My last post, Sustainable hospitality in France – Eco labels, listed the main ecolabels used in French hotels.

During my research on sustainable practices in the French hotel industry, one example caught my attention : the opening of Refettorio, https://refettorioparis.com/index.html ,  in Paris last March. I had a closer look at this initiative which is a great blend of corporate social responsibility and food wastage reduction, two of the main challenges we are facing in our societies.

“It offers a welcoming dinnertime food service to people in situations of social vulnerability transforming surplus ingredients – that would otherwise be wasted – into delicious meals”

 

Massimo Bottura, 3 Michelin starred chef of L’Osteria Francescana, https://www.osteriafrancescana.it/, is behind the opening of 4 “Refettorio’s” around the world, backed by the Carrefour foundation, which, through its network of supermarkets, is giving away unsold items to the restaurants.

Parisian palaces and hotels are also jumping in, contributing with ingredients leftover from their restaurant operations. On average, 120 kilos of unsold food are collected daily.

The kitchen team prepares 100 meals per day, destined for the homeless, or people who would otherwise have great difficulty in purchasing a meal.

Volunteers, who are legion (I registered on the website, fully booked!, https://refettorioparis.com/getting-involved.html ) look after the service, help out in the kitchen, every week, from Monday to Friday.

The launching week saw chefs such as Alain Ducasse, Michel Bras, Yannick Alléno to name a few behind the stoves. In future chefs will be rotating on a voluntary basis.

Seeing the involvment of chefs and volunteers in this project, and the change it really brings in peoples lives, fills me with hope. Of course, this alone is not going to lift people out of poverty, and we are still a long way from 0 food wastage, as we are still throwing away 1/3 of the food we produce!

But, as Chef Massimo Bottura puts it, this is not a charity project, but a cultural one which shows us that :

1) most of the food thrown away is still perfectly fit for consumption

2) it is possible to help others, hopefully restoring some dignity in them, a human contact, and of course food in their stomach!

May Massimo’s dream come true, that someday the world will be full of Refettorios!

Have a pleasant Sunday!