Chartwells-Thompson Dining Services @ St. Louis Public Schools Client Newsletter May/June 2011

Eat Healthy! For kids and adults of all ages, whether you hit the court, the field, the track, the rink, or your back yard to get some physical activity, you'll need some fuel to keep you going! Here are some great, kid-friendly snacks to munch on to keep your body moving and your stomach silent:

• Fresh veggies like carrots and celery sticks—try a protein-rich dip with them, like hummus or peanut butter

• Snack-sized boxes of raisins

• Pretzels

• Low-fat yogurt or cheese sticks

• Crackers — try graham or animal crackers

• Mini Bagels or Pita chips

• Fig bars

submit ideas for menu additions. She takes pride in her work and demonstrates a true con-cern for customer satisfaction.

In addition to her success at McKinley, Theresa has also provided feedback as a member of the Be a Star committee and helped start up a Breakfast in the Classroom program at her for-mer school, Dunbar Elementary. During her time there, she showed an abundance of enthusiasm for her students, decorating the cafeteria for seasonal holidays and greeting each student by name as they came through her serving line.

Congrats Theresa and keep shining!

Congratulations to Theresa Robinson, lead at McKinley Middle School and Associate Star of the Month for May 2011! Theresa was promoted to this role in February this year, following a renovation of the serving area and conversion of the menu to the new Environments program. According to her manager, Carolyn Penn, under her lead-ership, the program has been able to flour-ish. Food quality and presentation stan-dards are consistently maintained and the students and staff are very pleased with the results!

Recently, Theresa has implemented a stu-dent suggestion program, where McKinley students are encouraged to write down and

Associate Star of the Month: Theresa Robinson

Congratulations to Chartwells President Steve Sweeney! Steve Sweeney, President & CEO, Chartwells, received the International Foodservice Manufacturers Associa-tion’s 2011 Silver Plate Award, in the category of Foodservice Management. These annual awards recognize excellence in nine segments of foodservice operations and honor winners for outstanding industry achieve-ments, commitment to innovation, and contributions to the advancement of their segments and the foodser-vice industry as a whole. With over 35 years in the foodservice industry and 30 of those spent at Compass Group, Mr. Sweeney began his career in culinary school and catering. He has been at the helm of Chartwells, the education division of Compass Group that includes K-12 Schools, Flik Independent Schools and Higher Education, since its creation in 1995.

What’s On Our Plates this Month? Staying Healthy this Summer! Summer School will start on June 6th this year, and run until July 1st. This summer, when the kids in your life are not in school, remind them to keep their minds and bodies active. We will be offering the Chartwells Summer Fun book again this year to elementary schools in the District. This book is filled with projects, games, ideas and coloring pages to keep your little ones busy and engaged in healthy activities.

Stay active! You can drop your risk of devel-oping any type of cancer by 10 to 15% by simply staying active. Research has found that people who keep their bodies busy throughout the day were able to reduce their chances of several different types of cancer. This doesn't just mean exercise - any daily activity like cleaning the house or walking to work can help.

• Fruit juice boxes (make sure you choose 100% pure fruit juice, or for an added boost, try orange juice with added calcium)

• Small packages of trail mix with nuts, seeds or dried fruits

• Fresh fruits such as bananas, oranges, berries, apples, melon and grapes (try freezing your grapes for a new taste sensation!)

Pictured (L-R): Asst. Director of Dining Services Carolyn Penn and Associate Star of the Month Theresa Robinson

Page 2 Chartwells-Thompson @ St. Louis Public Schools Client Newsletter May/June 2011

A Beautiful Day for Gardening at Gateway Complex!

Clockwise, from above left: SLPS Director of Food Service, Althea Albert-Santiago, paints one of the four kiosks in the inner courtyard with help from volunteers; Harrison Stoudt carefully places a tomato plant in the bed; Parents, students and SLPS staff put the finishing touches on their work; Volun-teers spreading mulch over raised beds; (L-R) Eurest Dining Services manager Alfredo Cartagena, Thompson Hospitality Joint Ventures Manager Olivia Dorsey and Eurest District Man-ager Mike Butler take a moment to pose as they scrape peel-ing paint off of the kiosk; Gateway Greening demo by Ryan Barker in front of the pond; Chartwells-Thompson employees from SLPS manned the grill to prepare lunch for the group; Gateway Elementary instructor and garden area coordinator William Bennett shows Chartwells volunteers how to repair planting areas; Sierra Club member Ginger Harris digs up weeds; Chartwells-Thompson and Preferred Meal Systems managers worked the registration table, handing out T-shirts and gardening gloves to all volunteers.

Special Thanks to the Sierra Club and the following groups and companies for supporting this event:

Over 60 volunteers gathered together on Saturday, April 30, 2011 to ready the inner courtyard gar-den areas at Gateway Complex for the new season. The group included St. Louis Public Schools ad-ministrators, teachers, students and parents, employees of Chartwells Dining Services and our sister and partner companies, Eurest, Canteen and Thompson Hospitality, as well as Preferred Meal Sys-tems and the local chapter of the Sierra Club's Urban Agriculture Project. Volunteers pulled weeds, dug up dead roots, laid weed-blocking paper, mulched several garden beds, planted tomatoes and flowers, and repainted a number of kiosks used for plants and outdoor agriculture experiments. Ryan Barker from Gateway Greening gave a 30 minute demonstration to the volunteers on home gardening and Dr. Rose Howard, Principal of Gateway Elementary thanked the volunteers for their work.

This day of community service was part of the SLPS Food Service Department and Chartwells-Thompson initiative to create and support gar-den projects throughout the District that will engage students in the appreciation of fresh, locally grown produce. Other activities in this ini-tiative include new raised beds and culinary herb and vegetable seeds at both Clyde C. Miller Career Academy and Nottingham CAJT. If you would like to help with any of these projects, please contact Kelly Myers at kelly.myers@compass-usa.com or (314) 381-4155 x642.

Page 3 Chartwells-Thompson @ St. Louis Public Schools Client Newsletter May/June 2011

Banana Cakes

Position a rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 375 degrees. Oil an 8” round cake pan and line the bottom with parchment paper. Select the firmest, bruise-free banana. Set aside half of it for decorating the top of the cake. Peel the remaining half and all the remaining bananas and cut them into 1/8-inch-thick slices. Place the slices in a bowl. In another bowl, lightly beat the egg to break it up. Beat in the butter and milk, and then pour over the bananas. Add the 1/2 cup sugar and stir gently with a spatula or wooden spoon to mix. Sift the flour directly into the bowl and continue stirring to incorporate all the flour. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Give the pan a few shakes to level the batter.

Peel and cut the reserved banana half into slices about 1/16” thick. Arrange the slices in a decorative pattern on top of the cake. Create a wide circle of overlapping slices, or place the slices randomly. This is your artwork. Sprinkle the top with the remaining 1 teaspoon sugar.

Bake for 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the top is golden brown. Remove from the oven and put on a rack to cool completely. The cake will puff up slightly during baking and then deflate as it cools. Run a knife around the pan sides to loosen the cake and unmold the cake onto a serving plate. Cut into wedges to serve.

Ingredients (Serves 6)

• 1 1/2 pounds extremely ripe bananas • 1 egg • 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted and

cooled • 1/4 cup whole milk • 1/2 cup plus 1 teaspoon sugar • 3/4 cup all-purpose flour

Bananas originated in Malaysia and are noted in writing as old as the sixth century BCE. The plants on which bananas grow are not trees, as commonly thought, but rather the world’s largest herbs. Bananas are known for being high in potassium.

May is Asian-Pacific-American Heritage Month. Asia is home to more countries, more languages, more cultures and more cooking styles than any other continent. While Chinese, Japanese and Thai foods are the rage in the United States, Middle Eastern and Indian foods are gaining in popularity. Along with the many flavors of various Asian cuisines, we also celebrate some of the artists who have captured the unique vibrancy of these cultures.

Celebrating Asian-Pacific-American Heritage Month

Thank you to our friends at Thompson Hospitality for providing the Asian –Pacific-American Heritage Month information and recipe.

Art and sushi Karen Young Ford began her career in advertising but soon found herself intrigued by ceramics. The oxblood red glaze in this sushi set is a tradi-tional Chinese glaze fused with small pieces of recycled bottle glass to create different surface effects.

Paintings in 3-D Hannah Ueno’s digital paintings in 3-D provide stunning visual images through the use of lenticular lens — a process that produces images with an illusion of depth and the ability to change or move when the images are viewed from different angles

Kansha “Kansha is a word that is used in many circumstances,” Elizabeth An-doh explains. “It means appreciation. In terms of food, you are talking about … an appreciation of what the natural world provides, and the other is how clever people are in accessing it and using it.”.

Chartwells-Thompson @ St. Louis Public Schools Client Newsletter May/June 2011

Page 4

If you’re served a portion of food that looks much too large, do you eat all of it anyway? A new research study says that’s what chil-dren are doing. The study, published in the University of California Wellness Letter, reported that when children ages 3 to 5 were served dou-ble the size of a standard lunch entrée, they ate 25 percent more food than when they were served a “normal” portion. In addition, the children did not compensate by eating less of other foods served at the same meal. Researchers also reported that when the children were allowed to serve themselves, the amount of food they ate was closer to a typical serving size. This study is a good example of how portion sizes can affect the health of children. Over-eating leads to excess calories, fat, satu-rated fat, cholesterol, sodium and added sugars. This approach to eating can lead to excess weight gain and increase diet-related health risks.

Our passion for good food isn’t limited to the cafeteria. Together with balanced, delicious meals, we offer an exciting range of educational tools that help your students make wise, informed deci-

sions. “Eat. Learn. Live.” is the foundation of all that we do in school foodservice education.

Please consider the environment before you print this newsletter. But if you do print, please pass along to someone else or recycle when finished.

Chartwells-Thompson Dining Services at St. Louis Public Schools

5020 Lexington Ave • St. Louis, MO 63115 • (314) 381-4155 phone

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May/June Calendar

If You Serve It . . . They Will Eat It.

1/2 of your plate

should be filled with minimally processed

Veggies and Fruits (about 1/2

cup)

1/4 should be

Protein (about 3-4 oz.)

What Should your Plate Look Like?

Food Focus: Food Focus: Kidney BeansKidney Beans

Looking for a food to give you sustainable energy? Go for red kidney beans ‐ they’re packed  with complex  carbohydrates,  fiber,  protein, iron  and magnesium. 

1/4 should be

Whole Grains/ Carbohydrates (about 1/4 c)

Healthy fats like olive oil, avocados, nuts and seeds help round out a balanced meal. Just remember to go easy on them!