Combatting Food Waste in the Kitchen
By Amanda Faison
If there’s a pressing issue that the food industry has taken up, it’s that of food waste. And with some 40 percent of food in this country cast aside (and with it precious resources like water and labor) each year, it should be. Food waste occurs in many stages: on the farm, post-harvest, distribution, at the supermarket, in restaurants, and in our own homes. The effect is staggering with much of that discarded food finding its way to the landfill (where it generates harmful methane gas) all while one in eight Americans faces hunger.
With a more mindful approach we can all work to combat this tangled issue and return to the place where every meal, every ingredient, and every scrap is valued. As Steven Satterfield, chef-owner of Miller Union in Atlanta, Georgia, writes in his book Root to Leaf, “the term “nose to tail” was coined…to describe this idea of using every part of the animal. Now I am proposing that we look at all food this way. Using every edible part of the plant, utilizing scraps, and composting are just as important. This is what I call root to leaf cooking.”
Read on for how six Good Food 100 chefs are tackling food waste:
In the restaurant kitchen…
”Because of our commitment to the utilization of whole ingredients, be it animals or vegetables, we see very little waste on the prep and sourcing side of the equation. Our biggest waste occurs with our guests post consumption. To mitigate this we have lowered portion sizes to try to more accurately satisfy our guests. We have also started a program where we sell our eggs (pasture raised, less than an hour from Heirloom) for 25 cents to go. This encourages our diners to take home any leftovers to serve with a sunny-side up egg for breakfast the following day.” —Clark Barlowe, chef/owner, Heirloom Restaurant, Charlotte, North Carolina
The biggest barrier…
“Educating 120 people to have the same standards and how they utilize their knife to minimize waste.” —Alex Seidel, chef/owner, Mercantile Dining & Provision and Fruition Restaurant, Denver, Colorado
At home…
”Broths are not only a great way to get a second use out of scraps, but are also a huge boon to flavor. We also recommend grocery shopping more often—in smaller quantities—so you have a better sense of what will realistically be consumed in a given time frame. And of course, composting, if you can.” —Karen Leibowitz, co-founder and director of communications, The Perennial, San Francisco, California
Diner awareness…
“Our guests are very savvy when it comes to food awareness and waste. Very little waste comes from the customer end as far as food left on their plate or recyclables left on tables. We are a fast-casual concept with one trash can in the front of house. That trash gets changed just one time at the end of the day and on any given day we can see 800 to 1,000 customers come through our restaurant. I feel our guests are very aware of this topic.” —Jason Greene, co-owner/chef, The Grove Cafe & Market, Albuquerque, New Mexico
On respecting food…
“Our farm, Spice Acres, provides much of the food that we serve at Spice Kitchen + Bar, so we’re connected to it and it hurts more to waste it. It really drives us to pay more attention to how we’re utilizing everything in our kitchen and ensuring that it’s not dying on a shelf. We’re always looking for ways to utilize what might typically be considered ‘scrap,’ and we focus on staying agile and responding to what’s coming in from the farm and what needs to be harvested each week. Rather than setting a rigid menu, we work with what we have and what needs to be used.” —Emily Bebenroth, chef/founder, Spice Kitchen + Bar, Cleveland, Ohio
On targeting the next generation …
“We talk to our students about only taking what they’re going to eat from the salad bar (which we have in every school) and eating what they take. We’re in every school doing education programming during the lunch period at least once a semester so we take the opportunity to talk about portion size and food waste then. Thanks to another grant we’re going to be introducing the LeanPath systems into our front-of-the-house operations so kids will see in real time how much food is being wasted from school lunches and lunches brought from home.” —Ann Cooper, director of food services for Boulder Valley School District and founder of Chef Ann Foundation, Boulder, Colorado