With less than a year left before the Paris Olympics, in order to better provide high-quality dietary services to athletes, ensuring excellent performance at the games, the Nutrition and Diet Division of the National Sports Administration Training Bureau is proactively preparing for various tasks. They have started renovating the menu to create characteristic diets for athletes from all over the country preparing for the Olympics. On August 7th, they collaborated with the Fujian Sports Bureau to hold a two-week Fujian Special Food Week event, supporting the athletes for the Olympics.
During the food week, in addition to the daily essential nutritious meals, the National Sports Administration Training Bureau Athletes' Restaurant added Fujian-style cuisine. For this, they specially hired three professional chefs from Fujian to come to Beijing for an exchange and serve as the head chefs for Fujian specialty dishes. The restaurant introduced seafood dishes and provided local specialties such as small bowl Buddha Jumps Over the Wall, Fuzhou fish balls, and snacks.
During the visit of the Beijing Youth Daily reporter to the Athletes' Restaurant, athletes and coaches from various teams such as weightlifting, gymnastics, track and field, and badminton came to dine, with the synchronized swimming team girls arriving last. Since each team's morning training ended at different times, the Athletes' Restaurant started serving meals at 11 AM and continued until 1:30 PM, giving each team sufficient dining time. The dinner service also lasted for about two and a half hours. The chefs and staff of the Athletes' Restaurant work hard to ensure that the athletes eat well and get the necessary nutrition.
Chef Wang Lin, the head chef of the Athletes' Restaurant, told the North Qing Net reporter that all the meals provided, including during the Fujian Special Food Week, were made according to the relevant standards of the National Sports Administration. They have nutritionists who design and adjust the menus with strict production procedures. The goal is to ensure that athletes receive sufficient vitamins, minerals, and fluids every day to meet their nutritional needs. The national athletes' dietary standards also include other details, such as ensuring the intake of various food ingredients such as grains, vegetables, fruits, meat, eggs, dairy products, and beans, and drinking more than 3,000 milliliters of water daily. Different sports have different energy expenditure and nutritional needs, so when making dietary plans for athletes, the restaurant also considers their specific situations and requirements. Some foreign coaches and fitness trainers also dine at the Athletes' Restaurant, so they prepare some Western-style dishes for them, which have received praise from the foreign trainers. However, as they have been living in China for a long time, they have adapted to Chinese cuisine and mostly prefer Chinese dishes to supplement their nutrition.
Some star players from the Chinese badminton team arrived later, at around 12 PM, including Olympic champions Chen Yufei and He Bingjiao, leading male player Shi Yuqi, the women's doubles ace pair of Chen Qingchen and Jia Yifan, mixed doubles player Huang Yaqiong, and men's doubles player Liu Yuchen. When they saw the abundant variety of food, the outgoing Jia Yifan took out her phone to take photos before selecting her favorite food. She said, "I really want to invite my family, including my parents and grandparents, to come and eat. The mutton scorpion today is so delicious, but unfortunately, they cannot come and taste it. Usually, I can't finish all the food at the serving counter; my plate is already full, and I dare not go to the other side." Chen Qingchen exclaimed, "There are really too many dishes, and I can't eat them all. Today I specially chose some Fujian dishes, like Buddha Jumps Over the Wall. I heard that there will be a Guangdong Food Week in the future, and I am looking forward to the taste of my hometown. I hope it won't be held when I am away for competition." As for concerns about overeating affecting their figures, the two girls answered unanimously, "If we eat more, we'll just train more."
Wang Guoxin, the gold medal coach of the Chinese weightlifting team, also praised the restaurant's food, saying, "I have stayed at many training bases, but I still feel that the food at our training bureau's restaurant is more delicious and offers more choices. It's worth mentioning that the athletes here come from all over the country, and it's not easy to satisfy everyone's tastes. However, our restaurant manages to do so. While ensuring that the athletes get sufficient nutrition, it also provides a rich variety of dishes. The chefs and logistics staff work very hard, and we are satisfied. To repay their hard work, we must win more gold medals and championships in various competitions to bring glory to our country." The girls of the synchronized swimming team are the most hardworking; they arrived at the restaurant the latest. Their training lasted until about 12 PM, and some of them still had wet hair. Although they were eager to see so many dishes, they lined up orderly to get their meals. They also couldn't overeat because they had to maintain their good figures. The last one in the queue was the head coach, Zhang Xiaohuan. She told the reporter, "Now there are many young athletes in the team. Both new and old players are satisfied with the dishes provided by the Athletes' Restaurant. I noticed that today is the first day of the Fujian Food Week. I can fully feel the uniqueness and variety of the dishes. They are delicious and nutritious."
The Local Specialty Food Week will change every quarter, and before the Paris Olympics, there will also be Guangdong, Shanghai, and Shaanxi Food Weeks in succession, providing more dietary choices for the national team athletes training at the National Sports Administration Training Bureau.
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