Media Advisory: ‘Big Apple Crunch’ latest in UB’s Campus Dining and Shops innovative, creative, heathy food adventures

BUFFALO, N.Y. – Hundreds of students, faculty and staff will simultaneously take an enthusiastic and hearty bite into a locally produced apple this Friday as part of the University at Buffalo’s “Big Apple Crunch” eating rally to inspire and promote heathier dining habits.

What: The “Big Apple Crunch” is part of Food Day 2015, a celebration of food aimed at raising campus awareness of healthy, seasonal eating. It’s the first time the collective apple bite-in will be held on a SUNY campus.

UB Campus Dining will hand out free apples to the first 500 people coming to the event, and following a countdown, UB students, faculty and staff will “crunch” into locally produced apples en masse.

Where: Student Union Lobby, University at Buffalo’s North Campus

When: Apple distribution and staging begins at noon. Photos and countdown will begin shortly before 12:30 p.m. Simultaneous “crunch time” is scheduled for 12:30 p.m.

Why: The event is designed to promote healthy eating habits, and at the same time raise awareness of the value of eating locally produced food, says Raymond Kohl, marketing manager for UB Campus Dining and Shops. The apples provided for the “Big Apple Crunch” are locally produced Empire apples.

“It’s a great snack,” Kohl says.

The simultaneous biting into apples (those who prefer can bring their own kind) is just another example of how UB Campus Dining likes to do things that are different, creative and fun.

“We’ll start handing out apples at noon,” says Kohl. “Then we’ll line up and do the countdown to 12:30, once all the apples are passed. And then everyone will take that big bite together.

“We think it will be neat, that simultaneous bite at one time. I don’t know how loud it will be, but you will certainly get that effect. I think there will be a lot of excitement happening at the same time.”

The Big Apple Crunch is the latest special food event to come out of the creative and adventurous minds at Campus Dining. This follows such added-value dining events as the UB Big Blue food truck; the multi-media, interactive Hunger Games theme dinner in UB’s Crossroads Culinary Center dining hall; bringing dairy cows to campus to promote local dairy products; pride of New York sample displays from local vendors; and a campaign to help parents prepare healthy, creative bag lunches for younger children.

Friday’s Big Apple Crunch showcases apples, a healthy and seasonal food that grows abundantly in New York State. New York is the second-largest apple-producing state in the U.S., averaging nearly 30 million bushels annually.