Food Waste Focus

Day of the Week Waste Reports – Match Waste and Menus Many operators have menus that stay mostly the same day-to-day while others run cycle menus and specials that create regular change.  Regardless of which type of menu you have, it’s very useful to review waste by day of the week.  This step can reveal [...]

Timing is Everything: Watch the Calendar We’ve found that chefs who are successful at maximizing sales and reducing waste are, in most cases, very good at predicting customer demand. The more accurately we can forecast demand, the less likely we are to have leftover items that become waste. The only thing you can count about [...]

In February 2010, we wrote a post about Food Holidays as possible reuse opportunities.  We had great response and wanted to continue posting about these for this month and next. We mention these holidays, because they are fun (of course!), but also because incorporating these dates into your menu can help to reduce food waste [...]

The ‘A-ha’ moment.  It’s that very second when something becomes suddenly obvious to you.  You didn’t realize it before, but you do now.  That a-ha moment takes place throughout life in many different areas.  Today we want to talk about those a-ha moments in food service. We have been speaking with a lot of customers [...]

Just a quick post to let everyone know that you can now get LeanPath and ValuWaste merchandise for your operations.  Many of you have asked about purchasing different items to give out as reward and recognition awards for the staff. Please feel free to visit this site anytime:  http://shop.cafepress.com/leanpath All merchandise has either the LeanPath [...]

LeanPath coaches speak with clients on a regular basis.  Often we learn new information that can help others reduce waste and we like to share those Hints and Tips with you.  When reviewing data with clients often we see spikes in pre-consumer waste that are explained by: “sunny day”, “snow day”, “ice storm”, etc. Keeping an eye on the atmosphere can help you [...]

We know about big food holidays – Christmas, Easter, Passover, Ramadan (fried honey donuts!).  We know about other holidays that include a particular type of food in their celebrations like St. Valentine’s Day (chocolate), St. Patrick’s (green beer, green cookies, green everything), Oktoberfest (beer).  But what about those ‘other’ food holidays? You see them sometimes [...]

It seems that Food Waste and Food Waste Reduction strategies have finally made it to the ‘hot topic‘ list. We have seen a huge increase in the number of webinars focused around food waste and reduction strategies in recent months.  Below are just some of those available in the coming months. Check out these TWO [...]

LeanPath coaches speak with clients on a regular basis.  Often we learn new information that can help others reduce waste and we like to share those Hints and Tips with you.  Having a proper review and re-use policy goes along way toward making sure that items are safely stored and then re-utilized in an operation.  Sites often do a good job are keeping [...]

We ran across this cool calculator today and wanted to pass it along.  Originally intended for K-12 school foodservice, it can be applied to most other foodservice groups (hospitals, university, corporate dining) with a little adjustment. The Oklahoma Department of Agriculture created this produce calculator so that when a foodservice director  says, “I need enough [...]