Food for Thon

Business donations, University food services set to feed 1,000 people

This weekend, about 600 dance marathon participants will be dancing for 48 hours straight to benefit the Four Diamonds Fund. Because they will be using so much energy, the dancers will need plenty of sustenance to keep them going.

Overall Social chairwoman Amie Engel said it was easier this year than others to get businesses to donate.

"It's kind of like a big networking system," said Engel (senior-communication disorders). "On the committee, someone might have inside contacts. It puts more meaning in the Thon for that business."

Emmalia Roufos-Abbey (junior-media studies), social captain for overall meals, said the 19 committee members went to restaurants and other businesses to ask for their services.

Not only do dancers have to be fed, but committee and family members do as well. Engel said about 1,000 people will be eating at Thon. With such a large number of people consuming free food, Engel said, it is important to get as many businesses to donate as much as possible.

Irving's Bagels, 110 E. College Ave., is one of these businesses. David Schoenholtz, co-owner of Irving's, said the marathon benefits a "wonderful cause" and the restaurant will donate 3,000 bagels this weekend.

Ben & Jerry's, 124 S. Allen St., will be donating enough ice cream for 600 dancers Saturday, manager Bill Reynolds said, and the same amount of sorbet Sunday.

"It's such a worthy cause and it seems like a fun place to be," Reynolds said.

Even though ice cream will be served at the marathon, planning a healthy menu is still a priority for the social committee, Engel said.

"We go through what was used in the past and pulled dancers from past years to see what they liked and what they didn't like," Engel said.

Roufos-Abbey also said more healthy foods were considered for the marathon.

"We devised a tentative menu of what we thought would be good based on nutritional value and what would keep the dancers awake and energized," Roufos-Abbey said.

Engel said another strategy used to plan the menu was to learn what foods were left over after last year's marathon. French toast sticks were not very popular last year, Engel said. The grease from them did not sit well with the dancers, especially in the last hours of the dance marathon, she said. By using this information, Engel and her committee decided to serve a lighter breakfast menu, such as yogurt, fresh fruit and hash brown patties.

About 600 baked potatoes and 1,200 servings of pasta, which are filled with carbohydrates, Engel said, will be served by University Housing and Food Services. This way, the dancers will be ready for the long weekend ahead of them, Engel said.

Aside from numerous carbohydrate servings, Engel said the marathon will require about one ton of donated ice, 275 cases of Ocean Spray juices, 200 5-gallon jugs of water and 20 cases of potato chips from Utz.

Engel said they are also serving 100 cases of PepsiCo products and All Sport, and having 1,000 bananas shipped in from Pittsburgh.