EMPOWERING CHEFS TO REDUCE FOOD WASTE WITH CULINARY CREATIVITY
In the U.S. alone, 35% of all food goes unsold or uneaten every year—24% of which (54 million tons) ends up in waste destinations such as landfill or incineration facilities. Food waste in America is an appalling reality shared, in similar proportions, by many other countries all around the world.Boelter, in partnership with our trusted vendor Waring, is dedicated to becoming a resource for foodservice professionals to help address this issue and help set the culinary industry on a pathway to reducing food waste in commercial kitchens. Doing so is good for humanity, good for the environment, and it’s good for your bottom line! Read on to find out why.
Food Waste and World Hunger
This may come as no surprise, but there are millions of people who struggle with hunger in America and many millions more around the world. The term “food security” refers to the ability of people to have reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food. For many in America, food security is under serious threat, worsened by rising inflation. As food prices soar, countless individuals and families are struggling financially, leaving them without the means to afford essential groceries.
Charitable organizations have been stretched to the limits of their ability to meet the growing need for nutrition. In some developing countries, food security has been a pressing dilemma affecting people around the globe. Environmental and societal factors, such as drought, political conflict and unemployment due to a lack of education all contribute to the problem of worldwide hunger and malnutrition.
An awareness of this hunger crisis underscores the egregious nature of waste in our foodservice establishments. But it’s not the only problem generated by wasteful kitchen practices. The environmental consequences of producing food that remains uneaten are massive.
Food Waste and Climate Change
Food production consumes natural resources. The amount of food that is consistently thrown into the trash consumes approximately 14% of all fresh water used on farms. In the U.S., 18% of the croplands are utilized to produce food that no one eats. Food waste is the single largest component taking up space in landfills, consuming 24% of their capacities globally.
In the U.S. alone, the annual production of wasted food generates 4% of the greenhouse gas emissions released into the atmosphere. Add to this the energy and raw materials used to process, package and ship all of the food that just goes into a dumpster. Altogether, that makes food waste one of the top contributors of climate change. If all of the food waste in our country was grown in one location, the size of this enormous farm would cover approximately 80 million acres, which is an expanse over three-quarters the size of California. That’s how big the problem is! So, what can we do?
Changing the Way We Handle Food in Our Kitchens
As a premier manufacturer and distributor of professional kitchen appliances, Waring Commercial has taken on the challenge of helping the foodservice industry address the issue of food waste. It’s up to every business, large and small, to be part of the solution. Their job is to provide the research and deliver materials that educate and elevate the level of understanding throughout our industry. Just keeping food waste at top of mind can have a profound impact on our kitchen practices. With your participation and cooperation, we can all waste a lot less.
For inspiration we turn to a Waring Collective member, Chef Douglas McMaster of Silo London. Chef Douglas created the Silo restaurant brand in 2018 with the intention to focus on a zero-waste restaurant, bakery and coffee house.
Everything from the design of the kitchen and dining areas to the processes of food handling and recycling has been created in an eco-friendly way. The dining bar at Silo is made from reconstituted food packaging materials and covered in recycled leather. The wall lights are created from crushed wine bottles. The tableware is made from recycled plastic bags, and the natural cork flooring is carbon negative.
Food products arrive at the kitchen in reusable crates. The menu is predominantly plant based that feature some rejected ingredients like misshapen vegetables. Every attempt is made to utilize every part of the raw produce. Even the wines served are chosen from small, artisan vintners who produce eco-sensitive wines with zero sulphates.
Douglas McMaster is a one-of-a-kind restauranteur with the passion to take sustainability to the max. Conducting your business to the extent he does might not be practical for you, but having an impact of food waste can be a challenge and an accomplishment for everyone in foodservice. Chef Douglas says, “Waste is a failure of the imagination.” Using parts of vegetables and other food items that might ordinarily be tossed into the trash is something that can be done with culinary creativity. It should be the primary kitchen tool we use to help reduce food waste in our everyday operations.
Shifting from Food Waste to Ingredient Optimization
Optimizing the use of recipe ingredients is a function of the imagination. It requires chefs to engage their deeper creative energies and advance kitchen practices from food waste to Ingredient Optimization. Waring Commercial can offer inspiration and recipes to chefs to help make this transformation universal across the food service industry. A little knowledge and direction can go a long way in terms of reducing food costs, creating new revenue streams while dramatically increasing profits, decreasing waste costs and deescalating the effects of global warming and helping to feed the world.
We invite you to think about their culinary equipment as a system to create, rather than individual appliances that have a single purpose—versatile product sets that promote efficiency and provide solutions that inspire change. Through alternative thinking and new processes, we can implement actions that will measurably reduce food waste and provide inspiration for new ingredients and dishes.
The Benefits of Food Dehydration
A prime example of how you can begin to shift from waste to optimization can be found with food dehydration. By drying and preserving excess foods for use in recipes or as healthy snacks to sell, you can use up products that might otherwise go to waste. Dried food has a longer shelf life than fresh foods, so you can buy in bulk and not worry about throwing away the excess. In addition, some dried foods or ingredients can be expensive to purchase pre-made. If your budget is tight, choosing to buy fresh foods and dry them yourself could help you save money in the long run.
How to Become Empowered
Knowledge can empower all of us to make changes, and with all that is at stake from the problems that food waste can cause for our people and planet, failure is not an option! Interested in learning more? Contact us at Boelter to get in touch with a foodservice expert today!