FEATURES
Va lue Money for
Chefs offer 14 ways to get more value for the dollar.
By Jody Shee
The National Culinary Review | March 2011
FOOD COSTS are going up while
customers are still dangling their dining-out dollars. Should they go to a casual-dining chain and take advantage of two-for-one meal deals, or should they come
visit your establishment?
All this leads you to a clear mission:
provide value for guests. To do that, you
yourself have to find value, starting with
lowering food costs. Six chefs offer up
1
methods for stretching their purchasing
dollars. All agree that it requires skill on
all levels.
Watch the inventory. Reducing
operational waste is the first step, and
it begins with the delivery truck, says
Matthew Babbage, CCC, executive chef
at New York University, New York, for
Philadelphia-based Aramark. Babbage
is vigilant when it comes to checking for
package counts, sizes, temperatures and
the condition of product as it arrives off
the truck. “Who’s to say that something
expired or of lesser quality is not mixed
in?” he says.
Babbage also takes inventory every day,
rather than once a month, more to ensure
he doesn’t buy things unnecessarily. If
there are several jars of mayonnaise in the
storeroom, they likely all will get opened
