Why food waste is designed into menus, planning, and leadership decisions

Food waste in contract catering doesn’t start in the kitchen. It starts with decisions made long before service.

Menus are planned. Volumes are padded. Safety margins become the norm. The result is one of the most expensive and persistent problems in foodservice.

Each year, around 1.05 billion tonnes of food, nearly 20% of global production, is wasted (source: link). In European contract catering, foodservice operators have already achieved roughly 25% waste reduction, proving that food waste is not inevitable, but a result of how systems are designed (source: link).

In this episode of Served., Peter Baech, CEO and Co-founder of Kanpla, is joined by Vojtech Vegh, Anti-Food Waste Chef, Author, Speaker, Zero-Waste Plant-Based Chef at Surplus Food Studio, and Zero-Waste Culinary Advisor at Winnow.

Drawing on more than 15 years of experience across professional kitchens and multi-site contract catering, Vojtech explains why food waste is rarely an operational failure. It’s a leadership decision.

Where Food Waste Actually Starts

One of the most persistent myths in foodservice is that waste is created where food is cooked. Vojtech disagrees.

“I always say that the majority of food waste is not created in the kitchen. It’s created in the chef’s office.” - Vojtech

Menus are developed weeks or months in advance. Often centrally. Rolled out across multiple locations. Locked into cycles. Procurement, portions, and production volumes follow those decisions.

By the time food reaches the kitchen, the outcome is largely predetermined.

“We keep trying to fix waste after it’s been created. That's not prevention.” - Vojtech

Real prevention happens earlier. In menu design, yield thinking, and planning discipline. If by-products are not accounted for when the menu is written, waste becomes inevitable.

Measurement Is Not Optional in Multi-Site Operations

Before changing menus, rolling out training, or investing in technology, there is one non-negotiable starting point.

Measurement is not optional.

“If you don’t know what’s in your bin, you can’t reduce it.” - Vojtech

This is especially critical in contract catering, where assumptions multiply across sites. Weekly totals and aggregated numbers hide patterns. Granular, daily visibility reveals what actually drives waste.

“You don’t want to know that you wasted 50 kilos. You want to know what it was, when it happened, and why.” - Vojtech

Whether a site uses advanced AI tracking or manual weighing matters less than consistency. The goal is not perfection. It is truth.

Zero-Waste Cooking Is Not New. We Just Stopped Expecting It.

Zero-waste cooking is often presented as a modern innovation or a sustainability trend. In reality, it is a return to basics.

“This is not a new idea. This is how kitchens worked decades ago.” - Vojtech

Historically, chefs planned menus around whole ingredients, maximized yield by default, and treated waste as a sign of poor planning rather than an acceptable loss.

“Zero-waste cooking should be the standard. Not an extra initiative.” - Vojtech

In contract catering, waste has been normalized by scale, complexity, and fear of running out. That normalization is what needs to be challenged.

The ROI Is Already There. It’s Sitting in the Bin.

When foodservice leaders hesitate to invest in food waste prevention, the objection is usually cost. This is not a sustainability argument. It is one of the most reliable margin improvements available in contract catering.

Vojtech’s response is direct.

“Your budget for training is already in your bin.” - Vojtech

Reducing food waste increases the yield of every ingredient. Small percentage improvements compound quickly when applied across menus, sites, and volumes.

“For every dollar invested, you get seven dollars back.” - Vojtech

Why ESG Often Fails to Change Anything

Food waste is frequently discussed under the ESG umbrella. According to Vojtech, that framing can quietly limit impact.

“We treat sustainability as something on top of operations.” - Vojtech

When sustainability lives in a separate function, it becomes reporting rather than behavior change.

“It has to be inside the operation. By design.” - Vojtech

Real progress happens when leadership, menu developers, and operators share responsibility for outcomes. Not when sustainability is treated as an add-on.

One Action Every Contract Caterer Can Take Tomorrow

For all the strategy and systems, Vojtech’s most practical advice is deliberately simple.

“Take a clear container and put all food waste in it.” - Vojtech

No software. No dashboards. No hiding.

“At the end of the day, take a photo. You will be shocked by what you see.” - Vojtech

Visibility creates accountability. Accountability drives change.

The Question Leaders Should Ask Themselves

If there is one takeaway for leaders in contract catering, it is this.

“Question everything.” - Vojtech

Question why menus are built the way they are. Question why overproduction feels safer than precision. Question who decided that waste was the cost of doing business.

In contract catering, food waste is not waiting for better tools or better intentions. It is waiting for leadership to decide that the current way of working is no longer acceptable.

And the opportunity is already there. Right inside the bin.