Dining in Harmony

Yosemite restaurants lead the way in using sustainable foods.

by Joan Obra
Fresno Bee - September 29, 2004

If you like organic and sustainably harvested food, study the menus of high-end restaurants in Yosemite National Park. They are adding your favorite fare -- and hinting at what's to come in food courts and camp kitchens.

At The Ahwahnee, you'll likely find organic pork tenderloin and other meat that hasn't been genetically modified or treated with hormones and antibiotics. Or you could find Alaskan line-caught halibut, a sustainable food harvested in a way that conserves natural resources.

The Ahwanee restaurant buys free-range eggs as part of an effort to use organic and sustainable food at Yosemite and Sequoia national parks. Mark Crosse / The Fresno Bee

And on the menus of The Ahwahnee and Yosemite Lodge at the Falls, you'll find this statement: "We are proud to present our seasonal dinner menu featuring many organic items and sustainably harvested products. This enables us to advance our environmental initiatives beyond recycling programs."

What's happening in some kitchens in the park is a fraction of a larger environmental program called Project 21.

The program is the brainchild of Delaware North Companies, which manages hospitality and food service in locations such as Yosemite National Park, Sequoia National Park, Yellowstone National Park in Montana and the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia.

"All of Delaware North's parks and resorts are under Project 21," says John Huey, the company's director of sustainability and environmental affairs for these properties.

Among the project's goals:

* Add more organic and sustainable food in restaurants and camps.
* Employ a more diverse staff.
* Make more buildings environmentally friendly.
* In company stores, increase the number of products made of recycled materials.

"We want to make sure that we're not buying anything or selling anything in our stores that is being manufactured contrary to United Nations human rights requirements: no forced labor, no treating women badly," says Huey, who is realistic about Delaware North's success. "We'll never get perfect on this stuff because we just can't."

Since Project 21's start, Delaware North has taken slow steps toward its goals. Roland Henin, corporate executive chef for the company's parks and resorts, called on his chefs in March to introduce two summer menu items that use organic or sustainable food.

Though some restaurants added dishes to meet the goal, others already satisfied the goal and aimed for more.

"That was an unrealistically low threshold," says Michael Gover, executive chef at Yosemite Lodge. "I want as many as I can do without putting myself out of a job."

Organic and sustainable foods account for 35% of Gover's food sales. Gover's goal is to raise that level to 50%.

Terry Sheehan, executive chef at The Ahwahnee hotel, also wants organic and sustainably harvested items to make up 50% of his food sales. So far, he's up to 30%.

The goals set by Gover and Sheehan have put Yosemite National Park ahead of some of Delaware North's other properties.

"We look to Yosemite to be the leader in lots of issues, and probably Yellowstone, as well," says Huey, who adds that Yosemite's environmental programs became a model for the company.

Yosemite restaurants may be trendsetters, but the transformation hasn't been easy. Among the difficulties, Gover and Sheehan say, are finding vendors of organic and sustainable food.

"Our volume is so large, it sometimes can be hard for them to meet" our needs, says Gover, who oversees 3,000 meals a day. "We need to start looking for more local sources, and that's going to be our challenge. U.S. agribusiness isn't really set up for direct relationships with a farmer."

Because vendors need federal government approval to sell wares to national parks, farmers and restaurants must overcome additional bureaucracy.

"It took two months to get set up as a vendor," says Denesse Willey of T&D Willey Farms, a Madera company that sells produce to The Ahwahnee and Yosemite Lodge.

But for Gover and Sheehan, the hassle was worth it.

"Remember, we're aiming for 50% [sales of organic and sustainable food]. The way we're going to get there is by having direct relationships with farmers," Gover says.

By partnering with T&D Willey Farms, Gover can plan his menu ahead of time.

"Knowing what she's got planted," Gover says, "makes it much easier for me to get that next 15%."

After years of working with chefs in the Bay Area, the Willeys know what Gover and Sheehan need.

"Chefs are looking for things they can have on their menu for five months straight," Willey says.

In addition to more direct relationships with farmers, the chefs searched for vendors who would bring multiple products in one trip.

"I have no desire to have any more trucks driving into Yosemite," says Gover, who tries to buy fruits and vegetables from the San Joaquin Valley.

"I don't want to buy produce that was raised 15,000 miles from here," he says. In evaluating a product's sustainability, he asks, "How much fossil fuel is involved in the distribution of the product?"

All of the retooling has resulted in higher food costs for the two chefs, but they haven't raised prices for customers.

Higher-priced items can include seafood. The chefs are following the recommendations of Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch, which publishes a list of seafood that's raised and harvested sustainably.

"We were doing salmon for under $4 a pound," Sheehan says. "It's now $8 a pound."

The difference? The Ahwahnee now uses wild, line-caught salmon from Alaska or California instead of farmed salmon.

If not prepared properly, side dishes also can be more costly.

"Pasta ingredients have to be organic; the sauce has to be organic," Sheehan says. "For someone who is looking for organic, they are looking for organic throughout the whole meal."

The change has required more efficiency in the kitchen.

"We have to make more from scratch," says Gover, who points out that Yosemite Lodge serves enough meals to take advantage of economies of scale. "It's forcing us against more preprepared products."

In some cases, the addition of more organic and sustainable foods has caused alterations on the menu. Because it's hard to find appropriate sources of meat bones, Sheehan uses fewer meat sauces and more fruit and vegetable purées, as well as more sauces based on vegetable broth.

"Veal bones to make a demiglace need to come from an animal that's grass-fed or organically raised with no antibiotics," Sheehan says, "or you're not being true to your menu."

Delaware North's efforts have gained praise -- and skepticism.

"What they're doing is rather unusual," says Bill Rice, a marketing professor at California State University, Fresno. "This is a highly ambitious project."

The challenge for Delaware North is expanding the project beyond fine-dining venues like The Ahwahnee and Yosemite Lodge.

Adding more organic and sustainable food in their high-end restaurants isn't unusual, since well-to-do customers "have a social and political bent toward the natural," Rice says.

But a wider audience may not be as accepting, especially if food courts need to raise prices. "Most people say they want organic, but they're not willing to pay more," Rice says.

Gover is aware of the difficulties.

"The majority of our meals are not in the Ahwahnee dining room or the Mountain Room," he says. "The vast majority of our meals are mid-range, and we need to recognize that."

As the Mountain Room Restaurant at Yosemite Lodge adopts more organic and sustainable food, the food courts slowly follow suit.

About 20% to 25% of the meals in the food court feature a prominent sustainable or organic ingredient, Gover says.

"We featured eggplant Parmesan in the food court and got 200 orders a week," he says. "Two-thirds of that product is organic."

The next step? Introducing the changes to Yosemite's High Sierra Camp.

Luckily for Delaware North, there are resources to help company chefs. Jesse Ziff Cool, for example, is a longtime restaurateur in the Menlo Park area who relies on sustainable and organic food. She says Delaware North needs a practical approach.

At a company meeting in March, Cool told Delaware North chefs to rethink their definition of sustainable and organic products.

"A lot of people think that organic food means fresh, healthy food," she says. "But organics can also be preserved food. ... Local frozen organic corn in the middle of winter tastes so much better than fresh organic corn shipped from far away."

Mariposa farmer Brenda Ostrom, owner of Mountain Meadow Farms, also helped by giving a talk to some Delaware North employees about sustainable and organic food.

Ostrom herself has become one of The Ahwahnee's vendors, selling the hotel 15 dozen eggs a week from her layer hens.

"It wasn't easy at first because we didn't know that much about it," Sheehan says about organic and sustainable food. But as he learned more, Sheehan realized his role in educating the public about organic and sustainable food.

Chefs "can influence a great number of people. There's a great responsibility that comes with that," he says.

"There's so many issues around what we put in our bodies. If you give them the options, you'd be surprised at how many people want to go the organic route."