GROVE CITY, Pa. – The second annual Eat Local Challenge, hosted by Bon Appétit, Grove City College’s food service, will take place Oct. 3 on campus. That day, more than 400 Bon Appétit restaurants and cafes nationwide will serve a lunch made entirely of ingredients produced within a 150-mile radius of each facility.

The Eat Local Challenge meal goes beyond the normal scope of Bon Appétit’s Farm to Fork program, which has been in existence companywide since 1998 and on the Grove City campus for five years. Farm to Fork is aimed at supporting the local community through the purchase and use of product grown and/or produced within a 150-mile radius.

The Eat Local Challenge mandates that all ingredients in the menu item must be grown within a 150-mile radius, with the one exception being salt. The challenge of the Eat Local menu is that ingredients such as sugar and many other spices, citrus, bananas, baking powder, yeast, chocolate, coffee and tea are not grown within 150 miles of the campus.

According to Ralph Mura, general manager for Bon Appétit Management Company, the Eat Local Challenge will offer the campus community, as well as staff and students, educational information about the issues that surround local food supply and steps they can take to preserve agricultural and local artisan heritage. There will be an information table in each cafe with educational materials from Bon Appétit and other groups focused on protecting the local food supply.

The Eat Local Challenge menu offerings in the cafes will include:

• Honey glazed chicken: chicken, Frederick Farms, Fredericksburg, Pa.;
   honey, Rodney Bobby, Mercer, Pa.
• Beanless bison chili: buffalo meat, Forbes Buffalo Acres Farm, New
   Castle, Pa.; vegetables, Lengel Brothers Farm, Mercer, Pa.
• Cheesy scalloped potatoes: potatoes, Lengel Brothers Farm;
   cheeses, Laubschers Cheese Co., Mercer, Pa.
• Milk and butter: Turner Dairy, Penn Hills, Pa., and DuBois, Pa.
• Sautéed squash: zucchini and yellow squash, Lengel Brothers Farm;
   butter, Turner Dairy.
• Autumn beet salad: beets, Brenckle’s Farm and Green House, Troy,
   Pa., apple cider, Rodney Bobby.
• Butternut squash soup: butternut squash, Lengel Brothers Farm;
   milk and butter, Turner Dairy; speltz flour, Stutzman Farms, Oberlin,
   Ohio.
• Peasant flat bread: speltz flour, Stutzman Farms; milk, Turner Dairy;
   eggs, Dreamtime Farms, Mercer, Pa.
• Baked honey apples: apples and honey, Rodney Bobby.
• Watermelon water: watermelons, Lengel Brothers Farm; bottled
   water, Emlenton Water Bottling Company, Emlenton, Pa.
• Apple cider: Rodney Bobby.

Bon Appétit will also offer locally grown buffalo burgers at the GeDunk snack bar in the Student Union.