perspectives:

We have not seen significant savings in using the containers. Some of this comes because not everyone understands the concept of returning them after use. We are currently exploring a contract to monitor who has the containers. This would make them like a library book. When they are filled they would be scanned. Then when returned to the designated drop off area they would automatically be scanned as they enter the room. In this system after a period of time the individual who used them would be charged a fee if they are not returned. We hope that this will lead to better compliance returning them.

That said, in general the Dining Service staff is supportive of resident desire to save the resources of our planet. Our Administration is as well. For us the greater good was the best selling point.

We, too, have more people preferring to eat in their homes rather than in the dining areas and continue to see a high percentage of take outs post Covid.

The issue I don't see mentioned is hopefully stringent state regulations on food management in restaurants and other facilities. The regulations in Kansas mandate that independent living food services operate under different codes than those required for the regulated areas on campus. During cold and flu season one can easily imagine the infectious disease issues created for staff with used food containers, not matter how well washed, being returned to the dining area.

It is not uncommon for facilities to close dining rooms and kitchens to eradicate pathogens, a very lengthy and expensive process.

Recent reductions in staffing in governmental regulatory institutions such as the health department can only worsen the situation.

Our Green Team efforts to do as you indicated was stopped in its tracks by infectious disease concerns, and that is a very good thing. Our focus changed to educating and encouraging residents to bring their own tote bags which has worked to some degree.

There may be some hidden issues here. Covid-19 broke down the social network in many, possibly most, communities. In our community, there was a tradition of a 2-hour conversational meal in the Main Dining Room, and also the option of a cafeteria where residents could push a tray past servers and see the entree and side choices, choosing what they wanted. It was the same kitchen and the same food as the MDR, but fast and informal. Most residents opted for the MDR.

During Covid we isolated ourselves in our apartments and either cooked or ate take-out. Management seized the opportunity to redesign the dining. The main dining room was replaced with a food court, and the cafe was replaced with a bistro and a small formal upscale dining room. These new venues have been far less popular than management expected. The food court offers pizza, custom sandwiches, and a variety of entrees. The pizza and sandwiches are prepared to order. The main entrees are plated at the kitchen serving line. There have been problems with noise, food arriving at tables at widely different times so that people aren't truly eating together. If you wait for everyone to be served, your food may become cold.

We are working through these problems, and on the whole the quality of the food is better, and the different venues are slowly building trade, but the social aspect of dining has not fully recovered. Many use takeout and continue to eat at home.

Under the current plan, an outside contractor provides reusable takeout containers. Our trash rooms have special receptacles for the dirty containers. These are collected and washed and returned to the kitchen for reuse. There continues to be a problem of containers not being returned. But that's also true of regular china; a case of ceramic coffee cups disappears each month!

Richmond Shreve

NaCCRA Board Member

Forum Moderator

My CCRC in AZ has recently completed a multimillion dollar renovation of our dining room and cafe, hired a new Executive Chef and revamped our menus. Naturally management and our dining committee would like to see residents enjoy the new venues. However, habits developed during Covid are proving hard to break with many residents preferring takeout. Added to that we have a dress code in the dining room (jackets for men suggested not required) that some object to.

We do not allow food to be taken from either of the dining venues unless it is purchased a la carte so the "tin foil over china" problem alluded to does not occur here. Some ladies do slip Tupperware containers into their purses as an, illegal, alternative.

All our takeout containers are lite weight plastic (no utensils) and can be recycled after home washing (we have separate trash and recycling bins).

There has been discussion of adding a surcharge to cover the cost of the containers, but so far no will to do so.

I'll be interested in following this topic to see if there are ideas that we could borrow and consider.

David

Scottsdale

Unfortunately I have no figures, but our CCRC in Portland, OR uses black plastic heavy duty containers, that are machine washable—for a while, anyway. We residents don’t mind rinsing and returning them. The bigger challenge might be to justify a more environmentally friendly solution than black plastic (one of the most objectionable of all materials). A stainless steel “Lunch Bot” sort of container that would last indefinitely should justify the up-front cost. An eco-conscious organization shouldn’t mind a bit higher cost if it’s more sustainable in the long run. Some residents or groups may even donate to such a good cause. It’s a great PR strategy.

The "green team" of residents at the Hearthstone in Seattle are preparing a proposal for the adoption of reusable takeout containers here. We are assuming that despite its ethical appeal there may be some resistance from residents to the added bother of having to rinse and return takeout containers to the dining room. However, a recent decision to charge for takeout orders has been unpopular enough that reusable containers might win the day with proper support by management.

To get support we need to convince management that there will be net savings with this practice. That's taking into account the cost difference between reusable versus recyclable containers, the extra water and energy usage for cleaning used containers, and any extra dining staff time involved in the cleaning and storage of containers.

I assume that you and/or your management teams have done such assessments and found that reusable containers are cost effective in addition to being helpful in the interest of sustainability. If that's the case do you have any figures or approximate guesses to support the practice that you might care to share? I see that r.world is mentioned as one provider; were others considered?

I'd be very grateful for your thoughts and insights!

Rob Bowman

Seattle

Our efforts have been plagued by lack of resident cooperation. The administration, unfortunately, has failed to enroll residents in the programs that it has tried, announcing "new rules" instead of selling the idea. Consequently, a small minority thwart the effort by trashing the expensive containers. The most recent program imposed in this way included a one dollar surcharge for take out. Resistive residents simply brought foil to cover a "free" eat-in china plate, and took the china plates home.

Programs of this sort succeed or fail because of attitude breakdowns. They can degenerate into a contest of wills. The key is to begin with a collaborative process and create buy-in. With broad community support almost any system can work. Without it, the best fail.

Richmond Shreve

NaCCRA Board Member

Forum Moderator

We are considering using r.world as a supplier for our carry-out serve ware. Would like to know if any other facilities have contracted with them (or another supplier) to deal with an effort to reduce our contribution to the municipal solid waste stream.