Forget The Fruit Cocktail, Hospital Chefs Go Gourmet

When you think of hospital food, what comes to mind? Toast? Check. Jello? Check. Local winter squash delicata with pomegranate green tea foam? Maybe not so much.

But that's exactly the dish that Chef Brian Ray of Lahey Clinic-North Shore created for the first annual Massachusetts Health Council Hospital Chef Challenge. Radio Boston checked it out last year and this year, Commonhealth co-host Carey Goldberg was intrigued enough to take a closer look.

"I thought it sounded like an oxymoron. Yummy and hospital food? No, those don't go together," Goldberg says.

But hospital food, like hospital rooms, is evolving. Goldberg explains that "hospitals are trying harder to market themselves. Patients are also consumers and so [hospitals] are trying to appeal in a very broad way."

And, Goldberg says, the shift towards tastier cuisine makes sense. "Hospitals can actually be leaders in showing us how we can take healthy food and try to make it delicious as well."

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