Wallin Foodservice Resources

  We're sorry! This promotion is expired. Please subscribe to our  blog  to receive notices of future contests and promotions. Sharing food with loved ones is an essential element of our lives. Now more than ever, it is important to have food service equipment that supports changing operational procedures and processes to ensure safety and provide comfort to staff and our families. FWE has designed and built the needed equipment to provide the level of care for all those comfort foods that consumers are turning to during these uncertain times. With FWE’s current promotional offer, you can add equipment to your line that supports your facility. Whether your operation requires precision humidity and temperature control for protein sensitive foods like fried chicken, mobile hand washing stations for patio service, heated holding shelves for mobile order staging or pizza holding cabinets – FWE has the equipment to fit those needs. CLICK HERE to learn more about FWE’s produc...

A Toast for the New Year Happy New Year! Please join us for a toast to a healthy and prosperous year ahead. Not the bubbly kind that can give us a headache, but the warm and toasty kind that helps soothe our souls and energizes us to face the day. Today, we salute toast for that very reason. To start with a small slice of history, did you know that toast was invented by ancient Egyptians and adopted by the Romans in 500BC to prolong the shelf life of bread? Toast has come a long way since its original role of mold-prevention to becoming a staple at breakfast and beyond, either as a simple side or a base for the center-of-plate star of the show. Whether you’re cranking out mass quantities for dry or butter and jam-slathered consumption in a noncommercial setting, serving peanut butter and banana toast at a family restaurant, or crafting an avocado toast masterpiece on artisanal bread in a bistro, the right toaster helps you get the job done to mouth-watering perfection. The wrong on...

Wallin Foodservice Resources: 2020 High Notes If there ever was a year for reflection and searching for silver linings, 2020 was it. We are so proud and appreciative of our local foodservice community’s courage, resilience, and ability to adapt to near-constant change and adversity. The difficulties were many this year, but you rose to the challenge and inspired us every day to find ideas and solutions to help you do what you do best—safely. Here’s a look back at the events and top stories of the year that could never have happened without the relationships with our customers and industry partners that we hold so dear. New Name, New Look In June, we unveiled a new name that honors our heritage as the Wallin Group while reinforcing our commitment to serving the foodservice industry: Wallin Foodservice Resources. With our new name came a brand-new logo, tagline, website  wallinfsr.com , and the Wallin Resource blog.  Our Name is No Match for Our Service, So We’re Changing it...

Order Customization Made Easy Remember when asking for omissions or substitutions when ordering a meal was considered impolite? Things have changed a lot since then. Customization is no longer the exception: it’s the rule. Having the operational agility to take special requests and customizations in stride has become essential to serving today’s discerning consumers. The right infrastructure and the proper tools make it easy for staff to quickly handle customizations in the space you have, without missing a beat. Productive Prep Stations A well-designed prep station provides a foundation for seamless order customization. Important features include maximized space utilization, pan wells deep enough for flush-mounted 6" deep pans, and consistent safe temperatures below 41° F. A sizeable, cutting-board work surface and refrigerated storage beneath the table add up to efficient use of space and labor. Another space-optimizing feature to look for is stations that are 100% front b...

An Added Line of Defense: Antimicrobial and Antibacterial Surfaces In our last post, we talked about cleaning, sanitizing, and disinfecting as a critical part of every foodservice operation. Even with a vigorous cleaning and sanitizing program, multiple layers of defense are always a good idea to protect your operation and those you serve. One of those layers of protection is antimicrobial and antibacterial surfaces, but they are often misunderstood. These surfaces don’t replace frequent and thorough cleaning and sanitizing, but they do provide an additional line of defense in between cleanings. The idea of manufacturing high-touch products with antimicrobial surfaces was born in the late 1960’s, but it took a couple decades to create truly antimicrobial polymeric   products for both medical and consumer applications, and even longer to make them widely available and affordable. Fortunately, a number of commercial foodservice equipment manufacturers were early adopters of the t...

Top Products to Fast-track Staff Training Have you ever wondered if it's called “training” because it seems never-ending, much like waiting for a train to pass when you’re running late? In 2019, restaurant employee turnover averaged 75%. The reasons may have changed since then, but the challenge remains. With nearly 3 out of 4 foodservice employees turning over in a year, expertise is continually being lost—meaning that constant training is required to replace it and keep operations running smoothly. Today, we are going to showcase smart products that give you the power to fast-track your green recruits into productive employees that can help your business continue to produce consistent results. "Paint-by-Numbers" Recipe Prep Remember paint by numbers? Now we have paint by numbers for the kitchen! What better way to achieve consistency than by listing the recipe on the side of the prep vessel? Here are a few examples of personalization that Cambro has added to vario...

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...

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...

  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...