At Smith College, the power of local ingredients and diverse cuisine is on display.

From Puerto Rico to Northampton, from popular steakhouses to college cafeterias, Jamil Asad-Ubinas has helped run a lot of kitchens in his life. Today, he is Smith College Dining Service’s menu and systems specialist.

“What stands out about Smith,” he says, “is how true they are to supporting local and sustainable food. They truly want to be part of that movement.”

What stands out about Asad-Ubinas is his passion for good food, not just for the pleasure of eating it, but also for food’s capacity to teach about and affirm the value of each other’s cultures. Next Saturday, Feb. 8, he will tell a story about the transformative power of food at Field Notes, a live storytelling event hosted by Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture (CISA) featuring stories from people working hard behind the scenes of the local food system.

When school is in full swing, Smith College serves three meals a day to over 2,400 students. They operate nine dining halls, each with varying menus for different cuisines and dietary needs, along with two cafes and catering for events. Most locations are for students only, but visitors can eat at the Campus Center Cafe.

In his role, Asad-Ubinas is a key part of Smith’s efforts to buy more food from local businesses and farms. The college regularly serves local produce, dairy, sweeteners and more, yet where they truly excel is in getting more local meat on the table. That work began in earnest back in 2018, when Smith rallied several schools, including Hampshire, Mount Holyoke, and Westfield State, to propose what ended up being a winning proposal for the Kendall Foundation’s New England Food Vision Prize.

Their idea was simple, in theory: instead of buying meat by the cut, schools would buy whole cows and pigs from Massachusetts farmers, taking on the responsibility of getting the animals processed and then storing and using meat from the whole animal. Farmers would benefit from increased sales and getting to focus more on raising animals while the schools handled the rest. Meanwhile, the schools would get a reliable supply of fresher, higher quality beef and pork. The whole arrangement would reduce waste — since schools would use the whole animal, not just popular steaks or tenderloins — and direct more money into the local economy.

The training, new equipment, and learning curve of using whole animals was considerable, but seven years later, Smith is still buying whole animals from local farms. “It costs a little more than buying meat from other vendors,” says Asad-Ubinas, “but Smith recognized the benefits. It helps local businesses thrive, the students love the product, and so we worked it into our regular budget.”

Once food comes into their kitchens, Smith College Dining also excels at meeting students’ dietary needs. “Any student can meet with our nutritionists or chefs and make a dietary plan that fits their needs,” Asad-Ubinas explains. Among their dining halls, “there’s a gluten-free facility, an allergen-friendly space that also serves only Halal proteins, and a vegan and vegetarian space serving no meat whatsoever.”

Good food must be safe and nourishing. To Asad-Ubinas, it should also teach students about other cultures, or — if they themselves are far from home — offer familiar comforts and a sign of being welcome. These views come partly from his own upbringing, which helped encourage him into the kitchen in the first place.

“My mom is Puerto Rican, my dad is Palestinian, and I grew up in Puerto Rico,” he explains. “My parents’ food was amazing and just so unique, man. I knew if I wanted anything like it, I’d have to learn to make it myself.”

In high school he worked at a nearby bakery. After graduating and earning an associate’s degree in business, he said, “Dad, here’s the diploma you wanted, now I’m gonna go get mine,” and promptly earned his culinary certification too. By 2011, he was married and working for dining services at the University of Puerto Rico when funding shortfalls eliminated his job. Not seeing a clear future for his family and career in Puerto Rico, he moved to take a seasonal job in Florida.

“I made some contacts there and landed a job as executive chef at a new steakhouse in Maryland,” he says. “The restaurant was a hit, but the job and cost of living there weren’t sustainable for our family. So, we decided to move to Holyoke, where my mother-in-law lived.”

Arriving in Massachusetts in 2014, he first had little luck finding a job as a chef, until one fateful day at Hampshire College.

“My father-in-law was interviewing there to be a dishwasher, and because he’s deaf, I went with him to help translate,” Asad-Ubinas says. “I ended up talking to the general manager, and he realized, ‘I have your application on my desk. I was debating whether to call you for an interview. Since you’re here, do you want to do it now?’”

A few days later he got the job. Less than three years later, he was Hampshire’s executive chef. A few years after that, a workplace injury changed his life forever.

Adjusting to his new reality was difficult, but Asad-Ubinas continued to find meaning in making food — especially recipes from his Native Puerto Rico — and sharing it and the cultural lessons it contained with others. His accident, and the lessons he learned about himself afterwards, are the seeds of the story he will tell at Field Notes next weekend (tickets on sale now at buylocalfood.org).

Looking ahead, Asad-Ubinas dreams of opening his own restaurant where everything from the menu to the art on the walls is an homage to the rich history of Puerto Rico. “There’s so much the mainland can learn from the food and culture of this one little island,” he says, “and I know that’s true about everywhere.”

By the same token, at Smith, “I’m always excited to connect with students and bring in more of their food cultures,” he says. “Not just for special events, but as part of our regular menus. We do that for our students because we care — because we want to offer them a feeling of home.”

Jacob Nelson is communications coordinator for CISA.