Texas A&M AgriLife study: Community cafes improve nutrition options for food insecure

A new study from the Healthy Living team at the Texas A&M AgriLife Institute for Advancing Health Through Agriculture, IHA, found the nutritional quality of breakfast meals provided by pay-what-you-can community cafes is higher than meals eaten elsewhere among people facing food insecurity, using metrics from the U.S. Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service’s Healthy Eating Index.

Published in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, their research has been selected as an Editor’s Choice article, which earned the IHA’s team an interview on the journal’s podcast.

Research findings from IHA’s Healthy Living team

Community cafes are nonprofit restaurants that allow anyone in the community to pay what they can afford for a restaurant-quality meal without verifying need, said the study’s author Alexandra MacMillan Uribe, Ph.D., a registered dietitian nutritionist and assistant professor in the Texas A&M Department of Nutrition with the IHA.  

“This increasingly popular cafe model offers a promising solution to improving diet quality through the availability of healthy meal options,” she said.

Dining at these cafes provided a pronounced boost in diet quality among community members facing severe food insecurity. Despite positive outcomes, the overall Healthy Eating Index scores for both the cafe and the comparison meal remained relatively low, underscoring challenges in achieving optimal diet quality for food-insecure populations.

These findings emphasize the importance of nutritious meal options and access to healthy food choices, especially for those most in need.

Helping to alleviate food insecurity

Scientists studied access to nutritious meals at a cafe location in the southern U.S. While guests of any income or food security status can dine at these cafes, individuals included in the data were adults confirmed to be experiencing food insecurity.

The cafe where the study was conducted is open six days per week and offers a seasonal menu filled with nutrient-rich local ingredients, with no prices displayed to customers. The cafes manage their daily operations with a blend of staff and volunteers and are funded by both public and private donors.

The study was performed with the assistance of strategic wait staff, who informed guests about the opportunity to participate. After confirming informed consent, participants were asked to report what they had just eaten at the cafe and what they had eaten the previous day for that same meal when they were not at the cafe, with most meals reported as breakfast.

Looking ahead

The IHA’s research underscores the ability of community cafes to substantially improve diet quality, providing a hopeful route to enhancing overall health and decreasing diet-related illnesses in food-insecure communities.

Such studies are crucial for crafting effective strategies to encourage healthier eating behaviors within vulnerable populations through innovative, community-based food initiatives like these cafes.

“In terms of the five dimensions of food access — availability, accessibility, affordability, acceptability and accommodation — it can be reasoned that the cafe increases availability by offering nutritious food options on their menu, affordability through the pay-what-you-can system, and acceptability by preparing highly palatable, nutritious foods that respond to their guests’ taste preferences and dietary needs,” MacMillan Uribe said.

She said future research should delve into the diet quality of cafe meals beyond breakfast, exploring lunch and dinner, and to monitor how the diet quality of cafe patrons evolves over time.

Additionally, posting nutrition information or offering nutrition counseling as part of the community cafe experience could help guests access healthier meal options, further improving the nutritional values of the meals they eat at the cafe.