Beyond Meat Is Coming to 450 Hospitals, Cafeterias, and Ballparks Nationwide

Global food-service provider Aramark is adding Beyond Meat burgers, sausages, and crumbles to its menu selections at 450 colleges, hospitals, businesses, and ballparks nationwide. Aramark—which serves nearly 2 billion meals each year—is offering, or working to develop, Beyond Meat-based meals such as a Gumbo bowl using Beyond Sausage for hospital patient menus; a New Orleans-inspired plate featuring “dirty grains” and greens topped with Beyond Sausage; a Caribbean-inspired Beyond Burger with black beans, avocado, pineapple, and sriracha at Minute Maid Park in Houston, TX; and Beyond Sausage at Kansas City’s Kauffman Stadium and Citi Field in Queens, NY. “The trick for us is to develop and offer unique meatless options that taste great and appeal to consumers who might want to try something new and those who follow plant-forward diets,” Heidi Hogan, vice president of product development and culinary innovation at Aramark, said. “Early on, we understood that consumer preferences were driving a need for quality plant-forward offerings and our culinary team has been working with a broad range of plant-based products, to create more enticing menu choices.” The addition of Beyond Meat is part of Aramark’s plant-forward initiative which includes adding more than 200 new plant-based recipes, making 30 percent of its menu offerings vegan or vegetarian, and training its more than 1,200 chefs to cook plant-based dishes. In addition to Beyond Meat, Aramark recently partnered with vegan companies such as JUST and Ocean Hugger Foods to offer limited-time, plant-based menu items at select locations.