AUBURN, Ala. (EETV) – In honor of Earth Week, Auburn students plan a plant-based meal at the Edge Central Dining Hall.
Auburn students, Grace Reilein, Emory Morgan and Elie Creswell, partnered with Tiger Dining and the Sustainability Capstone course to celebrate Earth Week by providing plant-based meals at The Edge.
The event will be at The Edge’s urban kitchen from 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
“We’ve just been researching the positive impacts of eating more plants and just less meat in general with carbon emissions, personal health, water use, land use and things like that,” said Reilein.
Plant-based foods can slow down the excessive use of natural resources. Switching to plant-based diets can have health and financial benefits.
In preparation for the event, Reilein, Creswell and Morgan have researched academic journals and peer-reviewed sources as well as attended meetings with Tiger Dining and their marketing team.
“We went and toured some of the sustainable gardening food production processes on campus and that was pretty cool,” said Creswell.
One of the sustainable gardening options they visited was Auburn’s freight farms. Freight farms are freight containers designed to sustainably grow different types of produce on Auburn’s campus.
“We wanted to have those be served at the meal and then also highlight them to let students know where their food is coming from and the environmental impacts and how it’s just like a cool initiative going on on campus,” said Reilein.
Reilein, Creswell and Morgan coordinated with Tiger Dining’s chefs to help create a menu that will broaden students’ horizons on the wide variety of plant-based food options available.
“One of our goals with this meal is to destigmatize plant-based diets,” said Morgan. “I feel like people either don’t know what they are at all or it comes with a negative connotation, and were working to fight against that and show that plant-based food can be made at home, and it can be good and fulfilling. We are raising awareness for these types of diets and that they’re achievable.”
