Well Being Retreat Center
"Where Silence Is Expressed"
Retreat Meals
Our Philosophy
Well Being Retreat Center has been serving delicious, nutritious meals for events since 2013 in support of healthier bodies and clearer minds. Retreat Leaders may choose the type of meals (vegetarian or non-vegetarian) to be served on their retreats. Meals are freshly prepared, mostly gluten-free and mostly organic, with an emphasis on gluten-free whole grains, fresh fruits and vegetables, legumes, and humanely raised organic eggs, chicken and grass-finished beef for whole body, healthier, low glycemic meals. (A detailed list of ingredients that we do and don’t use is below.). Fruits and vegetables from Well Being’s organically tended orchard & garden are used in season as well as Well Beings own organic chicken & free range eggs. It is our mission to provide delicious food prepared in a conscientious way in support of mindfulness of the body and our connection with nature."
About Retreat Meals
Meal Service is available for retreats and workshops. For guests renting the cabins for self-retreats or weekend getaways, meal service is not available, but all cabins have kitchenettes.
Meals served in dining room and outside.
Snacks available throughout the day; teas and coffees.
For non-vegetarian retreats, a vegetarian option will be served at each meal.
Participants indicate meal preferences on retreat registration.
Labels
Since "vegetarian" can mean different things to different people, we find it useful to define Vegetarian as including eggs, dairy, and honey, but not including fish or meat.
Link to Picture Menu (Meat and Vegetarian)
Availability of Meal Service
Meal Service is available for retreats and workshops. For guests renting the cabins for self-retreats or weekend getaways, meal service is not available, but all cabins have kitchenettes.
Well Being Retreat Center has two licensed Commercial Kitchens:
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Main Retreat Center Building
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Powell River Pavilion
The kitchen at the Main Retreat Center Building is directly adjacent to the Dining Room which seats 32 people and the outside deck which seats an additional 28 people.
The kitchen at the Powell River Pavilion is intended to serve meals at the Pavilion which can seat 50 or more people in the open air pavilion directly on the Powell River. There is also an outdoor grill and a wood fired cob pizza oven at the Pavilion
Our kitchens are inspected by the State of Tennessee Health Department twice a year.
Meal Preparation Policies
Meal served at Well Being Retreat Center are tasty, mostly freshly prepared, and healthy.
By prior arrangement, we can serve vegetarian or non-vegetarian meals. We can also offer a vegetarian option with our non-vegetarian meals. We are also fully capable to serve dairy-free, gluten-free and vegan meals. Since "vegetarian" can mean different things to different people, we find it useful to define Vegetarian as including eggs, dairy, and honey, but not including fish or meat.
For group events, we do not prepare special individual meals, For example, if a retreat vegetarian, we will not prepare a special raw food plate for an individual.
Here are some things that we do and don't do:
What Meal Service Means
Meal Service means three meals a day served promptly at the scheduled times plus all day availability of drinks and snacks.
Breakfast
Breakfasts (served at 8:30 AM) usually consists of organic scrambled, eggs organic gluten-free ancient whole-grain cereal with a choice of nut & fruit toppings, yogurt, juice, coffee and teas. Occasionally, we will serve organic chicken or vegan sausages.
Lunch
Lunches (served at 12:30 PM) will vary with season and availability of vegetables from our one-acre, organically-tended garden. Generally, there will be a fresh hearty, mostly organic salad. (We won't bore you with a bowl of wimpy iceberg lettuce and call it a salad.) The salads may be mixed green salads, rustic cole slaw, or a grain salad such as a tangy barley or rice salad. And then usually a hearty home-made soup or other hot dish such as chili with home-made corn bread, or (wild-caught Alaskan) salmon salad.
Supper
Suppers (served at 6:00 pm) will have a vegetable (almost never white potatoes and often from the garden in season), a meat dish, a vegetarian grain or bean dish, freshly prepared complex salad, and dessert. Most of our meals are low glycemic, tending towards Paleo in character, but we will often make a sweet dessert for supper as well as offering fresh fruit for snacks and desserts.
All Day Choices for Drinking
Drinks will be available all day and will include:
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Chilled, tested, non-chlorinated well water which is delicious and mineral rich
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Starbucks coffee
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Unsweetened black tea with ice (sweeteners available)
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An unsweetened herbal tea (usually lemon balm) with ice available
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On-demand steaming hot water and a variety of herbal and black tea
Snacks
Snacks will be available all day and will include one or more of the following:
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Fresh Fruit
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Mixed Nuts (does not include peanuts)
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Paleo sweet loaf such as banana-apple-carrot cake, zucchini-almond loaf. These are moist and yummy, low-guilt delights that Patty serves up.
On Time Meal Service & Labels
We endeavor, and almost invariably succeed, in serving meals precisely at the scheduled times.
Each dish being served will be label. Labels will list ingredients and whether it is Gluten-Free (GF), vegetarian (VEG), organic (OG), and/or dairy free (DF).
Food Waste Recycling
We have a very efficient food waste recycling system. We call it "Having Chickens."
We have the chickens located in the orchard and, in off-season, field crop locations but not in our vegetable production beds. Therefore, food waste is cycled back into the topsoil.