August 29, 2024 • 48 mins
Can repurposing leftover food truly transform a community? Join us on this captivating episode of the Walk-In Talk Podcast as we spotlight the extraordinary food4vols initiative, led by the passionate and inventive Tyler White. With 25 years of culinary expertise, Tyler has taken a simple idea—repurposing high-quality leftover food—and turned it into a lifesaving mission against food insecurity at the University of Tennessee. From Crescent City Meats' eclectic sausage offerings to the unforgettable mortadella sandwich with burrata and pistachio puree, this episode is a feast of both flavors and inspiration. #Metro #KitchenStorageMakeover
Kitchen Storage Makeover
https://fesmag.com/ksm
Learn more:
https://rhtm.utk.edu/food4vols/
Discover the intricate journey of establishing a food redistribution program on a college campus, a challenge that Tyler and his team have embraced head-on. Learn about the hurdles they encountered, from financing and acquiring vehicles to ensuring food safety and handling an unexpectedly high volume of food waste. Tyler's dedication and resourcefulness shine through as he recounts the creative solutions implemented, such as using pool noodles to stabilize hotel pans, and the impressive capacity to produce up to 600 meals a day thanks to significant renovations and t
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hello Food Fam.
This is the Walk Talk podcastwhere you will find the perfect
blend of food fun and cookingknowledge.
I'm your host, carl Fiorini.
Welcome to the number one foodpodcast in the country.
We're recording on site at IbisImages Studios, where food
photography comes alive and Iget to eat it.
If you missed last week'sepisode with first watch
(00:30):
corporate chef Big Daddy Shane,I love him.
It's a must listen and theirfood is a must eat.
Go check out all of theirlocations across the country.
So I'm into quality made smokedfish dips and spreads, and I
know you are too.
Check out our friends over atCrab Island Seafood Company.
The Mahi Dip is magical and Imean that sincerely.
(00:52):
Visit them atcrabislandseafooddipcom.
Doc's own, pooch Rivera and PiusMedia's Glenn Haggerty traveled
over to Knoxville, tennessee.
You've kind of heard me talkingabout this for a while.
They covered Metro Shelving'skitchen storage makeover.
This is an amazing contestcreated by Metro Storage and
(01:14):
Distribution Systems inconjunction with FENS Magazine.
Well, we've got the winner andrecipient, mr Tyler White.
He is from Food for Vols.
It's a real feel-good story.
Tyler and his father help feedpeople lots of them.
We're doing a really cool thingwith this and I can't wait to
(01:37):
jump into it.
It's curbing food insecurity.
It's a cool thing.
Stand by, tyler is on deck andJefferson, my man, how you doing
, I'm fabulous man.
All right, john, I'm not evengoing to ask you an answer, it
(01:57):
doesn't matter.
Well, he will, he just likethis, all right.
So Crescent City Meats Allright, we got the meats.
Sausage.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
We got the sausage, the sausage.
All right, talk about it.
We got the sausage, the sausage, talk about it.
I can't wait to dig into thisone, especially because one has
got pork and crawfish.
Then we have the brand iscalled Boudin, but it is
actually pork burnt ends brisket.
Can't wait to get into that one.
And then the last one is thatgator, and then that one we're
(02:24):
going to do like a almost like ahotdog style, but without
relish and without sauerkraut.
I'm actually going to convertthat into Cajun spiced coast law
.
And then I did a drunken Bingcherries.
So I did like vodka and soakedthem, but like about a Bing
cherry.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah About a Bing, okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
And then made a relish with that, with the
Marasaki peppers that I grow inthe garden and some red pepper,
and then some scallions andstuff like that.
But then we also have dulce deleche ribs.
I can't wait to try this one.
Infused it with a little bit ofchipotle, so think salted
caramel on pork.
And then I did an apple relishor apple slaw and then, by the
(03:05):
way, no mayonnaise, john, yeah,he's happy.
And then I did a peach vinegarto add to that, and then little
sliced julienne onion, red onionto be specific, and then your
favorite candied pecan.
So I wanted to have that apple.
The dulce de leche, almost likean apple pie on the pork, is
what I was going for.
And then I did these stuffedchicken legs with guava and
(03:28):
whipped brie herbs, pulled theskin back and then filled it
back in with the puree ofchicken, with all that stuff,
stuffed chicken, and then bakedit off with a scotch bonnet,
agave, coconut rum glaze, thatone, I was really like wowed by
(03:48):
that one, just because it stayedtogether and it looked like a
chicken leg.
And lastly, we're doing areally good burger, a riff on,
like my buddy george patty downthere meat tap room.
It's gonna have peanut butter,peanut butter powder with banana
like fluff, and then the burgerjohn's ancho right, there are
ancho peppers yeah john's fromfrom the garden, from the garden
(04:09):
here roasted those off.
We're gonna have a little bit ofcheese in there and then some
just really good food today.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
So you're gonna be, you're gonna be really happy I
mean I'm happy now thinkingabout it, right, I mean I've
seen all the ingredients.
You gave me a a little uhflavor spoonful of that
pistachio puree.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
That's the goomba, yeah, mortadella sandwich yeah,
mortadella sandwich with burratathe the curd inside the burrata
is what I'm going to melt ontop.
And then that one's going tohave the pistachio puree,
roasted garlic puree.
Just one of those sandwichesthat you feel like nonna just
made you a sandwich becauseyou're not feeling well and it's
just going to hug you in theinside.
So something like that you know?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
I mean, I, I'd like to have that today, right, you
know?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
you're all, you're all bamboozled with the whole
bunch of, with the kids and thisand that, and I got you, got
you.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Oh yeah, you know it, this has been probably this is
a rough start of the school year.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
You know, for the last couple of weeks, man, it
has been one heck of atransition I will say this the
jump from elementary school formy daughter to the wake-up call
going to middle school, it's,she's.
I've never seen my kid go tobed at nine o'clock, like
willingly go to bed at nineo'clock.
And you mentioned, uh, chefsugar shane over there on, uh,
(05:23):
first watch.
Yeah, I went there sunday.
I took the family.
Oh, no, kidding, yeah, I wentover to.
And and you mentioned ChefSugar Shane over there on First
Watch.
Yeah, I went there Sunday, Itook the family.
Oh, no, kidding, yeah, I wentover to.
And I forgot, totally forgot,being what he said 23 of them
are test kitchens.
Yeah, I'm like, oh, you guysare going to be getting the
dragon.
What was the dragon called theBlazing Dragon?
Like, no, we're not.
Like, oh man, I forgot.
(05:44):
And the whole reason why Iwanted Jillian to try the
Blazing Dragon, that drink wasgoing to be awesome.
But no she had something elsewhich she loved.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
Yeah, actually there was a fellow who, so that you
know, obviously we John'sphotography is top notch and
somebody reached out to me afterseeing some of the photos of
that drink and it was actually alocal gin manufacturer,
distiller, whatever, and yeah,we're going to talk and he's
(06:11):
going to drop some product off.
John just perked up.
Yeah, because you know,remember, in that post I don't
know if that was Facebook orLinkedIn or whatever, but you
know, somebody mentioned likehey, this would be some, uh,
some booze, and I was like 100anyway, I think it was me that
day right.
Where's the gin on that rightand on that same thread post is
(06:36):
this cat.
Oh, that's awesome.
Yeah, so anyway nothing betteryeah, yeah.
So it'll be fun.
We're gonna we to rock that out.
All right, so without furtherado, let's welcome today's guest
, mr Tyler White.
How are you doing, sir?
I'm doing well, excellent man.
Thank you for being on the showtoday.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
No problem.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
And you're the winner .
I mean, that's awesome, we arethe winner, you are, you are the
champion.
So this thing is a big deal,this with Metro, you know, they,
they, they call out $50,000,you know worth of a kitchen
storage makeover, but it's, it'sdefinitely more than that.
I know that it is, and it's agreat, it's a terrific sort of I
(07:22):
don't know if you call it acompetition, but it's amazing.
And you know, tyler, here isthe recipient.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
You know, tyler, why don't you go ahead and give like
the 30,000 foot view of whereyou come from, what you do in
food and you know?
Kind of lay that out All right?
Well, my history I've beenworking in kitchens for about 25
years.
I've been working in kitchensfor about 25 years.
Started out in North Carolinawhen I got my bachelor's at
Western Carolina University,came to the University of
Tennessee to get my master's inhospitality and tourism and then
kind of stayed on board here atthe university teaching
culinary arts and then justrecently we launched the Food
(07:59):
for Ball program here at theUniversity of Tennessee in 2021.
So somewhat of a long span ofbeing in kitchens and teaching
all together.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Yeah, that's terrific .
At some point, you know, maybewe could arrange to have you
here and you can, you know, cookin studio.
We can do some cool photographyand stuff like that and kind of
put help help to.
You know, put the word out withwhat you're doing, can you?
How did you get started withthis food for vols, cause?
This is, you know, put the wordout with what you're doing, can
you?
How did you get started withthis food for vols, cause?
This is, you know, foodinsecurity is kind of a you know
(08:30):
big thing right now, and howdid you get into this?
Speaker 3 (08:35):
So we got into this meeting with the sustainability
manager here on UTK campus,which he does a really good job
of composting, and the managercame to me saying, hey, there's
all this food being wasted oncampus.
Ut does a really good job ofcomposting.
And the manager came to mesaying, hey, there's all this
food being wasted on campus andit's like really good food, Like
it's not chicken tenders andfries and things like that.
It's like salmon and theseother things.
(08:57):
So we met and said what can wedo about it?
There's all these students whoare hungry.
Ut had just released a reportthat 30% of college students
were food insecure and westarted kind of piecing
everything together and said Ithink we can do something here.
We have the facility, we havethe equipment, I have myself and
that's kind of where PooperBalls originated from was.
(09:18):
We understood there was wasteon campus and we understood
there was hunger on campus andwe kind of fused the two
together campus and weunderstood there was hunger on
campus and we kind of fused thetwo together.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
So at what moment did you realize that this was an
actual I don't want to say abusiness model?
But you know that you canactually execute this and make
it go.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
So we started in 2020 , right Kind of during COVID is
when we figured out okay, weneed to do something.
And 20, we had an AmeriCorpsVISTA member here for for a year
helping us research, figuringit out.
We talked to a lot of otheruniversities about what they
were doing in order to figureout what Food for Balls was
going to be.
We very underestimated what itcould be, because it's a monster
(09:58):
now, but it was in that 2020,right after post-COVID is kind
of when we figured out how topiece it all together.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
Well, what were some of the hurdles that you faced
when you were trying to kickthis off?
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Financing is a big one.
The food is free on campus.
That's the easy part, right.
I can collect all theoverproduced food for free, but
we had to acquire a vehicle togo around and collect it.
We had to overcome everybody'sdoubts about food safety so we
work with the Knox County HealthDepartment on that on what we
needed to do to abide by all theregulations and stuff that we
(10:31):
have here in Tennessee, whichreally isn't that much.
Then we had to figure out how wewere going to make the meals.
Where were we going to storethem?
What packaging were we going touse?
There was a ton of little ittybitty hurdles.
Packaging were we going to use?
There was a ton of little ittybitty hurdles.
The biggest hurdle that we hadto overcome was we got too much
food.
We under predicted how muchfood we were going to get.
(10:51):
We thought we would get maybe6,000 pounds from October to May
in an academic year and we got20,000 pounds in the first two
months.
So that was our biggest hurdlewas overcoming our lack of
knowledge on how much food wastethere actually was.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Can you repeat that number 20,000 pounds in two
months.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
Yeah.
So now for us here UT we have asmall football team that does
kind of okay at some othersports and we didn't anticipate
collecting from athletics, fromfootball games.
And in those first two monthsthat we launched I had a little
Dodge van and we collected20,000 pounds of food in the
first two months that weoperated.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
So tell us when you, when you're mentioning cause,
some of the listeners arefoodies and they don't realize
about, you know, the cold chainand and it has up and what that
means, and why do we have to beso vigilant about the, the cold
chain?
Speaker 3 (11:49):
yeah.
So we're really particularabout where we pick up what and
how we do.
We provide all the containers.
We control a lot of thetemperature, so I have
refrigerated vans that go andget it.
We make sure that the food isat temp when we get it.
We cool it down and kind ofmonitor it the whole way.
We have access to all diningstemp logs at all times too.
(12:11):
If we wanted to pull and testsomething we get to see on their
hot boxes at the football games, every time they temp that hot
box pulling that food out.
So we're very vigilant inmaking sure that everything
we're touching has been handledcorrectly up until the time we
get it as well.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So you still have to do and follow more strict
protocols than, let's say, maybea restaurant would because of
the HACCP that you're dealingwith, already cooked or RTE food
or raw food coming into yourfacility and then redistributing
it, correct?
Speaker 3 (12:43):
No.
So there's a big loophole inTennessee about what they'll
regulate and what they won'tregulate.
So really we don't have a lotof the health department because
everything we do is for free.
We fall under the GoodSamaritans Act.
As long as we're handling it ingood faith, that we're
following the rules and whiledining, followed all the rules,
(13:06):
that's all we're really heldliable to.
We go above and beyond and makesure that we're temping and
doing stuff, but the statereally only monitors what I do
in the academic classroom.
They really don't monitor whatwe do in our nonprofit.
That's free.
Now, if I was charging for thisfood, if I was charging all the
recipients who get all the food, we then kind of fall under the
(13:26):
restaurant regulations andthings like that.
But because we're doingeverything for free and we're
doing in good faith, there'sactually very little regulation,
which is a little bit scary.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Well, you know.
So let's switch gears a littlebit into Metro, right?
So you, you were picked, youwere chosen and they came in and
they did this.
I saw the before and afterpictures and they did a pretty
amazing makeover at the uh atthe kitchen.
Can you talk about what they'vedone?
Speaker 3 (13:56):
Yeah.
So they came in and ended up umrenovating six different areas
and some of the areas are notthings they normally do.
We have an 18-foot box truckthat they were able to get on
and, like I said, it's the heartof our operation.
That truck runs all day, everyday, collecting and distributing
food and they had to come upwith some really neat ways to
(14:18):
make it safer for our workers togo out and collect this food,
to store it on the truck, sothat things aren't sliding
around and falling over.
So the truck was reallysomething that they hadn't
really dabbled in before when itcomes to what Metro does.
But a lot of their shelvingthings they already had in
existence could be modified.
So it was really neat to seethe creativity the team had in
(14:40):
how to address a truck fortransportation.
The other five rooms.
They did really well impactswhat we're able to do here.
So we've made up to 350 to 400meals a day in the past and we
told Metro, hey, we need to getto 500 or 600.
So they spent a lot of time inour production facility putting
in new tables and new shelvingso that we can get more students
(15:04):
, volunteers, in there makingthese meals, tables and stuff
they put in there was the top ofthe line of what they had and
and for us is like the, thecadillac of our facility now is
what metro put in.
That's what we're going to showoff, because that's the best
thing we have here tyler, tellme how pool noodles, a pool
(15:27):
noodle and a food rack gotogether.
So we started out.
One of the hurdles wasfinancing and me and our
football coordinator his name isAndrew White, he's my father,
so he and I are creative.
We're also really big hoardersand we needed a way to collect
(15:49):
like 30 to 40 hotel pans of foodat a time and Bye, bye, baby
closed and they had some oftheir movable racks.
So we went and bought those,but the pans slide in it because
this doesn't fit perfectly.
It wasn't meant for food pans.
I was able to bend the panswith some pliers to make it fit,
but they were sliding.
(16:09):
So we thought what can we putin there?
One of them has a ratchet strapthat goes through it.
The other ones have poolnoodles that we take together so
that we can wedge it in thereso the pans don't slide.
Pool noodles are like a buck apiece.
With $2, we can do a shelf andthen it works for what we need
it to.
We're creative.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
And hoarders.
Well, the hoarding thing helpedout a lot in this case because,
like I said, I saw the, I sawthe photos of the before and
after and I'm looking at therack and I'm like what the hell
is the deal with the, with thepool noodles?
But you know, it served.
It served the purpose.
How many times do I have totell you chefs are macgyvers?
100, 100 I mean it really is itworked?
Speaker 2 (16:48):
but it's, you know, it's so funny.
It's like you seem morepassionate about and I would be
too, because it's so cool whenyou have structure.
That Metro came in.
You sound more excited aboutthe shelving and the ability to
store more than it would be theactual making the food for the
product or for the people,correct, because it's going to
be, it's going to be a lot more.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
It's like Christmas then coming now and AJ and them
who are here, we're like hereyou go.
It's like I can store morestuff, I can hoard more I can I
get to keep all the other racks.
We move somewhere and we'relike, well, where do we store on
those now?
So, yeah, no it.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
It was like christmas , getting all this new space to
put more things I will say thatwhen you, when you're dealing
with a truck when I worked for abroadliner it was difficult we
would use the trailer forstorage unit and to put just a
speed rack, because they're notflat floors, they've got grooves
, obviously, and you can't workin that and it's slippery, it's
(17:46):
dangerous.
So it's funny how, how metro,because of the talent they have
with their engineers, can walkin and just design something
right there for you.
I would.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
I can't wait to see pictures of that.
Yeah, well, I can't wait to seethe video because, basically so
, aj, you know, from metro, wehad a, we had a call the other
day and it was an impromptu sortof thing and we just kind of,
you know, recapped on the tripover there.
So the work, the manual laborthat goes into, you know, doing
(18:18):
these makeovers, is astounding.
And you know you're talkingabout measurements and you're
talking about, you know, piecesand little pieces and more
pieces and other things, and nowyou're talking about oh hey,
we're short here on you knowproduct A, b or C, so now
they're overnighting.
You know other, you know the,the, the, the fix or the missing
(18:42):
part or whatever.
It's a huge endeavor and I mean, and I want to give a serious
applaud to, to AJ and the teamfor at Metro for doing this, I
mean it is really a feel-goodstory.
It needs to be done more andmore.
And it needs to be done and,Tyler, you were saying how
(19:04):
there's a way to scale this outtoo correct?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Correct, so our program really doesn't take that
much to run.
Like I have one staff member,andrew, I help oversee some of
the purchasing and things likethat.
He's on the ground all day,every day, but it really isn't
that complicated to replicate.
So the University of SouthCarolina and Montana State
University are in the process ofreplicating this on their
campuses.
I think they're launchingspring of 25.
(19:28):
It's a very easy thing to beable to replicate.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
My thing is, I'm still trying to wrap my head
around 20,000 pounds of extrafood.
That to me.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
We did 160,000 pounds last year.
We're on track to do almost200,000 pounds this year.
Football is two days away.
We average on a football game4,000 to 7,000 pounds now per
football game.
And that's not popcorn andchips and stuff.
That's Skybox beef, prime riband all these other different
things coming out of theSkyboxes here.
So we move a lot of food.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
And just to be clear, people listening.
This isn't like a half-eatenhot dog or something that
they're repurposing.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
It's all overproduction, right that's
what I want to point out, it'sthe overproduction, and thank
God that they noticed it andthey came to you and said we
have a problem.
Here's a way we could feed morepeople instead of just putting
it into the you know, whateverthat trash bin or yeah, compost
and trash and it's not theirfault most of the time.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Like if it rains this weekend, half the people are
going to leave early from thegame and they still have all
that food left.
There's nothing.
They couldn't have planned itany different.
So we're blessed that we'rehere to be able to take that
food and serve not only those oncampus who are hungry, but we
also reach four countiessurrounding the university, from
nonprofits, from homelessshelters to rehab facilities and
(20:50):
ministries and things like that.
So our reach continues to grow.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
And then, what do you guys do as far as prep?
How does that work?
Do you get the food to make amenu, or is it just hey, we're
going to do this.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Yeah, so Andrew is a trained executive chef.
He's been in the industry for40 plus years.
So we collect the food we'llsay in the afternoon.
The next morning Andrew comesin and has to like jigsaw it all
together and makes his menusEvery day.
We usually have between eightand 12 different menu options
(21:23):
that we'll do, and it'sdifferent.
He gets to piece it together.
So he's the mad scientistlooking at what am I going to do
with the shrimp?
What am I going to do with thisenchilada sauce or this,
whatever he has?
And he creates brand new menuitems every single day.
Sometimes there's cookinginvolved, we get a lot of raw
product, and sometimes it's assimple as just putting a couple
(21:43):
things together and there's noother cooking needed.
But he does that every singleday.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
I just want to let people know I'm laughing and
rubbing my head because I do amenu every week and it's usually
three to six items.
He's doing that every singleday.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
I'm producing 40 to 50 of those meals for every menu
item.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
I mean, listen, this is one of those like.
This is a me chilling sort ofscenario here.
These guys should get a starfor the uh, the way they're
turning their menus over and howmany people prep with andrew so
he does all the prep himself.
Speaker 3 (22:19):
I help.
Or we have an americorps memberwho helps a little bit just
getting the food together.
Simple, he can do it in in twoto three hours each day.
He spends kind of prepping andgetting it together.
To assemble the meals takes asmall army and we generally have
eight to ten people here makingthe meals, mostly made up of
volunteers from the university.
(22:40):
The students will come andvolunteer and help us do this.
I have a couple work-studystudents and the AmeriCorps
member, so any given time wecould have up to ten assembling
the meals and they assemble allthe meals in a two hour period
in the afternoon.
That's all we have that we cankind of set aside.
So they're doing 300 to 400meals in two hours every single
day.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
What's the process of finding volunteers and listing
these people?
How do you manage to do that?
Speaker 3 (23:07):
It's actually quite simple.
No, no, we don't have to do anyof that that's awesome, so UT
they've adopted a new site.
It's actually quite simple.
No, no, we don't have to do anyof that.
That's awesome.
So UT they've adopted a newsite.
It's called Give Pulse, and alot of classes and a lot of
programs on campus requirevolunteer.
Right, we're the volunteers.
So a lot of classes andorganizations on campus require
volunteer hours.
So we post our stuff on acalendar that everybody can see.
(23:30):
It logs the hours for thestudents and kind of tracks how
many times they volunteered eachyear, and we fill up every
single day.
We do not have a problemgetting volunteers, which is the
opposite of what you think of,for a nonprofit operating like
downtown Knoxville may struggletrying to find volunteers on a
daily basis.
We have wait lists on all ourvolunteer opportunities.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
That's wonderful to hear.
How are you tracking theprogress of the effectiveness of
the program?
Speaker 3 (24:01):
So currently we track it based on production.
The more meals we're making,the more meals that are being
taken is the less food waste oncampus.
We recently got a couple grantsthat we are now creating
surveys to go on and surveythese students and we're trying
to do some pre and postevaluations of what was your
level of food insecurity beforeyou found out about Food for
(24:22):
Balls?
What is it now that you've beenusing Food for Balls?
So we are doing some survey andresearch on the specific
students using our program.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
What was when we spoke yesterday?
The other day, a couple of daysago, you had mentioned that it
isn't just students, correct?
Go into how you're helping somelike your ministry work, and
get into some of that.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
Yep.
So we make these ready tomicrowave meals that we give to
campus and that's open to staffmembers who might be making
minimum wage.
It goes to students whoeverwants it, we don't care who
needs to eat.
But that's only a small portion.
So last year we collected160,000 pounds of food.
60,000 pounds went to campus,100,000 went to community
(25:05):
partners.
So Knox Area Rescue Ministriesis one of our closest partners.
They feed 300 people a day,three times a day breakfast,
lunch and dinner.
They deal mainly with homelesshere in Knoxville and we give
them food twice a week, upwardsof 120 to 200 4-inch hotel pans
of food every single week.
(25:25):
That helps them feed andproduce their 900 meals that
they need to do every singleweek.
We have other partners that aredoing lots of work with people
coming out of incarceration sothey come and get our food and
they're able to help thesepeople eat.
We have rehabilitation centersand ministries that come.
We're willing to donate food towhoever needs it and we usually
(25:46):
can't find enough partners totake the food.
So Second Harvest of EastTennessee really has stepped in
to help us identify thesepartners, bring them into us and
we're able then to get the foodfurther out into the
communities that need it.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
Are you having much waste yourself after the fact?
Are you left kind of holding itback?
Speaker 3 (26:05):
Very minimal food waste that we have on our end
and any food waste we have goesinto compost.
Ut has a massive compostfacility on campus so they are
able to process all the foodthat we have.
They can process all kinds ofbones that I have left over from
class, animal fat and thingslike that that are able to
handle at their compost site.
(26:25):
So we really are able to stopany food from going into the
trash can because we make surethat it goes to compost and it
all is going where it needs togo.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
So if you're looking into 2026, right, or 20, you
know, 25 into 26.
Yeah, and 26.
This was a multi-year question,Yep.
Are there projections on thesort of is it the same?
You know, sort of 200,000pounds a year worth of food.
Are you expecting that to behigher coming up into the next
(26:57):
two years?
Speaker 3 (26:59):
We don't know that we can physically collect more
than 200,000.
We think that might be our maxof what we can hold in our one
refrigerator per day collectionand our hope is that when we
collect all this food wedocument where did we get the
food from, how much was it, wasit protein, starch, vegetable
dessert?
And we give this data back toeach facility that we collect it
(27:22):
from.
Our hope is to reduce waste andhelp with hunger at the same
time.
So our hope is that we don'tmaintain at 200,000 and we don't
grow, because our programshould help these companies
reduce their amount of waste andoverproduction, because they
can look back at trends and say,hey, first week of school we're
(27:43):
always overproducing.
We have three years of data nowthat we can look back on and
track and try to help theseentities on campus do better.
So hopefully we don't growbigger than 200,000, because I
don't think we can physically doit.
So that's our hope.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Is there?
I don't know the answer to this, so forgive me, but are you I
mean, let's just say that youhave these ready to eat meals
that you're putting together,what's the?
Are you allowed to ship those?
Is there a way for somebody toyou know they want to
participate and help, kind ofyou know move the food, so to
speak?
Are they able to?
(28:18):
Can you ship that?
Speaker 3 (28:20):
Yeah, it's probably not something that we would be
comfortable doing, unless we'relooking at dry ice and able to
make sure that we're freezingthe meals Any overproduced meals
that we have now we freeze andthe students take home over the
weekends or they do it overbreaks and things like that.
But we have found that freezingis an effective way to not let
(28:40):
the food go out of date when wemake these meals, but shipping
might be complicated.
Food go out of date and we makethese meals, but shipping might
be complicated.
We are looking at a new programfor the summer that we'll be
trying to give thesemicrowavable meals out in the
summer to the community, but Idon't think shipping is
something that we'd be able tocost on.
That, I think would probablymake it out of the reach as well
in order to ship.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
So does everybody in the neighborhood.
Is everyone aware of you?
Speaker 3 (29:06):
No, very few know we exist and it's for a reason we
like being a little bit quietabout what we do, because we
don't want people to abuse theprogram and plan all of their
meals through us and for thosewho don't need it.
So we don't have a lot ofmarketing that we're doing right
now.
We don't have great websites orsocial media.
(29:26):
We're working on that, but it'skind of we wanted to go pretty
slow with the program.
Make sure that we could meetthe need, Cause the last thing I
want is empty refrigerators oncampus.
That I manage.
I don't want somebody who needsa meal to walk up and be like,
oh no, there's nothing for mehere.
So we really try to try tomanage what we can produce and
make sure that everybody who'shungry gets it without running
(29:49):
out.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
So how are you walking that?
That's a tightrope.
How are you managing that?
Speaker 3 (29:54):
So right now Big Orange Pantry on campus handles
the majority of our meals andstudents and faculty and staff
have to go in.
They're allowed one meal at atime, so we're able to make sure
that people aren't taking morethan they really need.
So that's how we're doing itcurrently is just kind of they
go in, they see it, they'reallowed one meal and that's it.
The other locations we have oncampus aren't managed.
(30:16):
It's just refrigerators andmicrowaves and kind of a pantry
that has chips and bars and allthese other things that we get
and are able to go, but there'sno monitoring on those ones.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Now you are also a professor, correct?
Speaker 3 (30:32):
I do teach here as well.
Yes, talk about that.
So we have a culinary institutehere and I oversee the culinary
institute and Food for Ballsfalls under this umbrella.
Our culinaryinary Institute isa series of classes and faculty
who do research and outreachthat we do.
Our academic classes are reallydesigned to enhance certain
(30:53):
degrees here on campus foodscience, nutrition, hospitality
and tourism.
We try to teach these studentsin those majors what a real
kitchen is like.
Our kitchen is not set up likemaybe some of the big culinary
schools where everybody hastheir own stove and pot and pan.
We're set up with one hotline.
Everybody has to share theequipment, share some of the
other stuff, just like you wouldin a regular restaurant.
(31:16):
But we want these students tounderstand how to run a
restaurant.
How does it work, what are thefinances, what are all these
things that go with it.
They're not going to leave herebeing proficient and able to go
out and be executive chefs, butthey're going to go out and be
better assistant managers andgeneral managers and things like
that, understanding what theback of house is, or they
understand the terminology, thefinances behind it, how to
(31:39):
purchase, what these differentnew vendors are and how to
negotiate with them.
So we really spent a lot oftime are and how to negotiate
with them.
So we really spent a lot oftime kind of on the theory and
how to run a kitchen versusspending all day in the
laboratory.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
So there's a marriage between operations and
creativity, where you and yourfather are living.
What is your passion then?
Speaker 3 (32:03):
It's a little bit of everything.
I really like teaching andshowing these students how to be
creative, and that kind of goeswith the food for balls and
what Andrew's doing.
We're creating a new class.
That's all I call it art.
I have a class that we'recreating where the students have
to do what Andrew's doing.
They're going to come in andwe're going to learn.
It might be casserole day andthey have to go in the cooler
(32:26):
and look at everything that wehave available in there and be
able to make a casserole out ofwhat we have on hand.
And there's like a stew day orthere's a hand pie day or an
international day that we'regoing to do.
That's going to be reallycreative.
So I really like coming up withkind of new ideas, new programs
.
I guess that's my passion iscoming up with these new ways to
(32:46):
make everything exciting.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
I like the fact that the food scientists get into the
kitchen and see how a kitchenruns instead of being like an
accountant.
No offense to them.
Who are the pencil pushers thatput these things out and say
this is what we're going to runit now and it doesn't work.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Well, not even that the food scientists that come in
because we have bush beans herein town.
So a lot of the students gothere and say, hey, we're going
to make this bean and I'm like,well, what are we going to do
with that bean?
We try to show them.
Before you make something, youshould talk to the chefs and
figure out what they're going todo with it before you just come
out with it.
So that's kind of something new.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
That they haven't seen is how to utilize some of
the products in the kitchen,versus just making something up
I think an interesting point,also kind of in line with this,
is so there is this, it's a youknow the university of Tennessee
, right, and?
And then there's thischaritable sort of component to
it.
And you're, you're, you'reliving, you're actually
(33:40):
executing, you know you'reteaching and delivering, you're
doing both, and you're you knowno-transcript actually get out
(34:06):
into the trade like you andAndrew were doing.
I think that's spectacular andshould be applauded.
Speaker 3 (34:12):
And they get to see us do that every day, like they
see that we don't stop.
We're here at seven in themorning, we leave at five.
I don't have an educator'sschedule, I have an industry
schedule on what we do and thestudents see us moving all day,
every day schedule and what wedo, and the students see us
moving all day, every day.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
How do you feel about being an educator and hearing
some chefs go well, those thatcan't, you know, take it, teach
it.
Speaker 3 (34:32):
You don't fall into that or is it those who, yeah,
no, no, I mean I still do it.
So we cater.
Like I have football I saidbefore I football coming this
saturday.
I have a catering for 600people off site and it's going
to be me, andrew and onework-study student that are
doing it.
I'm doing a wing festival thisSunday for up to 10,000 people.
We just got finished making 80gallons of sauce to be able to
(34:54):
go to this thing.
I teach for a small portion ofmy day and the rest of my day
I'm still in the industry doingit all.
So we still have to, and youhave to, know more than what the
students know and be able to doit better than them.
So it's not that those ineducation can't hack it, it's
there.
They found a different way toexpress what they know, and not
(35:15):
everybody can be a teacher,right?
Not everybody can show somebodyhow to do what they do you are
like the indiana jones of offood man you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Like I wanted to point, I wanted to point this
out specifically because that'swhat you hear when, like someone
like me who left the industryquote unquote, left the industry
and went work for a broad liner.
Well, you, you can't cookanymore, you couldn't take it.
No, it had nothing to do withthat.
Speaker 3 (35:38):
We're just smarter.
We learn we want to have to bein the kitchen on the weekends
and nights and stuff like that.
We're just smarter.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
I don't know it's smarter because, I'll be honest
with you, I think I worked a lotmore hours when I worked for
the broad liner.
Wasn't physical hours, but itwas definitely more hours than I
did when I was working in thekitchen.
Yeah, oh my God, yeah, and it'sa misconception that well, well
, I you teach?
Speaker 1 (36:13):
huh, no, it's a lot more work.
Well, just to be clear,anything that has to do with
jeffrey schlissel is mental.
I mean, let's, let's put it outthere touche, yeah, touche, so
all right.
So then, tyler, what do you sofor people who are, you know,
have this passion to to cook,they have a passion maybe to to
help out the community they havehave this feel about this what
do you recommend to somebody toget involved, either with you or
something similar in anotherstate?
What would you say to that?
Speaker 3 (36:35):
So for those who want to start something similar to
this, I'm more than happy toshare all of the bumps and
bruises that we learned alongthe way to help them create
something like this.
It's very simple to replicateit.
There's also probably programslike this already existing in
their community.
Right, meals on Wheels is verysimilar to what we're doing.
I'm unique in that I'mcapturing all the food in one
(36:57):
area.
Right, we're using theuniversity as that geographical
area.
But there's other things thatthey could do.
They could set this up wherethey're collecting food and
taking it to food pantries thatexist in their area.
Second Harvest, like I said,for us in East Tennessee, is the
one who's helping us with someof the logistics a little bit.
I need extra food.
They help us with it.
The partnerships are what makethis work.
(37:21):
You can't do it by yourself.
I rely heavily on SecondHarvest.
They rely on me to help them.
We are all partners in how wedo this, so you can't have too
many partners with it.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
How do you get your funding, man?
I mean, you got to do stuffright.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Correct.
We have to buy every one ofthose microwavable containers,
we have to buy our vehicles, payfor the gas and all that.
So we've been very blessed thatwe're actually very good at
fundraising and we areself-funded.
We average every year probablyin the $30,000 to $50,000 that
we need to operate Food forBalls, and as we produce more
(37:57):
meals we have to do some morefundraising, but we've been very
good at it thus far.
Because of Andrew and I'sbackground we're able to do
catering to raise money,festivals and things like that.
So we're out there slinging itjust like we were in a kitchen
trying to make money to supportthe program.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
Well, if somebody wanted to support what you're
doing Food for Vols.
How do they do that?
Speaker 3 (38:18):
So we do have a website.
It's through the university.
You can just search for Foodfor Vols University of Tennessee
it should take you there andthere's a page where they can do
tax-deductible donations.
We're able to give credit forgifts in kind and things like
that.
We're working with a companynow hopefully trying to get them
some vehicle help and thingslike that, so we're able to help
(38:40):
make sure that it'stax-deductible and that they're
getting the credit that thatthey deserve for helping us out.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
Well, I'll make sure to to add that into the
description of the podcast, thisepisode.
You know, if anyone listeningwould want to participate, that
would be terrific.
Speaker 3 (38:57):
Yeah, we'd be super happy to to have some partners
come on and help us.
That's a little bit less workwe have to do going out on the
weekends doing catering tryingto support them all.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
Are you taking vacations?
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Like what's up with you?
Are you getting time off orwhat?
I went to Key West for a coupleof days over the summer.
That's probably the onlyvacation I'll have this year.
I think it's three days, allright.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
So the next time you're going to go to Key West
or somewhere in Florida, you gotto pass through the studio.
Speaker 3 (39:30):
We got to pass through the studio, we got to
set it up.
Okay, I want to make sure thatI'm clear.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
I have a good friend that lives in hudson florida,
just north of y'all, so shouldbe easy to get there.
Yeah, no, hudson's not far.
It's maybe an hour and a half,something like that.
Speaker 3 (39:35):
Maybe a deuce I gotta fly into saint saint pete
anyway.
Right, allegiant knoxville hasa direct flight straight down to
saint pete oh, saint p Pete'slike an hour from here.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Yeah, no, no, that would be awesome.
Yeah, man, cause then there'salways things to talk about off
air, you know, and uh, andthere's a lot.
I can just tell you thatthere's a lot.
We kind of, we kind of, youknow, poked at a few different
things the other day on our call.
But yeah, man, I'd love to uhto meet you in person.
Speaker 3 (40:02):
Yeah, no, usually it's easier when the semester is
done.
So we're looking December,january and then I got all
summer coming.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
I will tell you this you said you were from.
You went to what school?
For college?
Speaker 3 (40:14):
I went.
I went to Western Carolinauniversity.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
North.
Speaker 3 (40:17):
Carolina for bachelors.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
We're in Cullowhee, North Carolina, which is near
Dillsboro right, which is nearDillsboro right and Boone.
Speaker 3 (40:24):
It is near Dillsboro.
Speaker 2 (40:25):
Yes, so I only know one other person in the United
States that went there and it'smy best friend, and he took me
there to Paradise Falls.
Let me just tell you, ifanybody wants to go see a
beautiful campus, and especiallythat surrounding area,
dillsboro and Boone Farm Boone,rather, is just fantastic.
Speaker 3 (40:45):
It's a beautiful country up there.
Yeah, no, that whole area ofwestern North Carolina is very
picturesque.
They play tonight, too,football.
They're going to get creamed,but they play tonight.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
They were never very good I wonder why how many
people go to that school.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
I honestly think it was 8,000 or 9,000 when I was
there and UT's at like thirtysix thousand.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Oh, my goodness.
Well, I'll tell you what We'llkeep an eye out for the, for the
score.
It's going to be an ass kicking.
Tyler, I appreciate you being onthe show.
We appreciate you being here.
Just want to give a sincerethanks to Metro Storage and
Distribution for kind ofconnecting us.
I can't wait to see the videoand I can't wait to see our
(41:28):
video, because we have our owncoverage of this thing.
It's going to be bad ass again.
Tyler, thanks for being on theprogram.
Thank you all for having me.
Excellent, john.
Jeffrey man Screw you guys.
No, we, we are out.
Jeffrey man screw you guys.
No, we, we are out.
(41:49):
We'll see you next time.
Hello Food Fam.
This is the Walk Talk podcastwhere you will find the perfect
blend of food fun and cookingknowledge.
I'm your host, carl Fiorini.
Welcome to the number one foodpodcast in the country.
We're recording on site at IbisImages Studios, where food
photography comes alive and Iget to eat it.
If you missed last week'sepisode with first watch
(00:30):
corporate chef Big Daddy Shane,I love him.
It's a must listen and theirfood is a must eat.
Go check out all of theirlocations across the country.
So I'm into quality made smokedfish dips and spreads, and I
know you are too.
Check out our friends over atCrab Island Seafood Company.
The Mahi Dip is magical and Imean that sincerely.
(00:52):
Visit them atcrabislandseafooddipcom.
Doc's own, pooch Rivera and PiusMedia's Glenn Haggerty traveled
over to Knoxville, tennessee.
You've kind of heard me talkingabout this for a while.
They covered Metro Shelving'skitchen storage makeover.
This is an amazing contestcreated by Metro Storage and
(01:14):
Distribution Systems inconjunction with FENS Magazine.
Well, we've got the winner andrecipient, mr Tyler White.
He is from Food for Vols.
It's a real feel-good story.
Tyler and his father help feedpeople lots of them.
We're doing a really cool thingwith this and I can't wait to
(01:37):
jump into it.
It's curbing food insecurity.
It's a cool thing.
Stand by, tyler is on deck andJefferson, my man, how you doing
, I'm fabulous man.
All right, john, I'm not evengoing to ask you an answer, it
(01:57):
doesn't matter.
Well, he will, he just likethis, all right.
So Crescent City Meats Allright, we got the meats.
Sausage.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
We got the sausage, the sausage.
All right, talk about it.
We got the sausage, the sausage, talk about it.
I can't wait to dig into thisone, especially because one has
got pork and crawfish.
Then we have the brand iscalled Boudin, but it is
actually pork burnt ends brisket.
Can't wait to get into that one.
And then the last one is thatgator, and then that one we're
(02:24):
going to do like a almost like ahotdog style, but without
relish and without sauerkraut.
I'm actually going to convertthat into Cajun spiced coast law
.
And then I did a drunken Bingcherries.
So I did like vodka and soakedthem, but like about a Bing
cherry.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah About a Bing, okay, okay.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
And then made a relish with that, with the
Marasaki peppers that I grow inthe garden and some red pepper,
and then some scallions andstuff like that.
But then we also have dulce deleche ribs.
I can't wait to try this one.
Infused it with a little bit ofchipotle, so think salted
caramel on pork.
And then I did an apple relishor apple slaw and then, by the
(03:05):
way, no mayonnaise, john, yeah,he's happy.
And then I did a peach vinegarto add to that, and then little
sliced julienne onion, red onionto be specific, and then your
favorite candied pecan.
So I wanted to have that apple.
The dulce de leche, almost likean apple pie on the pork, is
what I was going for.
And then I did these stuffedchicken legs with guava and
(03:28):
whipped brie herbs, pulled theskin back and then filled it
back in with the puree ofchicken, with all that stuff,
stuffed chicken, and then bakedit off with a scotch bonnet,
agave, coconut rum glaze, thatone, I was really like wowed by
(03:48):
that one, just because it stayedtogether and it looked like a
chicken leg.
And lastly, we're doing areally good burger, a riff on,
like my buddy george patty downthere meat tap room.
It's gonna have peanut butter,peanut butter powder with banana
like fluff, and then the burgerjohn's ancho right, there are
ancho peppers yeah john's fromfrom the garden, from the garden
(04:09):
here roasted those off.
We're gonna have a little bit ofcheese in there and then some
just really good food today.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
So you're gonna be, you're gonna be really happy I
mean I'm happy now thinkingabout it, right, I mean I've
seen all the ingredients.
You gave me a a little uhflavor spoonful of that
pistachio puree.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
That's the goomba, yeah, mortadella sandwich yeah,
mortadella sandwich with burratathe the curd inside the burrata
is what I'm going to melt ontop.
And then that one's going tohave the pistachio puree,
roasted garlic puree.
Just one of those sandwichesthat you feel like nonna just
made you a sandwich becauseyou're not feeling well and it's
just going to hug you in theinside.
So something like that you know?
Speaker 1 (04:49):
I mean, I, I'd like to have that today, right, you
know?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
you're all, you're all bamboozled with the whole
bunch of, with the kids and thisand that, and I got you, got
you.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Oh yeah, you know it, this has been probably this is
a rough start of the school year.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
You know, for the last couple of weeks, man, it
has been one heck of atransition I will say this the
jump from elementary school formy daughter to the wake-up call
going to middle school, it's,she's.
I've never seen my kid go tobed at nine o'clock, like
willingly go to bed at nineo'clock.
And you mentioned, uh, chefsugar shane over there on, uh,
(05:23):
first watch.
Yeah, I went there sunday.
I took the family.
Oh, no, kidding, yeah, I wentover to.
And and you mentioned ChefSugar Shane over there on First
Watch.
Yeah, I went there Sunday, Itook the family.
Oh, no, kidding, yeah, I wentover to.
And I forgot, totally forgot,being what he said 23 of them
are test kitchens.
Yeah, I'm like, oh, you guysare going to be getting the
dragon.
What was the dragon called theBlazing Dragon?
Like, no, we're not.
Like, oh man, I forgot.
(05:44):
And the whole reason why Iwanted Jillian to try the
Blazing Dragon, that drink wasgoing to be awesome.
But no she had something elsewhich she loved.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
Yeah, actually there was a fellow who, so that you
know, obviously we John'sphotography is top notch and
somebody reached out to me afterseeing some of the photos of
that drink and it was actually alocal gin manufacturer,
distiller, whatever, and yeah,we're going to talk and he's
(06:11):
going to drop some product off.
John just perked up.
Yeah, because you know,remember, in that post I don't
know if that was Facebook orLinkedIn or whatever, but you
know, somebody mentioned likehey, this would be some, uh,
some booze, and I was like 100anyway, I think it was me that
day right.
Where's the gin on that rightand on that same thread post is
(06:36):
this cat.
Oh, that's awesome.
Yeah, so anyway nothing betteryeah, yeah.
So it'll be fun.
We're gonna we to rock that out.
All right, so without furtherado, let's welcome today's guest
, mr Tyler White.
How are you doing, sir?
I'm doing well, excellent man.
Thank you for being on the showtoday.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
No problem.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
And you're the winner .
I mean, that's awesome, we arethe winner, you are, you are the
champion.
So this thing is a big deal,this with Metro, you know, they,
they, they call out $50,000,you know worth of a kitchen
storage makeover, but it's, it'sdefinitely more than that.
I know that it is, and it's agreat, it's a terrific sort of I
(07:22):
don't know if you call it acompetition, but it's amazing.
And you know, tyler, here isthe recipient.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
You know, tyler, why don't you go ahead and give like
the 30,000 foot view of whereyou come from, what you do in
food and you know?
Kind of lay that out All right?
Well, my history I've beenworking in kitchens for about 25
years.
I've been working in kitchensfor about 25 years.
Started out in North Carolinawhen I got my bachelor's at
Western Carolina University,came to the University of
Tennessee to get my master's inhospitality and tourism and then
kind of stayed on board here atthe university teaching
culinary arts and then justrecently we launched the Food
(07:59):
for Ball program here at theUniversity of Tennessee in 2021.
So somewhat of a long span ofbeing in kitchens and teaching
all together.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Yeah, that's terrific .
At some point, you know, maybewe could arrange to have you
here and you can, you know, cookin studio.
We can do some cool photographyand stuff like that and kind of
put help help to.
You know, put the word out withwhat you're doing, can you?
How did you get started withthis food for vols, cause?
This is, you know, put the wordout with what you're doing, can
you?
How did you get started withthis food for vols, cause?
This is, you know, foodinsecurity is kind of a you know
(08:30):
big thing right now, and howdid you get into this?
Speaker 3 (08:35):
So we got into this meeting with the sustainability
manager here on UTK campus,which he does a really good job
of composting, and the managercame to me saying, hey, there's
all this food being wasted oncampus.
Ut does a really good job ofcomposting.
And the manager came to mesaying, hey, there's all this
food being wasted on campus andit's like really good food, Like
it's not chicken tenders andfries and things like that.
It's like salmon and theseother things.
(08:57):
So we met and said what can wedo about it?
There's all these students whoare hungry.
Ut had just released a reportthat 30% of college students
were food insecure and westarted kind of piecing
everything together and said Ithink we can do something here.
We have the facility, we havethe equipment, I have myself and
that's kind of where PooperBalls originated from was.
(09:18):
We understood there was wasteon campus and we understood
there was hunger on campus andwe kind of fused the two
together campus and weunderstood there was hunger on
campus and we kind of fused thetwo together.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
So at what moment did you realize that this was an
actual I don't want to say abusiness model?
But you know that you canactually execute this and make
it go.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
So we started in 2020 , right Kind of during COVID is
when we figured out okay, weneed to do something.
And 20, we had an AmeriCorpsVISTA member here for for a year
helping us research, figuringit out.
We talked to a lot of otheruniversities about what they
were doing in order to figureout what Food for Balls was
going to be.
We very underestimated what itcould be, because it's a monster
(09:58):
now, but it was in that 2020,right after post-COVID is kind
of when we figured out how topiece it all together.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
Well, what were some of the hurdles that you faced
when you were trying to kickthis off?
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Financing is a big one.
The food is free on campus.
That's the easy part, right.
I can collect all theoverproduced food for free, but
we had to acquire a vehicle togo around and collect it.
We had to overcome everybody'sdoubts about food safety so we
work with the Knox County HealthDepartment on that on what we
needed to do to abide by all theregulations and stuff that we
(10:31):
have here in Tennessee, whichreally isn't that much.
Then we had to figure out how wewere going to make the meals.
Where were we going to storethem?
What packaging were we going touse?
There was a ton of little ittybitty hurdles.
Packaging were we going to use?
There was a ton of little ittybitty hurdles.
The biggest hurdle that we hadto overcome was we got too much
food.
We under predicted how muchfood we were going to get.
(10:51):
We thought we would get maybe6,000 pounds from October to May
in an academic year and we got20,000 pounds in the first two
months.
So that was our biggest hurdlewas overcoming our lack of
knowledge on how much food wastethere actually was.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Can you repeat that number 20,000 pounds in two
months.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
Yeah.
So now for us here UT we have asmall football team that does
kind of okay at some othersports and we didn't anticipate
collecting from athletics, fromfootball games.
And in those first two monthsthat we launched I had a little
Dodge van and we collected20,000 pounds of food in the
first two months that weoperated.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
So tell us when you, when you're mentioning cause,
some of the listeners arefoodies and they don't realize
about, you know, the cold chainand and it has up and what that
means, and why do we have to beso vigilant about the, the cold
chain?
Speaker 3 (11:49):
yeah.
So we're really particularabout where we pick up what and
how we do.
We provide all the containers.
We control a lot of thetemperature, so I have
refrigerated vans that go andget it.
We make sure that the food isat temp when we get it.
We cool it down and kind ofmonitor it the whole way.
We have access to all diningstemp logs at all times too.
(12:11):
If we wanted to pull and testsomething we get to see on their
hot boxes at the football games, every time they temp that hot
box pulling that food out.
So we're very vigilant inmaking sure that everything
we're touching has been handledcorrectly up until the time we
get it as well.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So you still have to do and follow more strict
protocols than, let's say, maybea restaurant would because of
the HACCP that you're dealingwith, already cooked or RTE food
or raw food coming into yourfacility and then redistributing
it, correct?
Speaker 3 (12:43):
No.
So there's a big loophole inTennessee about what they'll
regulate and what they won'tregulate.
So really we don't have a lotof the health department because
everything we do is for free.
We fall under the GoodSamaritans Act.
As long as we're handling it ingood faith, that we're
following the rules and whiledining, followed all the rules,
(13:06):
that's all we're really heldliable to.
We go above and beyond and makesure that we're temping and
doing stuff, but the statereally only monitors what I do
in the academic classroom.
They really don't monitor whatwe do in our nonprofit.
That's free.
Now, if I was charging for thisfood, if I was charging all the
recipients who get all the food, we then kind of fall under the
(13:26):
restaurant regulations andthings like that.
But because we're doingeverything for free and we're
doing in good faith, there'sactually very little regulation,
which is a little bit scary.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Well, you know.
So let's switch gears a littlebit into Metro, right?
So you, you were picked, youwere chosen and they came in and
they did this.
I saw the before and afterpictures and they did a pretty
amazing makeover at the uh atthe kitchen.
Can you talk about what they'vedone?
Speaker 3 (13:56):
Yeah.
So they came in and ended up umrenovating six different areas
and some of the areas are notthings they normally do.
We have an 18-foot box truckthat they were able to get on
and, like I said, it's the heartof our operation.
That truck runs all day, everyday, collecting and distributing
food and they had to come upwith some really neat ways to
(14:18):
make it safer for our workers togo out and collect this food,
to store it on the truck, sothat things aren't sliding
around and falling over.
So the truck was reallysomething that they hadn't
really dabbled in before when itcomes to what Metro does.
But a lot of their shelvingthings they already had in
existence could be modified.
So it was really neat to seethe creativity the team had in
(14:40):
how to address a truck fortransportation.
The other five rooms.
They did really well impactswhat we're able to do here.
So we've made up to 350 to 400meals a day in the past and we
told Metro, hey, we need to getto 500 or 600.
So they spent a lot of time inour production facility putting
in new tables and new shelvingso that we can get more students
(15:04):
, volunteers, in there makingthese meals, tables and stuff
they put in there was the top ofthe line of what they had and
and for us is like the, thecadillac of our facility now is
what metro put in.
That's what we're going to showoff, because that's the best
thing we have here tyler, tellme how pool noodles, a pool
(15:27):
noodle and a food rack gotogether.
So we started out.
One of the hurdles wasfinancing and me and our
football coordinator his name isAndrew White, he's my father,
so he and I are creative.
We're also really big hoardersand we needed a way to collect
(15:49):
like 30 to 40 hotel pans of foodat a time and Bye, bye, baby
closed and they had some oftheir movable racks.
So we went and bought those,but the pans slide in it because
this doesn't fit perfectly.
It wasn't meant for food pans.
I was able to bend the panswith some pliers to make it fit,
but they were sliding.
(16:09):
So we thought what can we putin there?
One of them has a ratchet strapthat goes through it.
The other ones have poolnoodles that we take together so
that we can wedge it in thereso the pans don't slide.
Pool noodles are like a buck apiece.
With $2, we can do a shelf andthen it works for what we need
it to.
We're creative.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
And hoarders.
Well, the hoarding thing helpedout a lot in this case because,
like I said, I saw the, I sawthe photos of the before and
after and I'm looking at therack and I'm like what the hell
is the deal with the, with thepool noodles?
But you know, it served.
It served the purpose.
How many times do I have totell you chefs are macgyvers?
100, 100 I mean it really is itworked?
Speaker 2 (16:48):
but it's, you know, it's so funny.
It's like you seem morepassionate about and I would be
too, because it's so cool whenyou have structure.
That Metro came in.
You sound more excited aboutthe shelving and the ability to
store more than it would be theactual making the food for the
product or for the people,correct, because it's going to
be, it's going to be a lot more.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
It's like Christmas then coming now and AJ and them
who are here, we're like hereyou go.
It's like I can store morestuff, I can hoard more I can I
get to keep all the other racks.
We move somewhere and we'relike, well, where do we store on
those now?
So, yeah, no it.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
It was like christmas , getting all this new space to
put more things I will say thatwhen you, when you're dealing
with a truck when I worked for abroadliner it was difficult we
would use the trailer forstorage unit and to put just a
speed rack, because they're notflat floors, they've got grooves
, obviously, and you can't workin that and it's slippery, it's
(17:46):
dangerous.
So it's funny how, how metro,because of the talent they have
with their engineers, can walkin and just design something
right there for you.
I would.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
I can't wait to see pictures of that.
Yeah, well, I can't wait to seethe video because, basically so
, aj, you know, from metro, wehad a, we had a call the other
day and it was an impromptu sortof thing and we just kind of,
you know, recapped on the tripover there.
So the work, the manual laborthat goes into, you know, doing
(18:18):
these makeovers, is astounding.
And you know you're talkingabout measurements and you're
talking about, you know, piecesand little pieces and more
pieces and other things, and nowyou're talking about oh hey,
we're short here on you knowproduct A, b or C, so now
they're overnighting.
You know other, you know the,the, the, the fix or the missing
(18:42):
part or whatever.
It's a huge endeavor and I mean, and I want to give a serious
applaud to, to AJ and the teamfor at Metro for doing this, I
mean it is really a feel-goodstory.
It needs to be done more andmore.
And it needs to be done and,Tyler, you were saying how
(19:04):
there's a way to scale this outtoo correct?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Correct, so our program really doesn't take that
much to run.
Like I have one staff member,andrew, I help oversee some of
the purchasing and things likethat.
He's on the ground all day,every day, but it really isn't
that complicated to replicate.
So the University of SouthCarolina and Montana State
University are in the process ofreplicating this on their
campuses.
I think they're launchingspring of 25.
(19:28):
It's a very easy thing to beable to replicate.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
My thing is, I'm still trying to wrap my head
around 20,000 pounds of extrafood.
That to me.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
We did 160,000 pounds last year.
We're on track to do almost200,000 pounds this year.
Football is two days away.
We average on a football game4,000 to 7,000 pounds now per
football game.
And that's not popcorn andchips and stuff.
That's Skybox beef, prime riband all these other different
things coming out of theSkyboxes here.
So we move a lot of food.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
And just to be clear, people listening.
This isn't like a half-eatenhot dog or something that
they're repurposing.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
It's all overproduction, right that's
what I want to point out, it'sthe overproduction, and thank
God that they noticed it andthey came to you and said we
have a problem.
Here's a way we could feed morepeople instead of just putting
it into the you know, whateverthat trash bin or yeah, compost
and trash and it's not theirfault most of the time.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Like if it rains this weekend, half the people are
going to leave early from thegame and they still have all
that food left.
There's nothing.
They couldn't have planned itany different.
So we're blessed that we'rehere to be able to take that
food and serve not only those oncampus who are hungry, but we
also reach four countiessurrounding the university, from
nonprofits, from homelessshelters to rehab facilities and
(20:50):
ministries and things like that.
So our reach continues to grow.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
And then, what do you guys do as far as prep?
How does that work?
Do you get the food to make amenu, or is it just hey, we're
going to do this.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Yeah, so Andrew is a trained executive chef.
He's been in the industry for40 plus years.
So we collect the food we'llsay in the afternoon.
The next morning Andrew comesin and has to like jigsaw it all
together and makes his menusEvery day.
We usually have between eightand 12 different menu options
(21:23):
that we'll do, and it'sdifferent.
He gets to piece it together.
So he's the mad scientistlooking at what am I going to do
with the shrimp?
What am I going to do with thisenchilada sauce or this,
whatever he has?
And he creates brand new menuitems every single day.
Sometimes there's cookinginvolved, we get a lot of raw
product, and sometimes it's assimple as just putting a couple
(21:43):
things together and there's noother cooking needed.
But he does that every singleday.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
I just want to let people know I'm laughing and
rubbing my head because I do amenu every week and it's usually
three to six items.
He's doing that every singleday.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
I'm producing 40 to 50 of those meals for every menu
item.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
I mean, listen, this is one of those like.
This is a me chilling sort ofscenario here.
These guys should get a starfor the uh, the way they're
turning their menus over and howmany people prep with andrew so
he does all the prep himself.
Speaker 3 (22:19):
I help.
Or we have an americorps memberwho helps a little bit just
getting the food together.
Simple, he can do it in in twoto three hours each day.
He spends kind of prepping andgetting it together.
To assemble the meals takes asmall army and we generally have
eight to ten people here makingthe meals, mostly made up of
volunteers from the university.
(22:40):
The students will come andvolunteer and help us do this.
I have a couple work-studystudents and the AmeriCorps
member, so any given time wecould have up to ten assembling
the meals and they assemble allthe meals in a two hour period
in the afternoon.
That's all we have that we cankind of set aside.
So they're doing 300 to 400meals in two hours every single
day.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
What's the process of finding volunteers and listing
these people?
How do you manage to do that?
Speaker 3 (23:07):
It's actually quite simple.
No, no, we don't have to do anyof that that's awesome, so UT
they've adopted a new site.
It's actually quite simple.
No, no, we don't have to do anyof that.
That's awesome.
So UT they've adopted a newsite.
It's called Give Pulse, and alot of classes and a lot of
programs on campus requirevolunteer.
Right, we're the volunteers.
So a lot of classes andorganizations on campus require
volunteer hours.
So we post our stuff on acalendar that everybody can see.
(23:30):
It logs the hours for thestudents and kind of tracks how
many times they volunteered eachyear, and we fill up every
single day.
We do not have a problemgetting volunteers, which is the
opposite of what you think of,for a nonprofit operating like
downtown Knoxville may struggletrying to find volunteers on a
daily basis.
We have wait lists on all ourvolunteer opportunities.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
That's wonderful to hear.
How are you tracking theprogress of the effectiveness of
the program?
Speaker 3 (24:01):
So currently we track it based on production.
The more meals we're making,the more meals that are being
taken is the less food waste oncampus.
We recently got a couple grantsthat we are now creating
surveys to go on and surveythese students and we're trying
to do some pre and postevaluations of what was your
level of food insecurity beforeyou found out about Food for
(24:22):
Balls?
What is it now that you've beenusing Food for Balls?
So we are doing some survey andresearch on the specific
students using our program.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
What was when we spoke yesterday?
The other day, a couple of daysago, you had mentioned that it
isn't just students, correct?
Go into how you're helping somelike your ministry work, and
get into some of that.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
Yep.
So we make these ready tomicrowave meals that we give to
campus and that's open to staffmembers who might be making
minimum wage.
It goes to students whoeverwants it, we don't care who
needs to eat.
But that's only a small portion.
So last year we collected160,000 pounds of food.
60,000 pounds went to campus,100,000 went to community
(25:05):
partners.
So Knox Area Rescue Ministriesis one of our closest partners.
They feed 300 people a day,three times a day breakfast,
lunch and dinner.
They deal mainly with homelesshere in Knoxville and we give
them food twice a week, upwardsof 120 to 200 4-inch hotel pans
of food every single week.
(25:25):
That helps them feed andproduce their 900 meals that
they need to do every singleweek.
We have other partners that aredoing lots of work with people
coming out of incarceration sothey come and get our food and
they're able to help thesepeople eat.
We have rehabilitation centersand ministries that come.
We're willing to donate food towhoever needs it and we usually
(25:46):
can't find enough partners totake the food.
So Second Harvest of EastTennessee really has stepped in
to help us identify thesepartners, bring them into us and
we're able then to get the foodfurther out into the
communities that need it.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
Are you having much waste yourself after the fact?
Are you left kind of holding itback?
Speaker 3 (26:05):
Very minimal food waste that we have on our end
and any food waste we have goesinto compost.
Ut has a massive compostfacility on campus so they are
able to process all the foodthat we have.
They can process all kinds ofbones that I have left over from
class, animal fat and thingslike that that are able to
handle at their compost site.
(26:25):
So we really are able to stopany food from going into the
trash can because we make surethat it goes to compost and it
all is going where it needs togo.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
So if you're looking into 2026, right, or 20, you
know, 25 into 26.
Yeah, and 26.
This was a multi-year question,Yep.
Are there projections on thesort of is it the same?
You know, sort of 200,000pounds a year worth of food.
Are you expecting that to behigher coming up into the next
(26:57):
two years?
Speaker 3 (26:59):
We don't know that we can physically collect more
than 200,000.
We think that might be our maxof what we can hold in our one
refrigerator per day collectionand our hope is that when we
collect all this food wedocument where did we get the
food from, how much was it, wasit protein, starch, vegetable
dessert?
And we give this data back toeach facility that we collect it
(27:22):
from.
Our hope is to reduce waste andhelp with hunger at the same
time.
So our hope is that we don'tmaintain at 200,000 and we don't
grow, because our programshould help these companies
reduce their amount of waste andoverproduction, because they
can look back at trends and say,hey, first week of school we're
(27:43):
always overproducing.
We have three years of data nowthat we can look back on and
track and try to help theseentities on campus do better.
So hopefully we don't growbigger than 200,000, because I
don't think we can physically doit.
So that's our hope.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Is there?
I don't know the answer to this, so forgive me, but are you I
mean, let's just say that youhave these ready to eat meals
that you're putting together,what's the?
Are you allowed to ship those?
Is there a way for somebody toyou know they want to
participate and help, kind ofyou know move the food, so to
speak?
Are they able to?
(28:18):
Can you ship that?
Speaker 3 (28:20):
Yeah, it's probably not something that we would be
comfortable doing, unless we'relooking at dry ice and able to
make sure that we're freezingthe meals Any overproduced meals
that we have now we freeze andthe students take home over the
weekends or they do it overbreaks and things like that.
But we have found that freezingis an effective way to not let
(28:40):
the food go out of date when wemake these meals, but shipping
might be complicated.
Food go out of date and we makethese meals, but shipping might
be complicated.
We are looking at a new programfor the summer that we'll be
trying to give thesemicrowavable meals out in the
summer to the community, but Idon't think shipping is
something that we'd be able tocost on.
That, I think would probablymake it out of the reach as well
in order to ship.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
So does everybody in the neighborhood.
Is everyone aware of you?
Speaker 3 (29:06):
No, very few know we exist and it's for a reason we
like being a little bit quietabout what we do, because we
don't want people to abuse theprogram and plan all of their
meals through us and for thosewho don't need it.
So we don't have a lot ofmarketing that we're doing right
now.
We don't have great websites orsocial media.
(29:26):
We're working on that, but it'skind of we wanted to go pretty
slow with the program.
Make sure that we could meetthe need, Cause the last thing I
want is empty refrigerators oncampus.
That I manage.
I don't want somebody who needsa meal to walk up and be like,
oh no, there's nothing for mehere.
So we really try to try tomanage what we can produce and
make sure that everybody who'shungry gets it without running
(29:49):
out.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
So how are you walking that?
That's a tightrope.
How are you managing that?
Speaker 3 (29:54):
So right now Big Orange Pantry on campus handles
the majority of our meals andstudents and faculty and staff
have to go in.
They're allowed one meal at atime, so we're able to make sure
that people aren't taking morethan they really need.
So that's how we're doing itcurrently is just kind of they
go in, they see it, they'reallowed one meal and that's it.
The other locations we have oncampus aren't managed.
(30:16):
It's just refrigerators andmicrowaves and kind of a pantry
that has chips and bars and allthese other things that we get
and are able to go, but there'sno monitoring on those ones.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Now you are also a professor, correct?
Speaker 3 (30:32):
I do teach here as well.
Yes, talk about that.
So we have a culinary institutehere and I oversee the culinary
institute and Food for Ballsfalls under this umbrella.
Our culinaryinary Institute isa series of classes and faculty
who do research and outreachthat we do.
Our academic classes are reallydesigned to enhance certain
(30:53):
degrees here on campus foodscience, nutrition, hospitality
and tourism.
We try to teach these studentsin those majors what a real
kitchen is like.
Our kitchen is not set up likemaybe some of the big culinary
schools where everybody hastheir own stove and pot and pan.
We're set up with one hotline.
Everybody has to share theequipment, share some of the
other stuff, just like you wouldin a regular restaurant.
(31:16):
But we want these students tounderstand how to run a
restaurant.
How does it work, what are thefinances, what are all these
things that go with it.
They're not going to leave herebeing proficient and able to go
out and be executive chefs, butthey're going to go out and be
better assistant managers andgeneral managers and things like
that, understanding what theback of house is, or they
understand the terminology, thefinances behind it, how to
(31:39):
purchase, what these differentnew vendors are and how to
negotiate with them.
So we really spent a lot oftime are and how to negotiate
with them.
So we really spent a lot oftime kind of on the theory and
how to run a kitchen versusspending all day in the
laboratory.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
So there's a marriage between operations and
creativity, where you and yourfather are living.
What is your passion then?
Speaker 3 (32:03):
It's a little bit of everything.
I really like teaching andshowing these students how to be
creative, and that kind of goeswith the food for balls and
what Andrew's doing.
We're creating a new class.
That's all I call it art.
I have a class that we'recreating where the students have
to do what Andrew's doing.
They're going to come in andwe're going to learn.
It might be casserole day andthey have to go in the cooler
(32:26):
and look at everything that wehave available in there and be
able to make a casserole out ofwhat we have on hand.
And there's like a stew day orthere's a hand pie day or an
international day that we'regoing to do.
That's going to be reallycreative.
So I really like coming up withkind of new ideas, new programs
.
I guess that's my passion iscoming up with these new ways to
(32:46):
make everything exciting.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
I like the fact that the food scientists get into the
kitchen and see how a kitchenruns instead of being like an
accountant.
No offense to them.
Who are the pencil pushers thatput these things out and say
this is what we're going to runit now and it doesn't work.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Well, not even that the food scientists that come in
because we have bush beans herein town.
So a lot of the students gothere and say, hey, we're going
to make this bean and I'm like,well, what are we going to do
with that bean?
We try to show them.
Before you make something, youshould talk to the chefs and
figure out what they're going todo with it before you just come
out with it.
So that's kind of something new.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
That they haven't seen is how to utilize some of
the products in the kitchen,versus just making something up
I think an interesting point,also kind of in line with this,
is so there is this, it's a youknow the university of Tennessee
, right, and?
And then there's thischaritable sort of component to
it.
And you're, you're, you'reliving, you're actually
(33:40):
executing, you know you'reteaching and delivering, you're
doing both, and you're you knowno-transcript actually get out
(34:06):
into the trade like you andAndrew were doing.
I think that's spectacular andshould be applauded.
Speaker 3 (34:12):
And they get to see us do that every day, like they
see that we don't stop.
We're here at seven in themorning, we leave at five.
I don't have an educator'sschedule, I have an industry
schedule on what we do and thestudents see us moving all day,
every day schedule and what wedo, and the students see us
moving all day, every day.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
How do you feel about being an educator and hearing
some chefs go well, those thatcan't, you know, take it, teach
it.
Speaker 3 (34:32):
You don't fall into that or is it those who, yeah,
no, no, I mean I still do it.
So we cater.
Like I have football I saidbefore I football coming this
saturday.
I have a catering for 600people off site and it's going
to be me, andrew and onework-study student that are
doing it.
I'm doing a wing festival thisSunday for up to 10,000 people.
We just got finished making 80gallons of sauce to be able to
(34:54):
go to this thing.
I teach for a small portion ofmy day and the rest of my day
I'm still in the industry doingit all.
So we still have to, and youhave to, know more than what the
students know and be able to doit better than them.
So it's not that those ineducation can't hack it, it's
there.
They found a different way toexpress what they know, and not
(35:15):
everybody can be a teacher,right?
Not everybody can show somebodyhow to do what they do you are
like the indiana jones of offood man you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Like I wanted to point, I wanted to point this
out specifically because that'swhat you hear when, like someone
like me who left the industryquote unquote, left the industry
and went work for a broad liner.
Well, you, you can't cookanymore, you couldn't take it.
No, it had nothing to do withthat.
Speaker 3 (35:38):
We're just smarter.
We learn we want to have to bein the kitchen on the weekends
and nights and stuff like that.
We're just smarter.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
I don't know it's smarter because, I'll be honest
with you, I think I worked a lotmore hours when I worked for
the broad liner.
Wasn't physical hours, but itwas definitely more hours than I
did when I was working in thekitchen.
Yeah, oh my God, yeah, and it'sa misconception that well, well
, I you teach?
Speaker 1 (36:13):
huh, no, it's a lot more work.
Well, just to be clear,anything that has to do with
jeffrey schlissel is mental.
I mean, let's, let's put it outthere touche, yeah, touche, so
all right.
So then, tyler, what do you sofor people who are, you know,
have this passion to to cook,they have a passion maybe to to
help out the community they havehave this feel about this what
do you recommend to somebody toget involved, either with you or
something similar in anotherstate?
What would you say to that?
Speaker 3 (36:35):
So for those who want to start something similar to
this, I'm more than happy toshare all of the bumps and
bruises that we learned alongthe way to help them create
something like this.
It's very simple to replicateit.
There's also probably programslike this already existing in
their community.
Right, meals on Wheels is verysimilar to what we're doing.
I'm unique in that I'mcapturing all the food in one
(36:57):
area.
Right, we're using theuniversity as that geographical
area.
But there's other things thatthey could do.
They could set this up wherethey're collecting food and
taking it to food pantries thatexist in their area.
Second Harvest, like I said,for us in East Tennessee, is the
one who's helping us with someof the logistics a little bit.
I need extra food.
They help us with it.
The partnerships are what makethis work.
(37:21):
You can't do it by yourself.
I rely heavily on SecondHarvest.
They rely on me to help them.
We are all partners in how wedo this, so you can't have too
many partners with it.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
How do you get your funding, man?
I mean, you got to do stuffright.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Correct.
We have to buy every one ofthose microwavable containers,
we have to buy our vehicles, payfor the gas and all that.
So we've been very blessed thatwe're actually very good at
fundraising and we areself-funded.
We average every year probablyin the $30,000 to $50,000 that
we need to operate Food forBalls, and as we produce more
(37:57):
meals we have to do some morefundraising, but we've been very
good at it thus far.
Because of Andrew and I'sbackground we're able to do
catering to raise money,festivals and things like that.
So we're out there slinging itjust like we were in a kitchen
trying to make money to supportthe program.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
Well, if somebody wanted to support what you're
doing Food for Vols.
How do they do that?
Speaker 3 (38:18):
So we do have a website.
It's through the university.
You can just search for Foodfor Vols University of Tennessee
it should take you there andthere's a page where they can do
tax-deductible donations.
We're able to give credit forgifts in kind and things like
that.
We're working with a companynow hopefully trying to get them
some vehicle help and thingslike that, so we're able to help
(38:40):
make sure that it'stax-deductible and that they're
getting the credit that thatthey deserve for helping us out.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
Well, I'll make sure to to add that into the
description of the podcast, thisepisode.
You know, if anyone listeningwould want to participate, that
would be terrific.
Speaker 3 (38:57):
Yeah, we'd be super happy to to have some partners
come on and help us.
That's a little bit less workwe have to do going out on the
weekends doing catering tryingto support them all.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
Are you taking vacations?
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Like what's up with you?
Are you getting time off orwhat?
I went to Key West for a coupleof days over the summer.
That's probably the onlyvacation I'll have this year.
I think it's three days, allright.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
So the next time you're going to go to Key West
or somewhere in Florida, you gotto pass through the studio.
Speaker 3 (39:30):
We got to pass through the studio, we got to
set it up.
Okay, I want to make sure thatI'm clear.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
I have a good friend that lives in hudson florida,
just north of y'all, so shouldbe easy to get there.
Yeah, no, hudson's not far.
It's maybe an hour and a half,something like that.
Speaker 3 (39:35):
Maybe a deuce I gotta fly into saint saint pete
anyway.
Right, allegiant knoxville hasa direct flight straight down to
saint pete oh, saint p Pete'slike an hour from here.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Yeah, no, no, that would be awesome.
Yeah, man, cause then there'salways things to talk about off
air, you know, and uh, andthere's a lot.
I can just tell you thatthere's a lot.
We kind of, we kind of, youknow, poked at a few different
things the other day on our call.
But yeah, man, I'd love to uhto meet you in person.
Speaker 3 (40:02):
Yeah, no, usually it's easier when the semester is
done.
So we're looking December,january and then I got all
summer coming.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
I will tell you this you said you were from.
You went to what school?
For college?
Speaker 3 (40:14):
I went.
I went to Western Carolinauniversity.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
North.
Speaker 3 (40:17):
Carolina for bachelors.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
We're in Cullowhee, North Carolina, which is near
Dillsboro right, which is nearDillsboro right and Boone.
Speaker 3 (40:24):
It is near Dillsboro.
Speaker 2 (40:25):
Yes, so I only know one other person in the United
States that went there and it'smy best friend, and he took me
there to Paradise Falls.
Let me just tell you, ifanybody wants to go see a
beautiful campus, and especiallythat surrounding area,
dillsboro and Boone Farm Boone,rather, is just fantastic.
Speaker 3 (40:45):
It's a beautiful country up there.
Yeah, no, that whole area ofwestern North Carolina is very
picturesque.
They play tonight, too,football.
They're going to get creamed,but they play tonight.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
They were never very good I wonder why how many
people go to that school.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
I honestly think it was 8,000 or 9,000 when I was
there and UT's at like thirtysix thousand.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Oh, my goodness.
Well, I'll tell you what We'llkeep an eye out for the, for the
score.
It's going to be an ass kicking.
Tyler, I appreciate you being onthe show.
We appreciate you being here.
Just want to give a sincerethanks to Metro Storage and
Distribution for kind ofconnecting us.
I can't wait to see the videoand I can't wait to see our
(41:28):
video, because we have our owncoverage of this thing.
It's going to be bad ass again.
Tyler, thanks for being on theprogram.
Thank you all for having me.
Excellent, john.
Jeffrey man Screw you guys.
No, we, we are out.
Jeffrey man screw you guys.
No, we, we are out.
(41:49):
We'll see you next time.
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