We talked to Addie’s about their local, trendy food

Green juices, acai bowls, oatmeal bars, oh my!

BC students are no strangers to health trends. We wear Lululemon like it’s a uniform, actually go to the Plex, and like all good citizens, run marathons.

Boston College has helped us follow these healthy trends. In the past year, BC has introduced green juices to Mac and expanded Eagle’s Nest to have a two-part salad station. Addie’s makes acai bowls for breakfast, and their hand-made oatmeal bars are completely organic. (Shoutout to the banana bay smoothie).

So for the most part, it seems like we don’t have to search out healthy dining options (though we seem to know how many calories are in Late Nite).

The Tab sat down with the general manager of Lower and Addie’s to discuss just exactly how on-trend our dining options are.

Our perception of Addie’s was a little – we thought organic food was the focus.

But Derrick Cripps, General Manager of Addie’s corrected me. He said: “Local and sustainable is more of the goal.”

Cripps said: “[We] can’t get flour, salt, within a hundred miles. When you’re looking at a recipe, how far down do you go?”

Ultimately, Addie’s tries to get things as locally as they can. This is particularly challenging during the winter months in New England, where ingredients like fruit are completely unsustainable.

Regarding winter, Cripps said: “Cheese and all that we have locked in. Tomatoes and lettuce we can get. [We] typically start introducing root vegetable pizza that we can get during the winter season, but selection becomes nothing.

“If you truly want to be sustainable, things [like fruit] shouldn’t be offered at that time of year. But we also know you want it, so we provide it.”

In the instances which Addie’s can’t source an ingredient locally, they do know the chain of growth and production. For example, our flatbreads come from New York, and the flour that makes them comes from North Dakota.

Tomatoes, Cripps said, are usually from Florida, California and Mexico. They’re usually frozen and sauce is made down the road. However, there’s a company in Pennslyvania and New Jersey which BC works with where the pick the tomatoes and make the sauce all at once, so they’re not frozen. Cripps said they couldn’t get tomato sauce in the volume they need any closer.

There are organic options at Addie’s, like the oatmeal bars. The powder for the acai bowls is organic as well – but not local, because those are grown in Brazil.

In fact, acai bowls have been a huge hit for breakfast on Lower campus. The idea sparked this past summer, when Cripps attended a presentation on “food trends.” Acai was a #trendy food and “it is organic and fits with the message upstairs”

However, Cripps said: “Acai can be expensive and hard to get – 22 lbs. is $750.”

We went to Addie’s for one last flatbread and they were closed 🙁

The leadership of dining services was working on expanding breakfast options, because they “wanted to draw sales up to the Mini Mart, but didn’t get any.”

Cripps added: “[It’s] hard to get people to go upstairs. Everything [is] designed to be quick – food in one hand, coffee in the other hand. Usually grab-and-go.”

Though the addition of breakfast in Addie’s didn’t improve the Mini Mart, Cripps said they still want to keep it open. Thankfully, that means espresso will still be on the meal plan.

Though some ingredients overlap with Lower, Addie’s definitely has its own identity according to Cripps.

Addie’s is the longest-running concept Lower has ever had upstairs. Cripps said: “Before that, a concept typically lasted one to two years. [At] this one, the count keeps going up, keeps getting stronger.

“Last year, it could be hitting 900 [transactions] a night.”

Cripps was clear to note Addie’s and Lower are businesses. He said: “We’re not a grocery store – we could never compete with that price.

“People don’t understand the benefits we give our employees – the same benefits the professors have.

“We help pay for other departments – light, electricity, facilities – because we’re a revenue-generating company. We’re not a money maker. Our goal is to break even.”

With Addie’s continuing to evolve more and more, it will be interesting to see what the next change is.

Right now, through working with the Gulf of Maine Institute, Addie’s hopes to introduce sustainably grown shrimp to the menu upstairs.

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