Food Waste Focus

We just received these great Hints and Tips from some of our newest accounts.  We would like to share them with you: “Schmoosh Pie” -  take day old pies that look tired and use a potato masher to break them up (“smoosh”).  Place contents in a cup and top with whipped cream.  Sell in the [...]

Exciting News!  Martinsburg VA Medical Center (West Virginia) (a LeanPath customer), has achieved the honor and distinction of becoming a VA Sustainability Achievement Award winner.  They won the award for their Waste Watcher Program – which includes daily, electronic food waste tracking. VA Senior Sustainability Officer James M. Sullivan praised staff as “an excellent example [...]

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 [...]

What is “Utilization”? When chefs talk about “utilization”, they’re usually referring to finding a “profitable or practical use” for the food they purchase. The most obvious use is within the menu item for which the food was purchased. But often there is more food purchased than ultimately is required for its intended purpose (due to [...]

Have you heard the term Zero Waste? If you answered “yes”, you’re not alone. Many foodservice managers and chefs have been learning about Zero Waste initiatives recently and looking specifically at the feasibility of zero food waste. Operators tend to have one of two reactions: * That’s an impossible goal, we can’t run out of [...]

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 [...]

Have you seen it yet?  The new Ziploc commercial on food waste? Ziploc is a company that for many years has promoted their products as keeping your food fresh, longer.  But now they have created a new commercial that talks about the financial perils of not storing food properly.  In their latest commercial they have [...]

We recently ran across an article in Healthcare Design magazine titled: “Where does your facility fall on the greening spectrum?” Although this article focused on healthcare (regulated medical waste, preferred purchasing, etc.), they spoke about a Practice Greenhealth study and their efforts to break ‘greening’ down into specific categories.  By doing this it helps the [...]

When an operator starts monitoring food waste on the different stations, they often find that the salad bar has more waste than expected. Two good questions to ask are: What is the least popular item on your salad bar?  What’s the most popular? Least Popular: What doesn’t sell?  Why?  The change of seasons is often [...]

Is there really an i-phone App for Food Waste? Yes- it’s true! The folks at Waste Aware Scotland have created an i-phone app that helps the home consumer learn how to reduce food waste. “The app provides consumers with easy to use interactive tools such as a portion size planner; recipe finder for leftover ingredients; [...]