Ethel Cook Running a restaurant can be a very hectic thing to do. However, one thing that’s frequently overlooked is the issue of reducing food waste and how to go about it.
According to recent studies, restaurants generate as much as 33 billion pounds of food waste per year, leading to a loss of a whopping $12 million per year. This can be a big issue considering that over 50 million Americans experienced food insecurity during the pandemic.
Thankfully, all hope isn’t lost. With a better understanding of how to prevent food waste in restaurants, these establishments can play a part in food insecurity.
This article will cover tips that could help food service establishments in reducing food waste.
Conduct a Waste Audit
Without a waste audit, there’s no way to discover or know the amount of food waste you produce per time. Try to reduce the waste produced by sorting the leftovers and separating them from each other.
Additionally, you can create a database to record and journal all the waste you’ve produced per day. Include several cases such as expired or rotten food, broken substances, etc. Doing so gives you an idea of how much waste you produce and how to curb it.
Store Food Properly
Ensure that all food items are stored at the proper temperature. Monitor all refrigerators as deep freezers to ensure they work at optimal temperatures. Your refrigerator temperature should never be above 40°F. You should also never allow meals that require constant refrigeration to be at room temperature to prevent spoilage.
Store ready-to-eat and raw proteins on different shelves to prevent cross-contamination. For perishable foods, label them with the date purchased and expiry date. Be diligent about all these laid down rules and create a contingency plan for what to do if things don’t go as planned.
Identify Multi-Menu Items
Another important way to reduce waste is to find certain ingredients that can be used in several other dishes. This will help you take advantage of buying some items in bulk while ensuring that they don’t go to waste due to infrequent usage.
You can also turn leftover meals into new specials. For example, use bones of chicken or meat and vegetable leftovers to make stocks and broths. Leftover bread is ideal for bread crumbs or croutons. Turn meat remains into a stew or chili and roasted chicken remnants into a pot pie or soup.
Spur your chefs to be creative in transforming yesterday’s leftovers or excess ingredients into the next day’s specials. The more you use, the less you’ll waste.
This can also go beyond meals and ingredients. Managers can try to reuse any product that they can. For example, a laminated menu can be used instead of a paper one, or the paper one can be laminated to be reused.
Inspect All Food Deliveries
Sometimes food vendors can try to be crafty and attempt to put out rotting or expired ingredients beneath deliveries. Carefully scrutinize every delivery product before receiving it, or you might have no choice but to throw some away.
And if there’s a consistent record of receiving subpar products from certain vendors, it might be time to change them and find more qualified dealers. Use appropriate tech tools to appraise suppliers and to ensure that they consistently churn out quality food supplies and produce.
On the other hand, vendors can utilize software solutions to facilitate the smooth movement of the food products to the restaurant as quickly as possible. This is a good way to combat spoilage and decrease food waste.
Turn Organic Waste into Manure
While food waste can sometimes be inevitable, it can be transmitted to something else. You make food waste beneficial to the environment by turning them into compost.
Also, some products that you think are waste are perfectly edible. You can donate good but unused food to orphanage homes and food banks, reducing waste and helping with the food insecurity in your community.
Many of the scraps at your food establishment can be composted, turned into fertilizers, or burnt to generate methane, giving off fuel.
Train Your Staff
Regardless of how knowledgeable you are at waste management, you will never be fully successful until you bring your staff on board. Educate your staff on the reason for waste management. Make sure they are as passionate about the cause as you are.
Show them ingenious ways and techniques to make food fresher or stay for a long time. Encourage them to be able to whip up entirely new specials from leftovers.
Also, endeavor to integrate it into the culture of the company. That way, every new hire is intimated about the laid down rules and standards regarding waste management.
Conclusion
Reducing food waste may sound like a task, but it’s easier than you think. You only have to adopt the above mentioned strategies to reduce food waste, save costs, and sustain the planet. Making these small changes will add up over time, protect our environment and boost our planet’s longevity.
