As a restaurant owner, you're acutely aware of the importance of having a clean and up-to-code kitchen. The Board of Health makes sure you're complying with cleaning regulations and health codes. This is a good thing. Food safety is an important issue, as is the health of your staff and customers.

 

Many of the cleaning chemicals in wide use in restaurants are harsh, abrasive and powerful; often, they're toxic. Take your employees' health into consideration as workers soak their hands in these chemicals day after day. A simple sneeze or watery eyes can be the first indicator that these chemicals are harmful to the person using them.

 

As I've mentioned before, there are hundreds of new products out the...Read More

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Last week, celebrity chef Mario Batali, hosted a farmers market at the Palazzo Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas to celebrate his three newest Certified Green Restaurants in Las Vegas (Carnevino at The Palazzo and Enoteca San Marco and B&B Ristorante at The Venetian). With local honey, figs, artisan breads, locally raised meats, fresh produce and juices, the farmers market offered a refreshing change of scenery to hotel guests, shoppers and Vegas locals.

Even for restaurants that are smaller than the Batali/Bastianich enterprises, eve...Read More

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For restaurants with land, gardens, plants and sprinkler systems, spring and summer can be draining – in terms of the water bill, that is.

How many times have you seen sprinklers on during a spring shower or summer rainstorm? All too often, sprinkler systems are run on timers that don’t sense if it’s raining. However, great technology exists that helps prevent sprinkler systems from turning on when it rains. These sensors know the moisture level in the soil, and actually don’t cost much more than traditional systems.

Other water-saving tips for restaurants:

• Landscape with native plants, gravel and other things that require very little water to survive.
• Rain barrels are great to collect rainwater for watering plants, vegetables, herb gardens, etc.
• Check outdoor hoses for leaks a...Read More

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The GRA recently certified Guesthouse Restaurant, our first ever Certified Green Restaurant in Canada.

In an effort to help this particular restaurant find sustainable solutions, our environmental consultants immersed themselves in the world of Canadian manufacturers, distributors, products and service providers.

Solution #1 – Recycling:
The restaurant owner had recycling bins, but they were always empty and he wasn’t sure whom to call to have recycling picked up. So, we did some digging and found that his city doesn’t do commercial recycling, and he’d have to use a private recycler to get the goods.

Next, we helped him create signage so patrons would know what could be recycled and which bins everything should go in. Now, the restaurant reports that bins are full.

Solution #2 – P...Read More

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The push for local, organic, and sustainable foods has become mainstream. In thinking about where your food originates, the next question would logically be, “Where does it go?”

Keeping the conversation alive and bringing issues of food origin, safety and growing practices to the fore has helped consumers and industry professionals also start to realize that there’s life after food – it can be composted and its packaging can be recycled. It also spurs questions such as, "What chemicals were used to grow it?" and "What’s the best way to clean produce without wasting water?"

Where food originates and how it’s grown, prepared, and disposed of all goes into the overall practice of creating a more environmentally sustainable restaurant industry.

With spring in the air, it’s that time of ye...Read More

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Green is here to stay. During a recent weekly staff meeting at the Green Restaurant Association, we all took turns ...Read More

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At Full Circle Catering in Lexington, Va., Chef-owner Jenny Elmes is a one-woman-show, shopping for, prepping, cooking and serving the menus she creates for area weddings, luncheons, barbecues and birthday parties.

Aside from being a Certified Green Restaurant, Elmes has taken her green mission to the next level. “I grew up with a garden in the backyard, composting, and cooking everything our family ate. To me, this is just the way life should be,” she says.

Since she operates a catering company and her venue changes with each occasion, Elmes takes it upon herself to haul home compost and recyclables from each party. “I can’t ask my clients to deal with the waste, and I can’t expect them to sort it and separate it the way I want them to.” So, she does it herself.

Compost goes to her neighbor’s chicken farm, and recy...Read More

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As much as I’ve enjoyed spreading the mission of the GRA for the past 18 years, I can truthfully say that I hope the distinction of the word “green” doesn’t exist some day. No, I don’t want the green-business movement to stop or slow down. I want the need for green products, education, and services to someday end.

It’s my hope that the green excitement of the last few years is someday just the norm. That all products will be made with the highest efficiency, using non-toxic chemicals and the highest possible amount of post-consumer waste. That all restaurants will be zero waste and use water efficiently.

The idea of our work, and that of other green-minded organizations, is to normalize what is now distinct. Some success has already been achieved. Twenty years ago, recycling was a dream for many businesses ...Read More

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In honor of Earth Day, I’d like to propose a challenge: Try cutting back on unnecessary paper use in your restaurant.

Some tips to get started:

Chalkboard Specials: Follow the lead of Benders Caffé in Providence, R.I., which recently started posting specials on a wall in the restaurant, eliminating paper menus that changed daily. The trick? They painted one of the walls in the restaurant with chalkboard paint so specials easily wash off each night.

Paperless Bills: Ask vendors to go paperless, and do banking and bookkeeping online. This will reduce your amount of mail coming in and going out! Taranta, an Italian/Peruvian restaurant in Boston’s historic North End, recently switched to online billing and has noticed a significant change in the amount of paper in its recycling bin.

...Read More

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I’ve blogged before about the importance of post-consumer recycled content. By nature, it’s the best example of how a product can be used, recycled, made into something else and used again.

Recently, GRA consultants were faced with a challenge: find pizza boxes made from 100% post-consumer recycled content for Otto Enoteca Pizzeria in New York City. The industry standard for pizza boxes is 40-60% post-consumer material. This is great, but we view industry standards as a tool to help us create goals. There had to be something better out there!

At a recent food show, Otto’s GRA consultant came across the pizza box she’d been looking for, a 100% post-consumer recycled box, made from a paper mill on Long Island. Next, our consultant put Otto’s distributor in touch with the manufacturer, and they’ve been working happily together ever...Read More

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Cambridge, Mass., is known mostly for Harvard University, MIT and the Head of the Charles Regatta. But the small New England city is also home to hundreds of restaurants, including two Certified Green Restaurants that are housed in a 100-year-old building in historic Harvard Square.

Grendles Den and UpStairs on the Square were faced with the same assignment as all new Certified Green Restaurants: starting a recycling program. Because the building is old, lacks space and has one shared trash room, the thought of setting up different bins for glass, paper, cardboard, plastic and food, sounded impossible.

Never say never! GRA consultants worked to set the restaurants up with area recyclers that came in and organized the recycling areas in both kitchens so that the process of separating out materials was easy, efficient, and space-conscious.

Because of the sha...Read More

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Recently, the GRA began working with Forever Resorts’ Grand Canyon property to certify its restaurants, and in the process, we stumbled upon a reusable cup that’s effecting change one drink at a time.

Originally, the restaurants were offering their employees free, unlimited beverages while they worked as long as they purchased their first drink of the day. But the paper cups were piling up. With five years of experience working with other Forever Resorts locations, the GRA suggested that Grand Canyon join the reusable mug program.

Now Forever Resorts’ employees receive a brand-new travel mug when they start the season and can use it for unlimited drinks each day. The mugs are made from 100% recycled plastic that is FDA-compliant, containing 25% post-consumer conte...Read More

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