Food Waste Intelligence

In the foodservice industry, the use of plastic sometimes can’t be prevented. Much of the food we purchase and utilize in our operations come packaged in plastic and we use plastic in the operation to preserve the food we purchase and serve. But plastic waste is one of the fastest growing problems for the environment. It is estimated that by 2050, the weight of plastic in the ocean will surpass the weight of fish.

With this in mind, it is important not only for individuals to reduce their plastic use, but for foodservice operations to lead by example by reducing the amount of plastic generated in the workplace. Many large companies like Starbucks, IKEA, and Disney have already committed to eliminating single-use plastic waste in the near future, and we expect many others will follow suit.

The good news is that by preventing food waste, you can also reduce plastic use. And many of the habits Leanpath clients have developed to track food waste can be used to track and prevent plastic waste.

Here are five tips to help reduce plastic waste while at the same time reducing your food waste.

Food is thrown away and wasted due to a variety of reasons—overproduction, spoilage, expiration, and so on. At Leanpath, we use "mishandling" as a loss reason to define food that is unfit for consumption and must be thrown away due to improper handling during production. There are a myriad of examples of improper handling of food during production, but let’s focus on the most common occurrences I see in a kitchen and what you can do to avoid them.

Inspiring and engaging your culinary team is a constant challenge in today’s kitchens. There are always so many tasks to check off, prep to get done, things to clean, and meals to cook that sometimes keeping our teams inspired and engaged falls off the radar. As kitchens begin to ramp back up production, now is the perfect time to refocus your team's efforts and continue to build that culture of  food waste prevention that you had before the foodservice industry came to screeching halt due to the pandemic.

As Leanpath's full time Executive Chef, I've trained and coached hundreds of chefs and managers on preventing food waste in their operations. One of the most persistent issues is also one of the most avoidable: food waste from items expiring in storage. Avoiding this waste takes establishing and following strict processes to ensure everything in storage is used before it can expire. Here are three questions to ask yourself or your team to find out how effective your kitchen is at avoiding expired food waste.

Peels, pulp, cores, rinds, stems. When you prep fruits and vegetables you end up with trim. And for the majority of kitchens using Leanpath, trim waste ranks as their second biggest source of waste (behind overproduction). But that trim doesn’t have to lead to trim waste. You can maximize usage of this product, making better use of your food spend along the way. Remember, you paid for that rind, so why just throw it out?

Here are 18 ideas to get better use out of that often overlooked and underutilized fruit and vegetable trim.