Wallin Foodservice Resources

The Keys to Safe Food Holding      To wrap up September, National Food Safety Month, we turn our attention to safe holding of both hot and cold foods. You’ve received, stored, and prepared food with great care. Often the last step before serving, holding is a time when the greatest risk to food is time and temperature abuse, while the risk of cross-contamination remains. From staging for pickup or delivery to hot serving wells and bulk food holding, an expansive variety of equipment has been developed to protect food safety and quality on its final journey from kitchen to table, so much so that an entire book could be written on the topic. Today, we’ll focus just on holding individual to-go and catering orders. Delivery and Takeout Order Holding There was once a time, not too long ago, that the industry standard was to place packaged to-go orders on a counter or bar for pick-up. Now, with increased off-premise business and the added need to support social distancing...

Bringing Back the Breakfast Buffet I recently took a 4,000-mile road trip back-and-forth across the American West to help my son move. The 8-day, 7-night adventure was filled with unexpected events such as wildfires, dust storms, mid-September snow, and a variety of novel approaches to the pandemic-era, limited service-hotel breakfast buffet. The latter may not be exciting to the average person, but on a long road trip, the drive-through gets old fast. And as a 15-year professional in the foodservice equipment and supply business, I am always eager to share great ideas that protect the health of the foodservice and hospitality industry and those we serve. Many travelers choose a specific hotel because the cost of a night’s lodging includes a hot breakfast. Since the COVID-19 pandemic prompted a temporary shutdown of hotel buffet-style operations around the globe, hoteliers have been taxed to find ways to safely serve their guests a satisfying meal to start their day or resume their t...

Tools and Equipment to Protect Food Safety During Prep For the third part of our food safety series, we will be looking at risky areas of prep that may be hiding in plain sight. As we’ve mentioned in prior posts, most foodborne illnesses are caused by one of the following three things: time and temperature abuse, poor personal hygiene, or cross-contamination.   Food is especially vulnerable to all these hazards during prep, since it is often exposed to ambient temperatures, other foods, human hands, and other potential contaminants. The good news is that a wide variety of prep tools and equipment were designed specifically to make the job of protecting food safety a lot easier. Here are a few of our favorites. Mercer Millenia ® Colors for Color-Coding and Allergen Management Valuable components of any HACCP system that are easy for employees to use, these essential prep tools sport color-coded handles for dedicated use applications such as produce, poultry, or meats, to reduc...

We Are Fired up About Our New Line: Wood Stone! Wood-fired pizza, charbroiled seafood and chops, rotisserie chicken, rustic breads… How do you achieve consistent, artisanal results in a high-volume operation? The secret is the newest line in our manufacturer portfolio, Wood Stone! Founded in 1990 after successfully meeting the challenge of finding a wood-fired stone hearth or “brick oven” that could withstand the extreme demands of the restaurant world, Wood Stone built its reputation on authentic stone hearth ovens and now equips some of the hottest pizza chains in America. In addition to a large family of wood, gas, and wood/gas-fired combination ovens with baking surfaces ranging from 7 to 45 square feet, Wood Stone also designs, engineers, and manufactures a line of specialty commercial cooking equipment such as plancha griddles, rotisseries, and charbroilers. Like Wallin Foodservice Resources, Wood Stone is rock-solid in their commitment to the values of relationships, tru...

  Cutting Costs with Knife Ownership Vs. Rental Mercer Culinary recently spoke with an operations manager for a busy, multi-unit family dining group with 20 fast casual units. Having good tools for slicing buns and chopping vegetables is essential to supporting their sandwich-based menu. They had been using a knife rental service, but with multiple operating units, the costs of renting quickly added up. They also realized inherent drawbacks of low-quality blades and hidden costs of renting, so they decided it was time to explore the idea of knife ownership and an in-house sharpening program instead.   When presented with the cost benefit tool provided by Mercer Culinary, they found the savings to be immediate and impressive. “We found that in one year, the real savings was over $20,000,” shared Chad M., operations manager for the group. These savings directly impact the bottom line in an industry where every nickel counts. In fact, Mercer Culinary has developed tools ...

  Get Ready to Jazz up Your Tabletops and  Gear up Your Kitchen!  We’re stylin’ now! Wallin Foodservice Resources is pleased to announce the addition of leading brand TableCraft to our manufacturer portfolio. If you aren’t yet acquainted with TableCraft, we’d like to introduce you. This stylish brand can be found on tabletops and in kitchens worldwide, striking a balance between beauty and functionality with an extensive assortment of tabletop, beverage, buffet, catering, display, counter service, and bar supplies. And like the other manufacturers in our portfolio, TableCraft meets our high standards of safety, reliability, service, and quality. Always in step with our industry, TableCraft recently assembled a collection of tools to help foodservice operators adapt to the new landscape of foodservice, with products designed specifically to promote safety and hygiene. Hot well covers to temporarily re-tool buffet lines for pre-packaged single portions and safety shield...

Food Storage Safety Risks and Remedies Our last post reviewed safe receiving practices. The next step to safely shepherding food to the table is storage. Most foodborne illnesses are caused by one of the following three things: time and temperature abuse, poor personal hygiene, or cross-contamination. When it comes to food storage, cross-contamination is the most common culprit since food is all-too-often stored in a vulnerable manner. Risky Food Storage Practices Disposable coverings such as plastic film and aluminum foil are used extensively across the foodservice industry. They are inexpensive and convenient, but they pose some serious drawbacks that increase risk of cross-contamination and reduced shelf life. A single pan or container with a properly applied disposable cover typically doesn’t cause a problem until it’s accessed more than once, or it’s stacked on other pans or containers. Each time a disposable cover is lifted, pulled, or pushed back to access contents, its...

  Protecting Food Safety from the Point of Receiving September is National Food Safety Month, so we’re going to kick it off by taking a closer look at safe receiving practices. Our food is well traveled. From field to kitchen, with so many moving parts and points along the supply chain, food is vulnerable all the way to the table. Most foodborne illnesses are caused by one of the following three things: time and temperature abuse, poor personal hygiene, or cross-contamination. For any foodservice operator, unless you’re harvesting from your own garden, protecting against these potential hazards begins at the point of receiving. It looks like an innocent box, but as your mother might say, you never know where it’s been. Field, truck, warehouse, pallet, or floor are all among the possibilities. Insects are well known to hitch rides nestled in boxes of produce or inside tears in cardboard. Soil, absorbed liquids, and invisible microorganisms may be on the bottom of the carton where t...