When Wabash students break for lunch, they’re literally getting a local flavor.
Wabash’s catering company, Bon Appetit, is led by chef Jordan Hall, who delves deep into Indiana’s resources by going to local farms when searching for meats, eggs and vegetables.
"We are utilizing all the products Indiana has to offer," said Hall, a Veedersburg native. "This is the best corn in the country, hands down, and there is no other tomato like an Indiana tomato, especially at peak season."
Hall, a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Minneapolis, uses a Web site to find a list of farmers in the area. He will meet with them and decide if there is a product he wants to use. Recently, Hall decided to use products from Moody Farms near Browns Valley, after seeing a newspaper clipping in the Journal Review.
Adam Moody will provide Bon Appetit with grass-fed beef, eggs and free-range chicken.
"He’s really excited to work with us," Hall said. "As far as networking, what Adam Moody is going to provide Bon Appetit is going to be huge."
Bon Appetit also gets cabbage, zucchini, tomatoes and watermelons from Roger Myers in Waynetown. Other state farms used by Bon Appetit include Fair Oaks farms in Valparaiso, where he gets cheeses for the salad bar and is working up a program for milk for Wabash students.
Hall is working up a program to receive winter vegetables from John Feree in Danville and he relies on Capriole Inc. in Greenville, which has been showcased by TV celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse and is the best goat cheese farm in the state.
"Bon Appetit is very strenuous when choosing accounts," Hall said.
While looking for locality, Bon Appetit also seeks healthiness in its menu, which changes every week. Bon Appetit seeks to eliminate trans fats, serve poultry and hamburgers raised without the use of antibiotics as a routine feed additive, ensures shell egg purchases are certified humane and cage free and offer milk free of artificial bovine growth hormones.
There’s another reason for partnering with Moody.
"The time and passion he puts into his chickens, he’s very humane to them," Hall said, noting Moody operates a USDA approved slaughterhouse.
Hall has eight years experience and came to Crawfordsville from the Indianapolis restaurant scene, most recently at Lexplorateur — which was an AAA 4-diamond establishment by the time he left. But Bon Appetit was appealing to him when seeking a new place to boast his culinary skills.
"Bon Appetit always has been a company that’s been built on sustainability (defined on the Bon Appetit Web site as celebrating flavor, affirming regional cultural traditions and supporting local communities without compromising air, water or soil, now and in the future)," he said. "We’re (the general public) really getting into putting stuff into our body that we have no idea about."
Once Hall decided to apply as the head chef, it didn’t take long for Bon Appetit General Manager Mary Jo Arthur to realize he was the right guy for the job.
"I knew immediately he was a good fit for Bon Appetit," she said. "He understands the locality and the sustainability (as important)."