Health and Wellness

Smart Choice is the food wellness awareness program at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). The program was developed by UCSF Medical Center Department of Nutrition & Food Services and the UCSF Campus Life Services - Retail in March 2009 with the goal to promote healthy eating among UCSF retail food consumers.

The program has two main objectives:

• Increase consumers’ awareness of nutrient content of foods by providing nutrition facts, labeling, and icons.
• Increase consumers’ likelihood of buying healthy items via promotion of healthy items (i.e. incentives).

How to identify Smart Choice items:

• Entrees/meals meeting the following criteria will be identified with a Smart Choice icon on a menu sign or “cling” at the serving areas. If the item is packaged, the icon may also be placed directly on the package.
• Smart Choice criteria are summarized in an easy-to-read format and posted in café area.
• Specific nutrition facts for Smart Choice items are available to customers, posted in café and are available in writing. This web site will provide links to nutrition information in the future.

The Smart Choice nutrition criteria are based on health maintenance and disease prevention. Customers with existing health problems, such as obesity, diabetes, or hypertension, may need to adhere to more stringent criteria than offered by our program. As with any public health promotion, our guidelines are general rather than specific. We encourage customers with specific health concerns to meet with a registered dietitian for individualized counseling and meal planning. For more information see our standards for meals, beverages, and our vending. 

UCSF Nutrition & Food Services currently offers a variety of convenient and healthy dining options at our Parnassus, Mission Bay, and Mount Zion campuses. 

You can view menus at tiny.ucsf.edu/UCSFDiningMenus from your computer or mobile device.

Simply go to the drop down menu to see what each of our stations is serving for any given meal or day. Items are listed by date and station.  We list ingredients, nutritional information, and allergens for each item, a level of detail very few foodservice operations offer.

To see this evening’s menu at the entrée station, for example, click on today’s date, then click Moffitt Café Entrée Station on the menu tab. You’ll see all items at the entrée station, coded with a V (vegetarian), Vg (vegan), GF (no gluten containing ingredients used), S (Smart Choice our healthy choice standard), SS (Smart Choice side) or LS (Local/Sustainable, organic, local, or sustainably sourced). You can click on any item for nutrition information and click on ingredients/allergens for allergy information. To consolidate nutrition information for an entire meal, use the add button on the right side to build your own menu. 

Our retail food stores accept cash, major credit cards, and FastPay pre-paid cards, as well as resident/clinical fellow meal cards. Find out how to use your UCSF ID badge as a pre-paid card by visiting fastpay.ucsf.edu or stopping at the Nutrition & Food Services Business Office in room M294 on the Parnassus Campus from 8am-4:30pm Monday through Friday.