To convince diners to try vegetarian food, a hospital focuses on the climate : Shots

Michael Hawley, general manager of the kitchen at Faulkner Hospital, places roasted tomatoes into a pot as he prepares the roasted tomato and shallot coulis.

Jesse Costa/WBUR

A table outside a Boston hospital cafeteria offers samples of a daily special: a soba noodle stir-fry with shiitake mushrooms and mixed vegetables. Andrea Venable, a parking services employee in a bright red uniform shirt, picks up a small plastic cup and peeks inside.

“Looks like noodles,” says Venable. She shrugs. “I don’t know. I guess I’ll give it a try.”

She likes the sample but she’s not convinced by the cafeteria’s efforts to introduce more plant-based dishes. “I think it’s good for the people that eat, like, vegetarian,” she says.

Venable is not one of them. She likes meat and isn’t interested in eating less of it.

Therein lies the challenge for Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital leaders. It’s hard to persuade people to cut back on meat. Faulkner started trying about 20 years ago for health reasons. “Meatless Mondays” generated a lot of complaints at the hospital. And don’t even ask about the time they cut fries and chicken nuggets from the menu.

But hospital leaders say they’ve noticed a shift since at least 2020 when they began framing their efforts around climate change. Patients and employees who wouldn’t adjust their diet to improve their own health are doing it for the greater good.

“It’s a little bit more altruistic in that way,” says Susan Langill, the hospital’s director of food services, which are provided by the company Sodexo. “They are putting the earth and future generations before their own health.”

Faulkner is one of…