Reducing Food Wastage at Weddings & Big Parties.

Sincerety, Responsibility and interest in curtailing Wastage are to be Sworn in by individuals, Enterprises, and, the Municipal Administrations too. more  

We must think and act to minimise the wastage of Food in our Weddings & Big Parties, etc. Due to Social Status at least in India, we use to arrange much more food to serve than actual consumes. We arrange number of varieties which no single person can consume all at one sitting. As a result those remaining food go to waste after function. Once I tried to distribute this feed amongst the needy for several months and my experience was as under : 1. Collection of Food from Caterers : a) No Caterers like to hand over the food which left lying in 'Kitchen Shamyana or in Kitchen. b) The allowed to collect the Food left on the serving counters and Tables only. c) In left over food on counter, the left over Breads are found in very less quantities and asking the Caterers for cooking more Breads, they did not like to cook the same. After lot of persuasion, if we get them ready to cook the same, they cook the same in a very less quantity. Whereas, needy persons consume more breads than Vegetables. d) Some times due to sudden bad sessions, attendance of the guests reduces too much less and in that condition food left in very big quantity. Even then, the Caterers don't wants to hand over the left over food to us for distribution amongst the needy persons. But, at that time we claim the left over food in the ratio per Plates not used due to less attendance of Guests in proportion of at least @ 350 grms food per plates, otherwise, we request the organisations not to pay them for full booking of Plates and pay them only for the Plates consumed by the Guests. Then the Caterers comes in our grip. 2. Distribution of such Food : a) It is again a problem to distribute the same Food amongst the needy persons. b) Food left from Lunch in afternoon are give very much less problem and could be distributed very easily. But, Lunch Parties are organised in very less numbers and not more than 10%. c) Main problem for the distribution comes for the Food collected from the left-over from Dinner Parties. 1st of all these Parties does not ends before 'Mid-Night' to '2:00 AM' in Night. d) In night, it is not possible to find out needy persons to distribute the Food to them. Therefore, it required to store at least up to 08"00 AM Morning in Winter and up to 07:00 AM Morning is Summer in hygienic condition and required temperature as per seasons. Main problem comes in the Summer, because the left over Food kept in normal temperature from cooking time of 6 to 7:00 PM to 12:00 Night, i.e. for at least 5 to 6 hours and in Summer the Food in Normal Room Temperature start decomposing slowly within 4 hours and quickly after 6 hours. e) Therefore, in Summer we first test the Food for safe consume-ability before distribution in Morning. This process is again troublesome and no member in the team wants to take the responsibility for the same. For such tests, we also do not get any help and supports from the Food Labs of the Mahanagar Nigams or Govt, Labs. Moreover, those labs do not open before 10:00 AM. Therefore, at the end we stooped for doing this service, experiencing that it is not so easily workable as we were thinking before start. more