What is Farm-To-Table? Here’s Your Complete Guide!

A considerable amount of revaluation is needed for our eating practices as well. Besides popular options like a vegan diet or a plant-based diet, farm-to-table is something that is gaining tremendous attention.

Farm-to-table, as believed, is a practice that has the lowest carbon footprint because of its food traceability. But what does farm-to-table mean?

A Detailed Breakdown Of Farm-To-Table

This blog lays down the step-by-step journey of the farm-to-table concept. It comprehensively takes you through the origin of the concept to the current landscape.

1. Concept And Origin

It is very difficult to locate a single point in history that gave birth to the farm-to-table concept. Rather it is a series of events that gradually took the present shape. The first watershed event was the hippie movement.

The hippie movement originated in America in the 1960s after the consequences of World War II. It is championed as the most important counter-culture movement to date. Hippies survived either on farm products or on locally produced food items. Many counter-culture practices grew against the rise of fast food. It also gave birth to several subcultures that questioned the existing hierarchies.

This gave rise to numerous outlets and organizations that started forwarding farm-produced or locally sourced food ingredients. Carlo Perini’s “slow food movement” is one such example that grew in Italy. Subsequently, with time, people became aware of the destruction and exploitation caused by mass-produced packaged food. People started to choose more conscious options.

As a result, farm-to-table started as a social movement that believes in sourcing local food ingredients. It focuses on removing mediators and directly dealing with the person responsible for production. This helps in cutting down the waste and resources spent otherwise. It aims at the holistic development of the individual and the environment together.

2. Reasons For Popularity

Some important reasons why farm-to-table is gaining popularity are as follows:

Sustainable Choice

Choosing local suppliers gives you the advantage of keeping an eye on whether the product is being procured with sustainable practices or not.

Eco-friendly
Locally produced food items are always a more eco-friendly option as it doesn’t involve mass-production which often results in wastage of resources.

Transparency
As the buyer and supplier are in close proximity, there is transparency in production, consumption, transactions, and other facets as well.

Traceability

As the produce is local, the travel time the ingredients take to reach their destination is remarkably less. This makes fresh food items readily accessible.

Additionally,  local production offers a variety of seasonal produce alongside regular production. This gives the buyer more options to choose from.

3. Becoming A Farm-To-Table Yourself

To adopt a farm-to-table approach for your restaurant you have to take care of the following things:

Decide Carefully
With precision decide factors like your restaurant location and vision. Another important consideration is why you want to adapt to this new model and how well it aligns with your vision.

Find Suppliers
Decide what you want to serve and look for direct suppliers for the same. Find the best local options for you. Carefully choose local suppliers for vegetables, fish, spices, crockery, and other ingredients and materials that you would require.

Build A Team
Once you are ready with your blueprint, go and hire professionals for your restaurant. Also, learn to manage or consider hiring a restaurant manager for flawless execution of all your plans.

Set The Menu Right
It is very crucial to design the menu in accordance with the food and ingredients available locally. So analyze properly what all your restaurant can offer while keeping sustainable and eco-friendly practices in mind.

Also after deciding on the items on the menu move towards pricing the items carefully.

Adapt Sustanibility Whole-Heartedly
Don’t just try to be sustainable on the surface. Adapt sustainability in all the practices of your restaurant.

The food and beverage industry tries to incorporate every trend to remain relevant from a business standpoint. But conscious living is more than a business model. Adopting farm-to-table as the next choice gives us a chance to go back to sustainable food production practices and help us reverse the environmental degradation that we have caused.

It will be a good approach if the practice means more to the restaurateur than a trend as when done correctly it can impact the environment and local businesses positively.

Hope this blog helps you understand the concept and need for a farm-to-table model.

Rely on smart and updated restaurant POS software and the right people to manage your business operations smoothly while you prepare for the next steps of your business.

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