Do-gooder dorm move-out, vegan carrot hotdogs to grill, Unilever Food Solutions’ splashy tablescapes of the future and more

Heart of Foodservice: In this installment of FSD’s weekly series on good food, good deeds and stealable ideas, we see college students fighting food insecurity on campus, dietetic interns competing Chopped-style with wild mystery baskets, conversation-sparking place settings with Unilever Food Solutions at futuristic Chicago restaurant Esme, and more.

Coinciding with the release of its Future Menus Top North America Trends 2024 report, Unilever Food Solutions (UFS) hosted a one-of-a-kind tasting experience at Esme, an ever-evolving Michelin-starred restaurant in Chicago. The meal was a natural entryway into talking about topics like modernized comfort food, low-waste menus, irresistible vegetables and more. The fish dish pictured above was served on a placemat filled with water on top of an AI-imagined image. Chef Brandon Collins, recently featured on FSD’s podcast, narrated the interactive dinner.

Sodexo, Move for Hunger and California Lutheran University (Cal Lutheran) collected 904 pounds of non-perishable food and beverages to donate to the Campus Food Pantry and a local food bank, courtesy of students moving out of dorms and finishing out their school year on a positive note. Not just a one-time thing, Sodexo frequently works with Cal Lutheran to donate food items to the Community Cupboard, run by the university. Along with Swipe Out Hunger, a Meal Swipe Bank for food-insecure students has been established as well.

Dietetic interns from the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University (SBU) teamed up with Stony Brook Medicine’s Distinguished Dining Services team to show off the skills they’ve honed in the past year via a cooking competition that got fast and furious. Mystery baskets included unlikely ingredients like tapioca flour, venison, gochujang, figs, coffee and purple basil, and the teams used their time wisely with help from SBU Hospital Chef and Production Manager Eric Veilleux. First place went to interns Grace Daly and Kristina Maggiacomo (pictured), who made a blueberry crumble coffee cake.

At George Mason University, Mason Dining heated things up with the Too Hot to Handle Spicy Expose, inspired by YouTube’s Hot Ones series, in which celebs get asked increasingly tough questions to accompany increasingly spicy chicken wings. In this recurring event, spicy questions posed to participants have included “So, what major do you avoid dating?” Too Hot to Handle has grown to weeklong events highlighting culinary diversity, with spicy flavors hailing from South Korea, India and the Caribbean.

The culinary masterminds of Cura Hospitality have developed a vegan carrot hot dog recipe that’s really on the money. Using ordinary pantry items like soy sauce and honey, the carrots get the flavor, and through a quick boil, the texture is quite close, too. Add your own grill marks, and you’ve got a wiener—uh, winner!