7 Tips For Dealing With Restaurant Food Wastage

Food waste quickly leads to inflated food costs in restaurants. There will certainly be days with more leftovers than you expected, but discarding this food, while it’s still good, will lead to financial losses.

You’re throwing money away if you’re not trying to get profit from your leftovers. Turning them into profits can be done by:

1. Introducing chef specials

Creative chefs may be able to use the leftovers to create a “special of the day”. Owners should work with chefs to try and create a leftovers menu that will be able to turn common leftovers into other dishes.

2. Turning leftovers into ingredients

A common issue with restaurant food wastage is that leftovers are looked at as dishes rather than ingredients. Changing this mindset will further help the right chef turn leftovers into a delight for guests.

3. Creating portions for two

You can run specials for couples who want to share their meal. For example, you may offer fettuccine for $12 a plate, but couples can order a larger portion, meant for two for $20 or $22 when you have excess fettuccine cooked.

4. Offering daily discounts

Similar to the special of the day, the discount of the day will include your normal dish. You may offer cream of mushroom soup as a special on Tuesday because you have an excess of the soup from Monday.

5. Selling leftovers via apps

You will sell the food for around 50% off, depending on the app, but it’s an option to reduce waste. You can use these apps on those occasions when it’s a “do or die” situation and the food will end up in the trash at the end of the night.

6. Donating food to the hungry

Consumers are going to view your business in a positive light due to your contribution to the community. Charitable events and gestures, such as donating food to the hungry, are great for marketing and help the community.

7. Introducing leftover menu days

If you know that a dish will stay fresh for two to three days, you can offer leftover menus once or twice per week. These menus will have to state clearly that the consumer is going to be purchasing leftovers, and the price will be lower to reflect this fact.

Food waste is a major problem, and if you continually find that you have leftovers that are thrown out, you may want to consider lowering inventory and reducing forecasts on how much food to cook when prepping for the day.

Source: https://mcdonaldpaper.com/blog/restaurant-food-waste-management-tips