Greenbelt Fund grantee Halton Healthcare celebrated Local Food Week with a Local Food Expo at Oakville Trafalgar Memorial Hospital. We invited Halton Healthcare to share an update from the event, part of their project to increase local food served in their health care facilities. 

Local Food Expo a Hit in Oakville

Local food matters. The easiest way to convince people of this is to let them see it, hear about it and, most importantly, taste it. That’s the idea behind our Local Food Expo (part of Local Food Week). It’s also what inspires the local food champions who came together to share their knowledge, passion and food with patients, visitors, staff and volunteers at Oakville Trafalgar Memorial Hospital on June 8th. All told, 10 of our partners spent the day with us, serving up everything from herb and cheese appetizers to strawberry-rhubarb pie and sharing recipes and information to help people choose local.

The Expo is just the most visible part of our love of local food. Behind the scenes, our Food Services team (led by Manager, Marianne Katusin) works to bring food from ‘farm to bedside,’ creating their own recipes that use local ingredients. The result is tasty and nutritious meals that help our patients heal while at the same time getting the most value from our financial resources.

But we’re not stopping there. With a $51,000 grant from the Greenbelt Fund (through the government of Ontario’s Local Food Investment Fund), we’re launching phase two of our Good for You, Locally Grown initiative. We’ll continue to craft delicious meals that heal and we’ll also work to help patients identify local food choices so they can enjoy the benefits of local at home.

Missed the Food Expo in June? See you in October as we celebrate Ontario Agriculture Week!

About us

Located west of Toronto, Halton Healthcare encompasses Georgetown, Milton District and Oakville Trafalgar Hospitals. Our almost 5,600 physicians, staff and volunteers serve the healthcare needs of half a million residents. Last year we served approximately 575,000 nutritious and delicious meals to our patients.