Universities Tackle Waste by Repurposing Food

A new collaboration between university dining leaders and food waste nonprofit ReFED is proving that culinary creativity can yield powerful returns—not just for campus kitchens, but for people and the planet.

The Menus of Change University Research Collaborative (MCURC), an alliance of over 80 higher education institutions, foodservice partners, and researchers, recently wrapped a 12 week research sprint aimed at tackling one of the food industry’s most persistent challenges: pre-consumer food waste. Working in partnership with ReFED, the initiative focused on transforming surplus ingredients into viable, appetizing dishes – while tracking cost savings, carbon emissions, and staff morale along the way.

Chefs from nine universities were asked to develop just one or two recipes using repurposed ingredients. But what started as a modest challenge quickly became a revelation. “Our goal was really to look at how chefs’ creativity could be utilized as a food waste solution,” explained Abby Fammartino, Co-Director of MCURC. “We wanted to know, how does repurposing as a food waste solution impact an operation, quantitatively and qualitatively?”

The impact was immediate and multifaceted. At Vanderbilt University, Head Chef Brian Cochrane initially worried that staff might view the shift as burdensome. “The concern, or the hesitancy within leadership in our division was, is that going to be possible? That sounds like a lot,” Cochrane recalled. But his fears quickly faded. A simple broccoli slaw, made using broccoli stems that would have otherwise been discarded, became a turning point.

“The cooks assistants, our prep cooks, they got excited. They got invigorated and they started saving everything. They became part of that energy,” Cochrane said. Rather than feeling taxed by the new approach, the kitchen staff found renewed enthusiasm for their craft – a trend that was echoed at other participating institutions. “That was the biggest takeaway that we heard, that it was very fun for the teams and inspiring, motivating for the chefs to work on this challenge,” Fammartino said.

ReFED’s Executive Director, Sara Burnett, says that while waste prevention remains the gold standard in sustainability efforts, repurposing surplus food offers a critical – and often overlooked – next step. “We can’t prevent all the waste. We’re not able to predict exactly how much to produce all the time,” Burnett explained. “Repurposing is the next step on that journey. It is a way to get through all that volatility that naturally happens in foodservice.”

And the data backs it up. In just one month, the nine participating universities involved saved approximately $20,000 in food costs. The environmental impact was just as significant – equivalent to conserving 21,000 gallons of water and avoiding 545,000 tons of carbon emissions. Burnett emphasized the added benefit: “You did all that while making your employees more engaged and excited about going to work.”

Such gains came from only a couple of recipe substitutions per campus. Fammartino is confident that even greater savings await institutions willing to scale the approach. “You can extrapolate that. If you’re doing more than just two recipes, using repurposing to sort of guide the way you’re leading your operation, then there can be even more savings.”

At Vanderbilt, Cochrane’s team has embraced repurposing as a cornerstone of their operations. They’ve since crafted a sorghum grain salad using dressing made from aquafaba – the liquid drained from canned chickpeas – and transformed fruit pulp into curds and cobblers. These dishes, many of which now appear in the Repurpose with a Purpose Operational Toolkit developed from the research findings, have proved not only economical but popular.

“An operation like ours is fluid, it’s non-stop, and we need something turnkey,” said Cochrane. “Those recipes are so valuable to us to be able to just say, like, here, it’s easy, do this.”

Indeed, the results are resonating with more than just kitchen staff. Cochrane reports that the dining hall where the repurposing program was piloted has now become the most popular residential college dining facility on Vanderbilt’s campus – a testament to how sustainability, taste, and efficiency can coexist.

As MCURC and ReFED work to share their Toolkit more broadly, they aim to equip other institutions with concrete strategies to implement more sustainable, cost effective dining. For Burnett, the appeal is clear. “At the end of the day, every kitchen leader is really looking for win-win solutions,” she said. “And repurposing is just that, it’s really that kind of triple bottom line win that everybody’s looking for.”