By the time the meal gets on to the plate, the ingredients will frequently have travelled thousands of kilometers. I’m not talking about the tuna on your plate which may have swum 25,000 miles before being caught, shipped to a warehouse and from there to market or food factory (sometimes in another country) for processing before arriving at the kitchen door. Even the slow food restaurant using local ingredients will use olive oil and spices which may have traveled thousands of miles. Today those food miles are mostly made in the security of a shipping container, but over the centuries bags made of animal skins, ceramic vessels, wooden crates and one of the most effective and long lasting, the barrel, have been used to transport food.
The barrel is thought to have been devised as early as 3000 BCE by the Celts (appropriately, in France) and has been used by succeeding global empires and organizations to transport their products from source to markets. The reason the barrel has lasted so long is that it is made for very efficient handling: stackable and, because of its shape, wet and dry barrels containing liquids or dry goods are easily rolled and manoeuvred even when full. In other words, until the shipping container; conceived in 1956 by Malcom McLean – a trucking business owner from North Carolina, transformed the global economy.
The barrel as a means of containing and moving food (and material) has another great benefit; it can be repurposed, reused, repaired and recycled, unlike much of the ‘packaging’ used to deliver supplies to the professional kitchens of today.
Dealing with this mess of waste cardboard, plastic, glass and metal, safely and efficiently is a continuing issue for kitchen management. Much discussion is occurring on the issue of food waste and how to minimize or, better still, eliminate it, but this completely ignores the other half (or maybe even more) of the overall waste management problem.
The management of packaging is in most kitchens an unrecognized food safety issue. Boxes and outer packaging are generally taken either into the stores or directly into the kitchen preparation area (sometimes even by the delivery vehicle driver) to be opened and the contents removed for meal preparation.
Unfortunately, the packaging currently used for the efficient delivery of food to the business is a potential food safety hazard! You don’t know, or if you think about it, maybe you do know, where it has been: at the very least, on the ground, the floor of the delivery vehicle where the driver has been walking, after walking in the street and stepping on: I leave that to your imagination, but that is being brought into the kitchen clean areas on the surface of the containers and boxes, on footwear and on wheels.
There will always need to be a means of containing and handling the ingredients that we use, the issue is how to do it in the most safe and efficient way. In most existing facilities to ensure food safety, the boxes etc that the deliveries are received in should not be taken into the kitchen at all. For efficiency, if you’ve not taken the packaging, etc, into the kitchen, it doesn’t then have to be removed from the kitchen: remove the packaging before: time saved.
From a planning perspective, the designer can provide a zone at the goods receiving point for the unboxing and disposal of the ‘contaminated’ packaging to enable the system whereby unboxing occurs before the contents are either stored or taken directly into the kitchen. Note that the delivery containers, boxes etc and returnable containers are NOT held in the stores, where they would also potentially cause contamination. The contents have to be removed at some point, doing it early in the meal production process improves food safety as well as stock control and operational efficiency. (Think: the chef needs something quickly from the store in the middle of service, and having to waste time opening boxes.)
The pre-storage unboxing area will include compacting and other waste and recycling handling facilities will also be the location for holding returnable containers, crates, bins, pallets and carts: again, so they are never taken into the kitchen. (as an aside: I once observed a shipping pallet on the floor of the flight kitchen production area!). The unboxing area may also include facilities for washing returnable containers and even sanitizing any ingredients, fruit/vegetables that are received in bulk direct from the farm or market, before they are taken into store or the kitchen.
One logistic solution
Ideally the catering business would never receive supplies in potentially contaminated outer boxing. Any boxing is removed, and the contents transferred into enclosed, which also can be insulated shipping containers (such as Olivo Cold Logistics) by the warehouse or supplier before dispatch. An additional benefit of using insulated shipping containers is that they can be transported general freight rather than by specialized refrigerated transport: a considerable delivery cost saving. The whole process becomes part of the suppliers HACCP food safety and QA accreditation. In the same way wherever possible fruit and vegetable would be delivered in suitably dimensioned returnable containers or mobile bins to eliminate the need for disposal of recyclable waste.
To achieve this efficiency, the warehouse or supplier would be responsible for establishing the process and systems for using standardized dimensioned shipping carts or containers for the handling and delivery to all their foodservice customers. The same standard shipping module dimension once established would also be applied when specialized materials handling equipment is required to be designed.
The existing ISO standard dimension for shipping pallets is 1200mm x 1000mm. However, like all standards, everyone has a better idea and in this case the EU standard pallet is 1200mm x 800mm and the Australian (has to be really different!) is 1165 x 1165mm. In all cases these footprint dimensions would be too large for most kitchens: none would fit through a standard doorway.
To establish an effective standard suitable for the average foodservice facility, shipping modules need also be consistent with the application of the Gastronorm 2/1: 530mm x 650mm dimension or equivalent steam table pan dimensions and at the same time consistent with the ISO or EU standard pallet dimension.
The logical dimensions would therefore be either 800mm x 600mm or 800mm x 800mm by a maximum of 1800mm high to ensure general kitchen accessibility. A standard 20ft shipping container would hold 21 of the 600mm x 800mm units and 14 of the 800 x 800mm units. In addition, 2 of the 600mm x 800mm units would fit on either the ISO or EU standard pallets but only one of the 800mm x 800mm units. The 600mm x 800mm standard kitchen logistic module would therefore be the most efficient dimension based on the overall footprint and equivalent usable volume of each of these standard kitchen logistic modules with both being suitable for holding the Gastronorm GN2/1 and therefore all other GN dimensioned units.
While it may be optimistic to think that foodservice operators would have the benefit of the standardization of delivery units from all their suppliers any time soon, it must come at some point to overcome labor and food safety issues. Because the average professional kitchen is invariably expected to last for a decade or more, those designing these facilities today might usefully work on the assumption that at some point in the life of the kitchen, standardized logistic solutions may become the norm and, accordingly, provide flexibility for future application in their designs.
Tim Smallwood FFCSI
