FH1117

SUSTAINABLY 

SPEAKING 

Responsible seafood sourcing 

is top-of-mind for Canadians 

HEALTH CHECK 

The new approach to food at 

healthcare facilities 

WASTE NOT 

Getting a handle on 

food-waste management 

CANADIAN PUBLICATION MAIL PRODUCT SALES AGREEMENT #40063470 

PLUS 

THE 2017 

HOSPITALITY 

MARKET 

REPORT 

How operators 

are stepping up 

to increase traffic 

Jamie Kennedy on leading the 

local-food movement in Canada 

NOVEMBER 2017 $4.00

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VOLUME 50, NO. 7 | NOVEMBER 2017 

THE HOSPITALITY MARKET REPORT 

FEATURES 

10 MOVING THE NEEDLE 

Inaugural WITHorg conference looks to 

close the gender-equity gap 

16 TAKING RESPONSIBILTY 

Operators are making sustainable choices 

when it comes to seafood purchasing 

26 UPPING ITS GAME 

Why the foodservice industry needs to 

step up in an era of change 

35 

35 ICONS AND INNOVATORS 

F&H sits down with Jamie Kennedy, 

the godfather of Canadian cuisine 

43 RAISING THE BAR 

Canadian healthcare institutions are 

placing new focus on food offerings 

JONATHAN BIELASKI [SALMON & SUSHI]; DREW HADLEY 

[CHEF JASON MORRIS]; iSTOCK/OSTILL [BUSINESSMAN]; 

iSOTCK.COM MASHIMARA [TEA] 

16 

THE 2017 

HOSPITALITY 

MARKET 

REPORT 

P. 26 

47 CANADIAN MADE 

A pictorial perspective of 

our year-long photo contest 

50 RUM RUNNERS 

Rum makes its mark on cocktail menus 

51 WASTE NOT, WANT NOT 

Advancements in food-waste 

handling techology 

DEPARTMENTS 

2 FROM THE EDITOR 

5 FYI 

15 FROM THE DESK OF ROBERT CARTER 

56 CHEF’S CORNER: Jason Morris, 

Le Fantôme, Montreal 

56 

FOODSERVICEANDHOSPITALITY.COM 

NOVEMBER 2017 FOODSERVICE AND HOSPITALITY 1

FROM THE EDITOR 

THE NEED 

TO KNOW 

In recent years, restaurants have been forced to become all 

things to all people. To draw more customers in, operators 

have added new menu items, appealed to a wider net of customers 

and taken advantage of new technological advances 

(see Hospitality Market Report on p.26). Today, competition 

is tougher than ever and stealing market share has become the 

number-1 game in town. 

In many cases, the need to know has played a dominant 

role in the changing face of the landscape. Increasingly, customers 

want to know where their food comes from and who’s producing 

it. It’s all about provenance and transparency — 

whether we’re talking about meat, fish and seafood, or our 

vegetable supply. 

New research released by the Calgary-based Canadian Centre 

for Food Integrity (CCFI), studying consumer concerns and 

expectations surrounding food transparency and the overall food 

system, shows Canadians feel the food system is headed in the 

right direction, proven by an increase from 30 per cent in 2016 to 

43 per cent of Canadians this year. 

But while consumer confidence in food transparency is 

increasing, an equal number of Canadians (43 per cent) say they 

aren’t sure if the food system is on the right 

track, down from 50 per cent in 2016. 

The 2017 CCFI Public Trust Research study 

was undertaken in June 2017 and surveyed 

1,307 Canadians about top life concerns, specifically 

their level of concern, trust and transparency 

expectations related to food and how 

it’s grown. Those polled clearly identified food 

companies as the most responsible for providing 

information. Other food-system partners, 

including farmers, government, restaurants 

and grocery stores, also ranked high as being 

responsible for transparency. 

According to a release by the CCFI, the study 

reinforces that “Canadians are looking for credible 

information to make informed decisions 

about their food,” says Crystal Mackay, president, 

CCFI. “This research reinforces that everyone 

in the Canadian food system...should engage in 

conversations about food.” 

Consumers are hungry for information on food transparency and 

they’re scouring company websites to find third-party audits, track 

records and practices and policies that demonstrate a company’s values. 

The study found when reviewing these elements of transparency, 

accuracy was the most important attribute to Canadians. 

While many Canadians may be unsure about their food or 

how it’s grown, they clearly want to know more. And, for the second 

year in a row, Canadians ranked the rising cost of food and 

keeping healthy food affordable as their top two life concerns — 

above rising energy costs, healthcare and the economy. 

ROSANNA CAIRA rcaira@kostuchmedia.com 

@foodservicemag 

facebook.com/foodservicehospitalitymagazine 

instagram.com/rosannacaira 

NICK WONG, LOCATION PROVIDED BY VIA CIBO 

2 FOODSERVICE AND HOSPITALITY NOVEMBER 2017 FOODSERVICEANDHOSPITALITY.COM

EST. 1968 | VOLUME 50, NO. 7 | NOVEMBER 2017 

EDITOR & PUBLISHER ROSANNA CAIRA 

ART DIRECTOR MARGARET MOORE 

MANAGING EDITOR AMY BOSTOCK 

ASSISTANT EDITOR DANIELLE SCHALK 

SPECIAL PROJECTS EDITOR TOM VENETIS 

MULTIMEDIA MANAGER DEREK RAE 

GRAPHIC DESIGNER COURTNEY JENKINS 

SOCIAL MEDIA/EVENTS CO-ORDINATOR JHANELLE PORTER 

SENIOR ACCOUNT MANAGER/U.S.A. WENDY GILCHRIST 

ACCOUNT MANAGER MARIA FAMA VIECILI 

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ACCOUNT MANAGER CHERYLL SAN JUAN 

ACCOUNT MANAGER JACOB LEVIN 

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT DANNA SMITH 

CIRCULATION PUBLICATION PARTNERS 

CONTROLLER DANIELA PRICOIU 

ADVISORY BOARD 

CARA OPERATIONS KEN OTTO 

CRAVE IT RESTAURANT GROUP ALEX RECHICHI 

FAIRFAX FINANCIAL HOLDINGS LIMITED NICK PERPICK 

FHG INTERNATIONAL INC. DOUG FISHER 

FRESHII MATTHEW CORRIN 

JOEY RESTAURANT GROUP BRITT INNES 

KATIE JESSOP REGISTERED DIETITIAN KATIE JESSOP 

LECOURS WOLFSON LIMITED NORMAN WOLFSON 

WELBILT JACQUES SEGUIN 

SCHOOL OF HOSPITALITY & TOURISM MANAGEMENT, 

UNIVERSITY OF GUELPH BRUCE MCADAMS 

SENSORS QUALITY MANAGEMENT DAVID LIPTON 

SOTOS LLP JOHN SOTOS 

SOUTH ST. BURGER CO. JAY GOULD 

THE HOUSE OF COMMONS JUDSON SIMPSON 

THE MCEWAN GROUP MARK MCEWAN 

UNILEVER FOOD SOLUTIONS NORTH AMERICA GINNY HARE 

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Published 11 times per year by Kostuch Media Ltd., 

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of the Department of Canadian Heritage. 

Printed in Canada on recycled stock. 

Celebrating 

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Tradition. 

pillers.com/foodservice 

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ADVERTORIAL 

Industry Trend: 

Using social media to promote local food 

For restaurateurs and foodservice providers looking to bring in new customers, 

leveraging the active food blogger community can make a big impact. 

The Ontario agri-food sector is always 

seeking new, innovative ways to bolster 

local foods as a differentiator to bring 

in new customers. Recently, two grower 

organizations – Ontario Pork and the Ontario 

Apple Growers – have seen great success 

engaging with consumers through social 

media and other avenues, in a project that can 

be replicated across the food value chain. 

With funding support from the Greenbelt 

Fund, in partnership with the Government of 

Ontario, Ontario Pork’s goal was to highlight 

and promote underutilized cuts of pork. Ontario 

Apple Growers’ focus was to increase consumer 

awareness of the versatile nature of Ontario 

apples and the Foodland Ontario brand. 

Both groups used engagement with food 

bloggers with an active online base and 

built-in following and credibility to deliver 

their message. With chefs increasingly getting 

online to engage on social media, partnering 

with food bloggers is an opportunity to tap 

into a new base of consumers who are proud 

to make informed, socially aware food choices. 

Enhancing Credibility 

For restaurateurs and foodservice providers 

looking to bring in new customers, leveraging 

the active food blogger community can make 

a big impact. Giving consumers a window into 

the foodservice world through bloggers they 

know and trust shows significant potential 

as a new tool to promote local food to savvy 

consumers. 

There’s benefit for the bloggers, too. 

Charmian Christie, a culinary instructor and 

author of the blog “The Messy Baker” says 

that “as a culinary professional, farm tours 

are invaluable. When I say “I’ve been to the 

orchard” or “I’ve see the apples being washed 

and packed,” I have a level of authority no 

amount of Googling can recreate. As a result, 

my students and readers are more engaged, 

ask more questions and are more eager to 

shop Ontario.” 

Engaging bloggers 

“We had a large involvement with 

Facebook,” explains Susan Fitzgerald of 

Ontario Pork. “Food bloggers picked up on our 

objective and promoted a huge variety of pork 

recipes, from simple to complex.” 

Ontario Apple Growers took a “hands 

on” approach and selected ten bloggers to 

introduce to Ontario apple production. 

“We took them on a farm tour last fall, where 

they could learn directly from an experienced 

apple grower,” explains Kelly Ciceran of Ontario 

Apple Growers. “We encouraged them to ask 

questions about all stages of apple production.” 

The bloggers were later taken on another tour 

of storage and packing facilities, allowing them 

to understand how Ontario apples are made 

available to consumers year round, how apples 

are graded and many apple products. 

Strong Results 

Ontario Pork reports that the campaign 

exceeded all of its objectives, with “views” 

of its six videos topping 443,000 – almost 

double the target. In addition, the original six 

recipes ballooned into an entire healthy recipe 

booklet, which hit 225,000 “reaches” through 

bloggers – triple the goal. 

Ontario Apple Growers’ had participating 

bloggers then created three recipes that they 

posted to their blogs and shared through a 

variety of social media. “We also compiled 

these 30+ recipes into an e-Cookbook that 

was available for download from our website 

in nutrition month, March of 2017,” Ciceran 

explains. “The e-Cookbook was so popular 

upon its release that the website crashed.” 

Engaging the blogosphere and social media 

can bring in discerning consumers who want 

to learn more about where to find local food 

when going out for a meal. As Ontario Pork 

and Ontario Apple Growers demonstrated, 

the agri-food industry can benefit by taking 

on this opportunity and reaching consumers 

in new ways. 

The Greenbelt Fund changes the way we eat by investing in projects that bring more Ontario 

food to Ontarians’ plates, with financial support from the Government of Ontario.

MONTHLY NEWS AND UPDATES FOR THE FOODSERVICE INDUSTRY 

iSTOCK.COM/ [TEA]; iSTOCK.COM/PHOTOLOG [COFFEE-INFUSED COCKTAIL] 

CAFFEINE BUZZ 

Toronto Hosts the Canadian Coffee & Tea Show 

BY DANIELLE SCHALK 

The Canadian Coffee & Tea 

Show returned to Toronto 

at the end of September, 

bringing together baristas, 

tea experts, distributors and 

industry influencers. 

The 2017 edition of the annual 

tradeshow featured morning education 

sessions and more than 130 

exhibitors. For the first time, the event 

also featured a selection of interactive 

workshops on the tradeshow floor, 

including latte-art demonstrations, 

pour-over coffee tutorials and cupping 

seminars. 

During morning sessions, Stephen 

Gray, national Business Development 

director, Canada, Monin Gourmet 

Flavourings, highlighted key trends 

in café-beverage sales. In particular, 

he stressed the power of seasonal 

limited-time offers to drive sales and 

attract consumer attention — pointing 

to research indicating that 37 per 

cent of North American consumers 

are willing to spend more to try 

unique flavours. 

Growing interest in non-coffee 

beverages also offers a key opportunity 

for operators to focus on a new 

growth area.” 

Iced teas, flavoured waters, handcrafted 

sodas and lemonades are key 

products that can provide operators 

with an edge and bolster sales. 

These offerings also offer a prime 

opportunity to dazzle customers 

with visual appeal. Offering 

variety is particularly 

important given millennials’ 

penchant 

for visiting cafés 

THE 

CANADIAN 

COFFEE 

& TEA SHOW 

also 

featured 

educational 

sessions 

on coffee 

roast-profile 

development, 

tea tasting, 

tea blending 

and coffee 

and tea trends 

for grocers 

and coffee shops during all dayparts, 

he adds. 

“What we’re seeing, especially in 

that millennial category, is [consumers] 

want an experience and they will 

pay for it, so don’t be afraid to work 

that in your favour,” says Gray. 

Adi Baker, executive assistant, Tea 

and Herbal Association of Canada 

(THAC) hosted a “Tea Industry 

Update” session, which highlighted 

consumer habits, as well as recent 

developments within THAC. 

According to Baker, the profile 

of the Canadian tea drinker is very 

diverse. In particular, the tea traditions 

of immigrants have fuelled 

growth in specialty tea (tea besides 

black tea bags) sales, however “we are 

predominantly a black tea-drinking 

country,” she adds. 

That said, millennials are also 

major influences when it comes to 

tea. “Looking at [Canada’s] total tea 

drinkers, 58 per cent of them are 

female and 70 per cent are between 

22 and 31,” Baker explains. 

“[Millennials] perceive 

and like tea and coffee 

equally. There is a 

time for tea and coffee 

in each of their days.” 

Like Gray, Baker also 

noted millennials’ preference 

for variety and 

different flavours, which 

is driving sales of both specialty 

and herbal teas. 

In the “Tea and Coffee-infused Cocktails” session, Tata Global Beverages and Brad Gubbins, owner of Cordial 

& Company Consultancy, highlighted how incorporating tea and coffee into restaurant cocktail programs can 

grow profit margins. Gubbins walked attendees through key in-house techniques and recipe examples that 

can help bring unique flair to a restaurant’s beverage program. 



INNOVATION UNVEILED 

GEORGE BROWN COLLEGE celebrated 

the grand opening of its 

new Culinary Research Innovation 

Labs at the Centre for Hospitality 

& Culinary Arts in September. The 

event was attended by industry 

partners, donors and friends of 

George Brown College, who were 

treated to tours of the new facilities, 

as well as food and drinks. “We are celebrating the launch of new facilities that 

will help expand George Brown’s applied-research capacity and infrastructure while 

enabling the development of safe, innovative and affordable new food-and-beverage 

products,” said Anne Sado, president, George Brown College. “Acting as a hub for 

experiential learning, these applied-research facilities will expose our students to 

real-world challenges and projects, allowing them to become flexible innovators and 

problem solvers. At the same time, they will provide vital support to Ontario’s small 

and medium-sized food-and-beverage businesses — offering product-development 

opportunities that range from product and market research to commercialization.” 

The new additions include a showcase kitchen and state-of-the-art research 

labs, including a baking lab, innovation pod and chocolate lab. The creation of 

these facilities was supported by a $7-million investment from Federal Economic 

Development Agency for Southern Ontario, as well as contributions from donors 

and members of the food-and-beverage industry. — Danielle Schalk 

COMING 

EVENTS 

NOV. 4 Canadian Hospitality Foundation Gala, The Fairmont 

Royal York Hotel, Toronto. Tel: 416-363-3401; email: chf@ 

thechf.ca; website: thechf.ca 

NOV. 6-7 Ontario Food Tourism Summit, Scotiabank 

Convention Centre in Niagara Falls, Ont. Tel: 416-483-1691; 

email: info@tiaontario.ca; website: tiaontario.ca/events 

NOV. 16 Friends of We Care Vancouver Bowling Challenge, 

Revs Bowling & Entertainment, Burnaby, B.C. Tel: 905- 

841-1223; email: gmandziuk@friendsofwecare.org; 

website: friendsofwecare.org 

NOV. 23 Friends of We Care Toronto Bowling Challenge, 

Planet Bowl, Toronto. Tel: 905-841-1223; email: khartl@ 

friendsofwecare.org; website: friendsofwecare.org 

DEC. 1 The 29th Annual Pinnacle Awards, The Fairmont Royal 

York Hotel, Toronto. Tel: 416-447-0888, ext. 235; email: 

dpricoiu@kostuchmedia.com; website: kostuchmedia. 

com/shop 

FOR MORE EVENTS VISIT 

http://bit.ly/FHevents 

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BUILDING PARTNER 

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RESTO BUZZ 

The Butternut Tree 

Bacchanal has opened in Toronto’s West 

Queen West neighbourhood in the space 

that formerly housed Recess Diner. 

Helmed by executive chef Luke Donato, the 

restaurant focuses on “neo-French” cuisine 

as well as cocktails and a selection of more 

than 25 wines by the glass. It also boasts 

a pastry program led by pastry chef Cori 

(Murphy) Osborne — formerly of Lavelle 

and Alo…Toptable Group is reimagining 

the concept of Whistler Village’s iconic 

restaurant Il Caminetto. Darin Newton has 

been tasked with driving the future success 

of Il Caminetto as the new restaurant director and will lead the front-of-house team in the contemporary, 

regionally inspired dining room and work side-by-side with executive chef James Walt…The Butternut 

Tree, a 58-seat restaurant, has opened its doors across from the Alberta legislature in the Ledgeview 

Centre. Owned and operated by St. Albert, Alta.-born chef Scott Downey, the restaurant focuses on 

Canadian ingredients, such as Ocean Wise-certified rockfish from B.C.’s coast…Chef Lucais Syme is set to 

open a pasta-focused restaurant in Vancouver this winter. Autostrada will feature seating for 30 and a bar 

featuring a selection of wines by-the-glass, beer and cocktails. 

Opening a new restaurant? Let us in on the buzz 

Send a high-res image, menu and background information about the new establishment to tvenetis@kostuchmedia.com. 

Kasa Moto 

CHANGE UP 

Chase Hospitality Group (CHG) has partnered 

with chef Antonio Park, owner of 

Montreal’s Park restaurant, to reimagine the 

menu at Kasa Moto. As the Toronto-based 

restaurant’s new culinary leader, chef Park 

is introducing new dishes, such as a shrimptempura 

Caesar; seared-scallop ceviche, 

with coconut, lime and plantain chips; and 

beef tataki with mushrooms and Sansho 

Miso. “Chef Antonio Park and CHG were 

brought together by our shared mission to 

emphasize high quality, responsibly sourced, 

sustainable ingredients,” says Steven Salm, 

president, CHG. “It is a pivotal moment for 

us to welcome such a globally recognized 

chef not just into the Chase Hospitality 

Group family, but to Toronto.” 

CHASE HOSPITALITY GROUP/STEVEN LEE [KASA MOTO]

IN BRIEF 

MTY Food Group Inc. has completed the 

previously announced acquisition of the 

totality of the assets of Dagwoods Sandwiches 

and Salads. Spiro Krallis, Dagwoods’ current 

president, will continue with MTY for a threemonth 

period to ensure a smooth transition. 

Michel Lamontagne will be leading the 

Dagwoods operations following the closing of 

the transaction…Starbucks Canada has opened 

its second express location in Montreal’s 

Central Station. The 400-sq.-ft. store is 

designed to provide a faster speed of service 

ideal for morning commuters…The Second 

Cup Ltd. has signed a category-exclusive 

licensing agreement with Pinkberry Canada 

Inc. and has begun rolling out the Pinkberry 

Frozen-Yogurt program in Second Cup cafés 

across the country…Sobeys has launched 

Easy Meals — a line of pre-packaged meals, 

prepared in-store at local Sobeys and Safeway 

stores in the Seafood, meat, kitchen and deli 

departments…Air Transat has partnered 

with Quebec chef Daniel Vézina to provide 

passengers with six new exclusive dishes and 

two breakfast choices. These meals, which can 

be pre-ordered, will be served to all Club Class 

passengers and will be available in Economy 

Class starting Dec. 1…Max’s Group Inc. has 

partnered with Alibin Group Inc. to establish 

a flagship Max’s Restaurant in Winnipeg. The 

chain’s first Canadian location is scheduled to 

open next year…DoorDash has expanded its 

door-to-door delivery service to more than 

20 neighbourhoods in the cities of Edmonton, 

St. Albert and Sherwood Park, Alta., including 

Strathcona, Beverly, Silver Berry, Ottewell, 

Balwin, Blue Quill, Jasper Place, Pleasantview 

and Terra Losa…JR Canada Restaurant Group 

Ltd., the master developer for the Johnny 

Rockets brand across Canada, opened the 

brand’s third Canadian location in Vancouver… 

Slower-than-expected growth has led the 

Freshii brand to reduce its target net openings 

through 2019. The company has noted that 

expansion in the U.K. and several U.S. states has 

been slower than expected because its multiunit 

franchisees have been more conservative 

in their real-estate selection than the 

company anticipated…The Landing Restaurant 

Group opened Kellys Landing Bar Grill Hub in 

downtown Toronto. Like its sister locations, food 

is prepared fresh daily from local sources and 

features a selection of 30+ wines and 24 beers 

on tap, including wheat beers, cider and radlers. 

PEOPLE 

Michael Allemeier, chef and culinary instructor 

at the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology 

(SAIT), has earned a Master-Chef certification 

— becoming the third Canadian chef to receive 

the designation…Starbucks Corporation has 

appointed Rosalind Brewer as group president 

and chief Operating officer. Brewer is the 

former president and CEO of Sam’s Club and is 

Rosalind Brewer 

a current Starbucks 

board member. 

She boasts more 

than 10 years of 

experience leading 

multi-national 

retailers…Chef Kyle 

Puddester was 

crowned the final 

champion of Battleapps — a Canadian chefbattle 

series presented by McCain Foodservice 

and Underground Chef Co…Benjamin Mauroy- 

Langlais has won the chance to compete 

against 20 global contenders for the San 

Pellegrino Young Chef 2018 title in Milan in June 

2018. He beat out 10 Canadian semi-finalists 

with his signature smoked-eel dish. Mauroy- 

Langlais was chosen by a jury of industry 

heavyweights including Anthony Walsh, Joel 

Watanabe, Todd Perrin, Ricardo Bertolino and 

Jenn Agg, who evaluated the signature dishes 

of each semi-finalist based on ingredients, 

skills, genius, beauty and message. 

SUPPLY SIDE 

The Rational condensation hood UltraVent 

Plus XS ensures good air quality in the front 

cooking area. The SelfCookingCenter XS, in 

combination with the UltraVent Plus XS for front 

cooking areas, doesn’t allow any unpleasant 

smells. The Ultravent Plus filters and directly 

dissipates the steam and impure air, thereby 

eliminating the costs of complex ventilation 

systems…Antunes has partnered with A&W 

Food Services of Canada, Inc. on a chain-wide 

rollout of its Egg Stations to approximately 550 

restaurant locations. The rollout coincided with 

the Canadian fast-food chain’s launch of its 

all-day breakfast program. An alternative to 

grill cooking and with a small footprint to easily 

fit into any operation, Antunes’ Egg Stations 

offer a reliable way to quickly cook eggs to 

order using steam and heat…DayMark Safety 

Systems has partnered with Nutritics to launch 

a new cloud-based recipe analysis system. The 

system is designed to help food processors 

analyze more than 60 individual nutrients in 

their grab-and-go food products, including 

calories, sugar, salt, vitamins and glycemic 

index. It also provides a complete breakdown 

of recipe costs and costs-per-portion and 

reports contribution of individual ingredients 

in order to help reduce operating costs and 

increase profit margins…Tableware Solutions 

is the newest partner in promoting Spring 

USA products. Established in 2000 and located 

in Ontario, Tableware Solutions distributes 

tabletop products designed for the foodservice 

industry…ConnectedCooking and Club Rational 

have come together to create an online portal 

for foodservice professionals. This new platform 

offers services relating to cooking and Rational 

appliances. An updated ConnectedCooking app 

allows access to a database of recipes, how-to 

videos and tips and tricks from professional 

chefs. As a result, Club Rational is longer 

available, but login information that members 

of Club Rational used in the past will remain 

valid…Andrew Peller Limited has announced 

plans to acquire three British Columbia-based 

wineries in the province’s Okanagan Valley — 

Black Hills Estate Winery, Gray Monk Estate 

Winery and Tinhorn Creek Vineyards — for 

$95 million. 



MOVING 

the 

NEEDLE 

Women in Tourism and 

Hospitality Conference 

empowers women to move 

the needle on gender equality 

PHOTOGRAPHY BY TRINA TURL 

Keynote speaker Kirstine Stewart, 

chief Strategy officer at Diply GoViral 

THE INAUGURAL Women in Tourism and Hospitality 

(WITHorg) conference, the first of its kind in 

Canada, was held at the Park Hyatt Toronto in 

September. More than 160 industry professionals 

gathered for the unique day-long conference and 

workshop hybrid created by Kostuch Media Ltd. 

and Sequel Hotels & Resorts. 

Bonnie Strome, GM Park Hyatt Toronto 

Ellen Dubois 

Du Bellay, EVP, 

People, Inside 

Out International 

Carolyn Clark, SVP AccorHotels 

Johanne Belanger, 

president & CEO of 

Tourism Toronto 

Lucie Guillemette, 

EVP and chief 

Commercial officer 

at Air Canada 

(from left) Anne Larcade, Christiane Germain, Carolyn Clark, Minaz Abji, 

Roz Winegrad, Stephanie Hardman and Rosanna Caira

WOMEN IN TOURISM & HOSPITALITY 

Reetu Gupta, COO of 

Easton’s Group of Hotels 

and The Gupta Group, led 

a morning meditation 

Shelmina Abji, former VP at IBM and current 

advisory board member for Girl Up 

Lucie 

Guillemette 

presented 

Kathleen 

Taylor (left) 

with the 

WITHorg 

Economic 

Empowerment 

Award 

Yvonne Heath, 

former nurse 

turned author 

and inspirational 

speaker 

(from left) Anne Larcade; Hani Roustom, 

GM, Hazelton Hotel (who won two tickets 

to any where Air Canada flies); and 

Rosanna Caira 

Arielle Meloul-Wechsler, SVP People and Culture, Air Canada 

Christiane 

Germain, 

co-president 

of Groupe 

Germain 

Hotels 

Heather Haynes, founder, 

Worlds Collide Africa 

Statia Elliot, 

director, 

School of 

Hospitality, Food 

and Tourism 

Management, 

University of 

Guelph 

(from left) Don Cleary, Ellen Dubois Du Bellay, Julia 

Christensen Hughes, Stephania Varalli and Kirstine Stewart 



DECEMBER 1, 2017 

FAIRMONT ROYAL YORK HOTEL, TORONTO 

CO-HOSTS 

ROSANNA CAIRA 

Editor & Publisher 

Kostuch Media Ltd. 

VIKRAM VIJ 

Chef & Owner 

Vij’s 

Introducing the 2017 Honorees 

COMPANY OF THE YEAR 

REGIONAL COMPANY 

OF THE YEAR 

JANET ZUCCARINI 

INDEPENDENT 

RESTAURATEUR 

JASON BANGERTER 

CHEF OF THE YEAR 

SUPPLIER OF 

THE YEAR 

ROSANNA CAIRA 

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Canadian ingredients, products, menu items, Canadian-born chefs, as 

well as quintessential Canadian restaurants. A judging panel comprised 

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(see all the winning entries on the next page) 

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Eng Chak 

Toronto 

At the 2017 Pinnacle Awards, 

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FROM THE DESK OF ROBERT CARTER 

GLOBAL 

INFLUENCES 

Foodservice 

traffic grows in 

every global market 

outside of U.S. 

in second quarter 

iSTOCK.COM/PESHKOV [GLOBE] 

While you’ve likely heard a lot 

about “anemic growth” and 

“declining traffic counts” 

over the last few years, you 

may be surprised to hear 

that global foodservice traffic increased in 

every major market outside of the U.S. in the 

second quarter of 2017. 

This finding comes from a recent report 

by The NPD Group, which continually 

tracks consumer use of foodservice outlets 

in Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, 

Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Korea, 

Russia, Spain and the United States. 

Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, 

the quick-service segment and delivery services 

were key drivers of global visit growth during 

this period as consumers globally adopted 

many of the same consumption habits we see 

in Canada. 

The growth of technology — and specifically 

mobile — has continued to change the 

way consumers shop for food and the way 

they dine out. The use of digital technology 

to place orders has been growing rapidly for 

several years, not only in Canada, but around 

the world. And while the “digital door” currently 

represents only two per cent of all 

foodservice and fast-moving consumer-goods 

orders in Canada, it continues to be a significant 

visit motivator, as nearly 10 per cent of 

consumers claim to have been influenced by 

a social-media platform before making a restaurant 

choice. In fact, in every major market 

The NPD Group tracks, virtually all growth 

in the past three years has come from mobile 

or internet services. Furthermore, nearly 

all global foodservice-traffic growth came 

through the quick-service restaurant (QSR) 

segment, where consumers have responded 

positively to advantageous pricing, aggressive 

unit expansion and advertising of QSR chains 

and outlets. 

Looking outside of North America, 

European markets continued solid, if unspectacular, 

recovery while Brazil and Russia — 

both mired in recession in recent years — also 

rebounded slightly. Even Korea posted a solid 

traffic gain. 

When looking at dayparts, visits during 

the breakfast dayart are growing broadly, but 

it’s still a relatively small daypart in terms 

of traffic share in most global markets and 

can’t drive overall growth like other meals 

can. Lunch traffic did increase in Brazil, 

China, Russia and Spain, but declined in all 

other countries. Visits at dinner were flat or 

up in most countries, with the exception of 

Australia, Canada and the U.S. 

However, perhaps the most interesting 

finding comes out of the U.S., where total 

visits to restaurants and foodservice outlets 

declined by one per cent — a loss of 94.5 million 

visits in the quarter compared to a year 

ago. While this finding is clearly significant to 

U.S. operators, it should not be overlooked by 

those in Canada, given that the foodservice 

industry is a bellwether for the economy at 

large and our neighbours to the south tend 

to have a significant impact on our economic 

well-being. While the U.S. has experienced 

seven-plus years of strong economic growth 

and stability, the decline in visitation traffic 

may indicate a slowdown in consumer confidence 

that may be mirrored in Canada should 

the nearly decade-long bull market in the U.S. 

come to an end. 

However, until that time comes, we can 

(and should) focus on some of the bright 

spots in the marketplace — after all, it’s been 

a while since we’ve seen such broad-based 

traffic growth across the globe, which makes 

future quarters promising. FH 

Robert Carter is executive 

director, Foodservice Canada, 

with the NPD Group Inc. He 

can be reached at robert. 

carter@npd.com for questions 

regarding the latest 

trends and their impact on 

the foodservice business. 



FOOD FILE 

Riding the 

How the sustainable-seafood movement 

is attracting new disciples 

STORY BY CHRIS POWELL 


n July 22, 1992, as disgruntled 

fisherman tried 

unsuccessfully to barge 

into the St. John’s hotel 

room where Canada’s then 

Federal Fisheries Minister John 

Crosbie was speaking, he announced 

the unthinkable: a moratorium on the fishing of 

Northern cod. 

Years later, Crosbie would describe the decision, 

which put an estimated 40,000 people in Atlantic 

Canada out of work, the hardest of his political career. 

Northern cod had sustained Newfoundlanders for 

nearly 500 years; when the English explorer John Cabot 

discovered the North American coast in 1497, he is 

reported to have said the fish on the Grand Banks were 

so abundant they slowed his ship. But human ingenuity 

has a way of rendering even the unthinkable possible. 

The introduction of new and improved fish-finding 

technologies, as well as factory freezer trawlers capable 

of spending months at sea, helped make the cod-fishing 

industry ruthlessly efficient. 

Boats from Canada — not to mention Spain, 

Portugal, Russia and other countries — pulled a record 

810,000 tonnes of ground fish (a group that includes 

cod, flounder, halibut and sole) from the frigid waters 

of the North Atlantic in 1968. Nobody knew it at the 

time, but it was the beginning of the end. The annual 

harvest would decline steadily over the next decade, 

with the harvestable biomass of Northern cod alone 

JONATHAN BIELASKI 

THE ART OF SUSTAINABILITY 

Langdon Hall’s warm scallops 

with sorrel, hogweed and 

apple; Ocean Wise-certified 

mussels (right) 


FOOD FILE 

plummeting 82 per cent between 1962 and 1977, leading to the 

industry’s eventual collapse and Crosbie’s fateful announcement. 

Nobody could have foreseen it at the time, but there would one 

day be a bright side to the story. Jay Lugar, program director, Canada 

for the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) in Halifax, points to the 

collapse of the cod industry as the flashpoint for today’s sustainableseafood 

movement. “It galvanized people, not only because of the 

health of the oceans, but the people involved,” he says. 

Today, sustainable seafood is increasingly top-of-mind among 

Canadian restaurateurs. It ranked seventh in the top-10 hot trends 

in Restaurants Canada’s 2017 Canadian Chef’s Survey and sixth 

overall in the top-10 up-and-coming trends. 

“Sustainable is gaining buzz,” says Kunal Kr, director of Culinary 

Development at Halifax’s Grafton Connor Group, which operates 

restaurants in the casual, fine-dining, bars and grills, nightclub and 

dinner-theatre categories. “It gives the guests a feeling of appreciation 

[they don’t get] with fish from China.” 

Kr recently worked 

with Grafton Connor 

president Gary Hurst 

to implement a 

sustainable-seafood 

program around the 

re-launch of the company’s 

35-year-old 

flagship restaurant, 

The Five Fisherman, 

in May. “Before that, 

sustainability was 

not on our list [of 

priorities],” says Kr. 

“We live in a fishing 

town and the most 

important thing is to 

maintain and increase 

production for the 

long-term without 

jeopardizing our 

oceans and eco-systems. 

Over-fishing is 

probably the biggest 

threat our oceans are 

facing.” 

The Grafton 

Connor Group 

FRUITS OF THE SEA (clockwise from 

top left) Salmon and sushi from 

Earls Restaurant + Bar; Ocean Wisecertified 

prawns; MSC-certified 

smoked salmon and dill 

submitted the Five Fishermen’s menus to Ocean Wise — the sustainable-seafood 

program operated by the Vancouver Aquarium — 

which suggested menu changes based on sustainability. The 

items were then sourced from Afishianado Fishmongers, a Halifax 

supplier specializing in “sustainable, transparent and locally 

sourced seafood.” 

Grafton Connor’s story is being repeated around the world. 

According to a 2016 report by the International Institute for 

Sustainable Development (IISD), certified-sustainable seafood 

accounted for 14 per cent (roughly 23 million metric tonnes) of 

total global production in 2015, up sharply from a mere 0.5 per cent 

(500,000 metric tonnes) just a decade earlier. 

“We’re clearly seeing a growing level of interest [in sustainable 

seafood] among consumers and all providers of seafood,” says Lugar. 

Established in 1997, MSC’s globally recognized “blue ecolabel” 

JONATHAN BIELASKI [SALMON AND SUSHI] 


Call today for your 

FREE SAMPLE of TWISTED CALAMARI 

Oceanfood Sales / Toll Free Number: 1-877-255-1414 

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FOOD FILE 

GUARDIANS OF THE OCEAN The Marine Stewardship Council offers certification to 

restaurants and suppliers that source seafood in a sustainabile manner 

is the oldest standard for the labelling of sustainable wild-catch 

species. More than 20,000 seafood products worldwide now carry the 

MSC label, signifying that they come from a wild-catch fishery that is 

independently certified and fully traceable to a sustainable source. 

More than 28 fisheries in more than 33 countries are currently 

certified to the MSC standard. These fisheries boast combined 

annual production of nearly nine-million metric tonnes (approximately 

10 per cent of annual global yields). 

The Canadian sustainable-seafood program, SeaChoice, defines 

sustainable seafood as fish or shellfish “caught or farmed in a manner 

that can be sustained over the long term without compromising 

the health of marine ecosystems.” Criteria for the 

FINAL AD NOVEMBER 2017.pdf 1 10/13/2017 9:32:32 AM 

sustainable 

designation among wild-caught species includes low vulnerability 

to fishing pressure; they are caught using techniques that minimize 

“by-catch” of unwanted species and captured in ways that maintain 

natural functional relationships among species. 

Rob Stutman, co-owner of Brit & Chips — an eight-year-old 

fish-and-chips chain with three locations in Montreal — says there 

is “absolutely” growing customer interest in sustainable seafood. 

Brit & Chips became the first independently owned restaurant 

in Canada to achieve MSC certification in 2015, allowing it to serve 

cod, haddock, salmon and sole bearing the MSC label (its menu also 

features sustainable hake that is not MSC certified). 

“We wanted to make sure whatever products we were using were 

excellent for our clients and good for the oceans,” says Stutman. “We 

want to make sure we don’t clean out the oceans just to sell some 

fish and chips.” 

Brit & Chips pays between $3,000 and $4,000 each year to maintain 

its MSC certification, but Stutman has no qualms about the cost. 

“It’s not much for what we believe in,” he says. 

Kr says sustainable seafood can cost as much as 25-per-cent more, 

based on several factors. Many sustainable species are line-caught, for 

example, which requires additional fishermen and typically results in 

a smaller yield, while there is also the behind-the-scenes work that 

goes into creating and maintaining sustainable-fishing programs. 

These costs are typically downloaded to patrons, requiring restaurants 

to educate them on the importance of sustainability. “I see 

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FOOD FILE 

nothing but positives once everybody gets educated on what’s happening,” 

says Kr. 

The rise of sustainable seafood coincides with unprecedented 

pressure on fish stocks around the world, with global per-capita 

consumption reaching 20kg a year for the first time ever in 

2014, according to the 2016 edition of the Food and Agriculture 

Organization’s The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture report. 

Canadian seafood consumption is modest by global standards, 

with the average Canadian consuming 7.5kg of fish in 2016 according 

to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, down from a high of 

10.04kg in 1999. That compares with 32.5kg of chicken, 25kg of beef 

and 20.9kg of pork. 

While the collapse of the Atlantic-cod industry has become 

synonymous with overfishing, it is by no means alone. According 

to a January report from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) entitled 

Fishing for Proteins, 31 per cent of the world’s scientifically assessed 

fish stocks are considered overfished, while another 58 per cent are 

considered fully fished — with any further increase in fishing activity 

carrying the potential to “gravely jeopardize” their health. 

In addition to Atlantic cod, Greenpeace’s so-called “Red List” of 

the 22 marine species that should not be made commercially available 

includes albacore tuna, Atlantic halibut, Atlantic salmon, orange 

roughy and Chilean sea bass. 

Yet, even a perfunctory search quickly turns up Canadian menu 

items such as miso-glazed Chilean sea bass and Atlantic halibut with 

smoked-salmon crust, suggesting there’s still work to do in making 

sustainable seafood the industry standard. 

Jason Bangerter, executive chef of Langdon Hall in Cambridge, 

Ont., says his menu features only seafood sourced from reputable 

suppliers. He works directly with Organic Ocean, a group of independent 

west-coast fisherman specializing in sustainable seafood 

that claim to be the first seafood supplier in the world to provide 

DNA-certification of their products. “These are the people I’m surrounding 

myself with when it comes to ingredients,” says Bangerter. 

“People that are serious about sustainability, about the environment, 

and the product.” 

Organic Ocean has supplied restaurants throughout Canada, 

including Mercer Hall in Stratford, Ont., the Four Seasons Hotel’s 

YEW Seafood + Bar in Vancouver, Borealis Grille & Bar in Kitchener 

and Guelph, Ont. and The Chase in Toronto. 

Yet there appears to be ample room for the growth of sustainable 

seafood among restaurateurs, with a recent MSC-sponsored study 

of 16,000 seafood eaters in 21 countries finding Canadians “overwhelmingly” 

report purchasing sustainable seafood in grocery stores 

versus restaurants (91 per cent versus 21 per cent). 

In 2014, QSR giant McDonald’s announced that all of the fish 

(Alaska Pollack) in its Filet-O-Fish sandwiches sold in the U.S., 

Canada and Europe was MSC-certified. “Restaurants are gaining 

a sense they need to speak to sustainable seafood,” says Lugar. 

“They’re searching for credible ways to make it happen.” 

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FOOD FILE 

Ingredient 

Spotlight 

® 

The popular saying “first you eat 

with your eyes” is put 

to the test at The 

Five Fishermen restaurant 

in Halifax. 

Alongside standard 

sustainable ocean fare 

such as oysters, mussels, 

tuna, haddock and halibut, 

the 35-year-old restaurant offers a 

decidedly odd-looking food (one description has 

them looking like “dinosaur toes”) called gooseneck 

barnacles. 

Also known as percebes, gooseneck barnacles 

are a popular delicacy in Spain and Portugal. 

Tubular in shape, these crustaceans are found 

clinging to rocks below the high-tide line. 

They are known for their sweet flesh, which is 

described as tasting like a cross between lobster 

and clams. At The Five Fishermen, they are served 

steamed with a dipping sauce. 

In Canada, gooseneck barnacles are harvested 

from the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations’ gooseneck-barnacle 

fishery in Clayoquot Sound, B.C. 

Recognized as a sustainable-seafood choice by 

the Vancouver Aquarium’s Ocean Wise program in 

2015, the harvest site consists of 48 rocks. 

Colorado-based FishChoice’s “Sustainable 

Seafood Restaurant Finder” identifies 988 restaurants 

in Canada offering certified-sustainable 

seafood. They range from chains such 

as Earls and Moxies, to independent eateries 

such as Lbs. in Toronto’s financial district. 

But Lugar believes sustainability’s growth 

potential is hampered because it hasn’t 

become a key factor when it comes to selecting 

a menu item. “[Restaurants] don’t often 

get people saying ‘I want this fish because it’s 

sustainable.’ When they’re eating fish in a restaurant 

they’re looking for taste, texture and 

flavour,” he says. 

Because it’s voluntary, MSC relies on the 

public to push demand for sustainable seafood, 

which Lugar says can put pressure on 

fisheries to become certified. 

“We can educate and inform people, but 

fisheries have to volunteer to come forward. 

Using consumer demand, and having people 

become aware of the need for sustainable 

seafood, will push those requirements to 

these fisheries.” FH 

FOODSERVICEANDHOSPITALITY.COM


Restaurants are experimenting with healthier menus 

and technology to keep Canadians coming back 

STORY BY TOM VENETIS 

ILLUSTRATION BY MARGARET MOORE 

While Canadian foodservice operators 

should expect a modestly healthy 2017 in 

terms of growth, increasing competition and 

a changing consumer-spending landscape are 

going to prove challenging into 2018. 

According to a recent Conference Board of 

Canada study, Canadian Industrial Outlook: 

Canada’s Food Services Industry, an increasingly 

competitive restaurant landscape and 

weakening consumer spending means revenue 

growth will be limited to only 3.9 per cent 

for 2017. 

While Canadians may be holding onto 

their wallets a little more tightly, signs point 

to consumers still wanting to eat out. A recent 

study by Restaurants Canada, The Discerning 

Diner: What Canadians Want From Their 

Foodservice Experience, finds most Canadians 

eat out at least once a month, with 42 per cent 

favouring quick-service restaurants and 41 

per cent spending their dollars at table-service 

restaurants. The study also finds QSRs continue 

to remain popular with Canadians — 44 

per cent say their choice is motivated by convenience, 

34 per cent by value and 31 per cent 

by fast service. 

QSR 

Aaron Jourden, managing editor, Global, with 

Chicago-based Technomic Inc., says QSRs 

continue to be the top choice for Canadians, 

so individual operations and chains will have 

to innovate if they wish to remain competitive. 

“So far, 2017 has looked healthy and we 

expect next year to be as healthy or healthier,” 

he says. 


In fact, according to Foodservice Facts 2017, 

released by Restaurants Canada, the QSR 

segment recorded approximately $29 billion 

in annual sales in 2016 and is expected to 

increase another 4.3 per cent by the end 

of 2017. 

Jourden says menu innovation will be 

key to customer service in the QSR segment, 

including healthier ingredients and a wider 

range of food options. “They are working to 

eliminate some of the unwanted ingredients 

and additives from their menus and we are 

starting to see them move towards more sustainable 

and eco-friendly sourcing practices 

for their ingredients,” he explains. “This might 

include cage-free eggs and antibiotic-free 

meats; and even the introduction of some 

ingredients that 10 years ago you would 

have not seen on a quick-service menu. For 

example, you are starting to see high-end 

condiments and cheeses [at restaurants such 

as] Subway.” 

The Discerning Diner study shows 27 per 

cent of Canadians say they are more likely 

to visit a restaurant that offers organic or 

environmentally friendly food. However, 

Doug Fisher, president of Toronto-based 

FHG International Inc., is skeptical. “It’s hard 

to believe someone is making a choice to go 

to A&W over McDonald’s because they say 

A&W has no hormones in its meat,” he says. 

“In the end, you are going for taste, quality 

and for price and convenience.” 

Late last year, Technomic released 5 Ways 

Canadian Foodservice Will Change in 2017 — 

a study highlighting important changes in the 




Canadian foodservice market. With Chinese 

and Mexican foods now part of the mainstream, 

the report notes that Canada is likely 

to see more global fare making an appearance 

in restaurants, especially QSR and fast-casual. 

Another trend is plant-based comfort foods, 

such as burgers, burritos and pizza. Not to 

be forgetten, desserts, for those with a sweet 

tooth will see the introduction of specialty 

flavours and ethnically inspired options such 

as Mexican paletas, Taiwanese shaved ice and 

Japanese-style cheesecake. 

Robert Carter, executive director, 

Foodservices, with Toronto-based The NPD 

Group, says while 68 per cent of all consumer 

traffic in Canada 

continues to be generated 

through the QSR 

segment, how guests 

interact with operations 

is going through 

a profound shift. A 

survey by Canada 

Mobile shows 42 per 

cent of 18 to 34 year 

olds ordered take out 

or delivery on their phones in 2016, while 35 

per cent of that demographic used them for 

rewards or special deals. 

In response, the days of lining up and placing 

an order with a front-line counterperson 

may soon be over, as many QSRs begin either 

experimenting or rolling out smartphone 

70 

60 

50 

40 

30 

20 

10 

0% 

Market Share by Restaurant Segment 

68.2% 

50.9% 

Quick-Service 

Restaurants 

11.2% 

Traffic 

applications allowing consumers to place and 

pay for their orders from an app, while others 

are adding electronic-kiosk ordering to 

their locations. 

Carter is quick to add this is not new to 

the segment. “If you look at the restaurant 

segment 40 years ago, it was much more traditional 

dinners where you would go in, sit 

down and eat something,” he says. “Then there 

was the advent of the drive-thru with A&W 

and McDonald’s and that changed the landscape 

of the restaurant market and the eating 

Full-service restaurants 

Traffic: 20.2% 

Dollars: 41.4% 

8.3% 

Dollars 

18.3% 19.0% 

0.7% 

SOURCE: THE NPD GROUP INC.\FOODSERVICE\CREST®\TOTAL CANADA\YE DECEMBER 2016. 

4.1% 

Mid-scale Casual Dining Fine 

Dining 

11.7% 

7.7% 

Retail 

Foodservice 

habits of consumers. That convenience option 

continues to evolve and, within the last five 

years, has seen a huge push towards digital and 

online technologies.” 

“Online traffic in Canada represents 

[approximately] $1.4 billion annually in 

spending and that has been, over the last three 

years, with an average growth of about 25 per 

cent,” Carter says, adding he foresees mobile 

ordering growing exponentially next year. 

Performance by Province 

[Commercial Foodservice] 

Sales Growth Sales Growth 

Forecast in Forecast in 

’17/’16 1 

2016 Sales 

Average Unit 

Units Menu Inflation 

(in millions) 2 

Volume 3 

’16/’15 1 

Pre-tax Profit 

’16/’15 1 (% of operating 

revenue ) 4 

CANADA 

NEWFOUNDLAND & LABRADOR 

PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND 

NOVA SCOTIA 

NEW BRUNSWICK 

QUEBEC 

ONTARIO 

MANITOBA 

SASKATCHEWAN 

ALBERTA 

BRITISH COLUMBIA 

4.9% 6.2% $64,909.4 $677,173 95,854 2.6% 4.3% 

1.4% 2.4% $879.5 $752,646 1,169 3.3% 4.4% 

4.3% 4.7% $239.0 $571,732 418 2.6% 6.5% 

2.0% 7.4% $1,589.7 $703,574 2,260 3.0% 5.2% 

3.6% 7.1% $1,162.2 $659,007 1,764 3.0% 6.0% 

5.0% 7.8% $12,010.0 $531,059 22,615 2.0% 4.4% 

5.6% 6.0% $25,566.1 $685,933 37,272 2.7% 3.4% 

6.0% 7.0% $1,958.3 $756,682 2,588 2.6% 4.2% 

-0.5% 3.3% $1,878.5 $753,958 2,492 1.7% 5.5% 

2.9% 1.0% $8,975.4 $820,949 10,933 3.3% 5.5% 

6.3% 10.3% $10,472.0 $741,381 14,125 2.6% 4.4% 

SOURCE: STATISTICS CANADA AND RESTAURANTS CANADA’S RESTAURANT INDUSTRY FORECAST. 

1 Growth rates are undadjusted for menu inflation. 2 Includes full-service restaurants, quick-service restaurants, caterers and drinking places. 3 Data are based on sales from the Monthly 

Survey of Foodservice and Drinking Places divided by the number of units from the Business Register, Statistics Canada. 4 2015 data. 


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FAST CASUAL 

According to Jourden, while fast-casual has 

been a foodservice trendsetter, this year and 

into next will likely see a bit of a slowdown in 

growth, due primarily to the increased number 

of players in the segment. Competitive 

pressures from newcomers expanding into 

Canada — such as the popular Americanbased 

chain The Cheesecake Factory, which 

is set to open in Toronto this fall — means 

existing brands need to up their game. 

“As this market gets more saturated, operators 

will need to start thinking about how 

they’re going to better differentiate themselves,” 

he says. “Traditionally, what we have 

seen in the fast-casual sector is a lot of the 

bakery-cafés and Freshii-type models. Now 

the question is ‘what else can fast-casual bring 

to the table?’” 

The Restaurants Canada report places 

consumer spending in restaurants this 

year at four per cent of household spending, 

down from 5.3 per cent in 2016, due to 

a retrenchment in consumer’s disposable 

income growth and increasing consumer 

debt. To remain competitive, fast casual is 

going to have to change. While demand will 

moderate in Ontario and B.C., Alberta and 

Saskatchewan will see a slight increase following 

two years of declines, the report says. After 

adjusting for menu inflation, real sales will 

grow at about the same pace as population 

Commerical Foodservice Sales Forecast 

[year-over-year change] 

4.8% 

0.8% 

3.5% 3.2% 

5.1% 

4.4% 

growth — meaning in order to grow sales, 

fast-casual operators will need to steal traffic 

by focusing on food quality, value, convenience 

and innovative menu offerings. 

Innovation is certainly something Neil 

Creighton, director of Food and Beverage at 

Toronto-based Aroma Espresso Bar, says will 

continue to be important for companies like 

his to be successful. He says Aroma’s strategy 

of bringing the best of quick-service and fastcasual 

traits together has helped the company 

5.1% 5.2% 6.2% 

4.9% 

4.3% 

3.7% 3.6% 

3.2% 

08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16-P 17-F 18-F 19-F 20-F 21-F 

SOURCE: CONFERENCE BOARD OF CANADA, STATISTICS CANADA AND RESTAURANTS CANADA. 

NOTE: Growth rates include inflation. 

P= PRELIMINARY F= FORECAST 

More global fare will be making 

appearances on Canadian menus 

in 2018, according to studies 

Restaurants Canada Sales Forecast 

Canada 

2015 Final 

(in millions) 

% Change 

‘15/’14 

2016 

Forecast 

Quick-service restaurants $26,870.3 6.7% $28,903.9 7.6% $30,153.2 4.3% 

Full-service restaurants $26,626.0 4.5% $28,225.1 6.0% $29,777.5 4.1% 

Caterers $5,312.9 4.6% $5,375.3 1.2% $5,488.2 4.2% 

Drinking places $2,289.3 -2.1% $2,405.1 5.1% $2,383.5 1.5% 

TOTAL COMMERCIAL $61,098.5 5.2% $64,909.4 6.2% $68,085.0 4.9% 

Accommodation foodservice $6,230.0 5.4% $6,392.0 2.6% $6,678.0 4.5% 

Institutional foodservice $4,487.0 2.6% $4,618.0 2.9% $4,761.0 3.1% 

Retail Foodservice $1,811.5 10.7% $2,014.4 11.2% $2,137.3 6.1% 

Other foodservice $2,558.5 3.0% $2,640.4 3.2% $2,738.0 3.7% 

TOTAL NON-COMMERCIAL $15,087.0 4.7% $15,664.8 3.8% $16,314.3 4.1% 

TOTAL FOODSERVICE $76,185.5 5.1% $80.574.2 5.8% $84,399.2 4.7% 

Menu Inflation 2.8% 2.6% 2.3% 

REAL GROWTH 2.3% 3.2% 2.4% 

SOURCE: RESTAURANTS CANADA, STATISTICS CANADA, fsSTRATEGY INC. AND CBRE HOTELS 

% Change 

‘16/’15 

2017 

Forecast 

% Change 

‘17/’16 

grow to 40 locations, with four more to be 

added by the end of 2017. 

When it comes to sitting down for a coffee, 

Creighton says consumers are looking 

for something more. “One of the things that 

has set us apart and allows us to be successful 

is the commitment we made to making 

our locations both stylish and comfortable,” 

he says. “Where many others in our space 

have the food served in takeout packaging, at 

Aroma, when you sit down with our food, it is 

served on china and you get a proper cup for 

your coffee or espresso.” 

FULL SERVICE 

The full-service segment — from premiumcasual 

to fine dining — continues to struggle. 

Carter says the segment has been facing 

increased challenges since 2008, when the 

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North American and European economy 

were rocked by a global recession and people 

scaled back their restaurant spending. While 

there has been some recovery in the global 

economy, he says Canadian consumers 

remain cautious. 

TD Economics forecasts disposable-income 

growth will slow from 3.4 per cent in 2016 to 

3.1 per cent in 2017 and three per cent in 2018. 

In the third quarter of 2016, household debt 

as a share of disposable income jumped to a 

record 168 per cent. Canadians will have to 

bring down that debt, which likely means less 

spending at restaurants. 

“[Full service] has just not recovered,” 

Carter says. “They’re way off the numbers 

that they saw in customer visits in 2008 and 

our expectation is that it’s going to be many 

years before that segment gets close — if it 

ever reaches those levels — to what it had 

in 2008.” 

Foodservice Facts 2017 shows sales growth 

in the FSR segment forecasted at only 4.1 

per cent for 2016/17 — a decrease from last 

year’s sales growth of six per cent. 

That means those operating in the premium-causal 

and fine-dining segment have to 

find ways to not only attract consumers to 

their establishments, but to keep them coming 

back. Steve Pelton, CEO of the Torontobased 

The Landing Restaurant Group and 

SVP of Milestones, says offering more than 

just a high-quality menu is key to keeping 

people coming back. For his brand, he says, 

that means using quality, local ingredients, 

keeping abreast of new food trends and adding 

unique experiences, such as beer and 

wine parings. “At The Landing Restaurants, 

we try to source only local items, those that 

are fresh, sustainable and seasonal,” Pelton 

says. “While we certainly can’t pull shrimp 

from Lake Ontario, we do make sure our 

shrimp come from sustainable sources. We 

believe our customer base really appreciates 

this. There is still growth in the segment — 

our Landings brand has grown from three 

restaurants to nine in two years, and our 

Milestones brand has seen excellent yearover-year 

growth, with this year better than 

in the last five.” 

Andrew Oliver, CEO and president of 

Oliver & Bonacini Restaurants agrees that 

while overall growth in the fine-dining segment 

is down, his restaurants have been 

doing well, with solid year-over-year growth. 

He says what consumers want from a finedining 

experience is just that — an experience. 

“When people go out, they want to 

have a good experience, something of value. 

When it comes to fine dining, the expectation 

is that people want that ‘wow’ factor. 

So, whether you’re going to Canoe once a 

year or once a week, you want to be sure it’s 

a phenomenal experience,” he explains. “You 

have to make sure, each time a person comes 

to your restaurant, that meal is better than 

the one they had before — because there are 

25 other restaurants they may want to try, 

and you want to make sure they come back 

to yours.” 

Steve Salm, president of Toronto-based 

Chase Hospitality Group, says in his restaurants 

there is also a decided emphasis on 

food quality and health. In fact, approximately 

25 per cent of all its menu offerings 

are plant-based, and there’s a strong emphasis 

on local and sustainable products — 

something he says customer are demanding. 

Because experience is such as key component 

for guests, Salm says his restaurants 

now offer customized menus or plates. For 

example, Kasa Moto offers customized sushi 

platters and The Chase boasts a customized 

raw-bar platter. Planta can even create a customized 

menu for birthday parties. 

Fisher predicts premium-causal and 

fine-dining establishments will look for new 

ways to reach customers going into 2018. He 

sees fine-dining and mid-range fine-dining 

restaurants eyeing the fast-causal or quickservice 

marketspace, but with a unique twist. 

For example, Chase Hospitality Group 

recently introduced Palm Lane, located in 

Toronto’s new Yorkville Village. The restaurant 

focuses on whole-meal salads and grainand 

legumes-based bowls. The 2,000-sq.-ft. 

restaurant will seat 65 diners, but will also 

place an equal emphasis on take-out and 

catering. Diners will have a chance to select 

from 80 ingredients to build their own meals, 

or select featured salads and bowls. 

MEAL KITS 

With people’s lifestyles getting increasingly 

busy, eating out and shopping are becoming 

something of a luxury. Enter the meal kit. 

According to The Nielsen Company (US), 

LLC, meal kits are making inroads with 

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THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION 

Digital technologies are rapidly reshaping 

the restaurant landscape. According to the 

Restaurants Canada report, nine per cent of 

Canadians said they were very interested in 

using self-service and touch-screen kiosks, 

13 per cent were interested and 29 per cent 

somewhat interested. Electronic-ordering systems 

at tables are also something Canadians 

want to use, with 10 per cent being very 

interested in seeing what it offers, 16 per cent 

definitely interested and 28 per cent somewhat 

interested. 

UberEats, Just Eat and SkipTheDishes 

are becoming increasingly popular ways for 

operators to reach customers, while mobileordering 

apps will become commonplace, 

according to Carter. “The growth has been 

dramatic and more players are getting 

involved in offering what we like to call a 

digital door,” he adds. 

Companies such as Starbucks have blazed 

a trail with its order-and-pay mobile app 

and Tim Hortons recently followed suit 

with its new mobile app that is available on 

iOS and Android. McDonald’s also has an 

app in the works for Canada and even smaller 

chains, such as Aroma, are looking at mobile 

apps and digital technologies for its operations. 

“If you’re not looking at it, you don’t 

have a long-term business strategy,” 

says Creighton. FH 

PALM LANE in Toronto is capitalizing on the new 

trend of whole-meal salads 

time-harried families. While meal-kit sales in 

the U.S. continue to grow, they are still relatively 

new for Canadian consumers, but room 

for growth is tremendous. While only four per 

cent of Canadian households purchased meal 

kits in the past 12 months, compared to 25 

per cent in the U.S., 80 per cent of those have 

continued to buy meal kits after trying them. 

Forty-three per cent said it helped them save 

time on meal planning; 39 per cent appreciated 

the time saved on preparation and cooking; 

32 per cent liked the convenience of having 

the kits shipped to them; 31 per cent that 

it saved them time on grocery shopping if the 

kits were picked up in a grocery store; and 30 

per cent liked the chance to try a new recipe. 

And while QSR and FSR operators struggled 

for their share of the dinner check, sales 

of retail dinner traffic grew by more than 20 

per cent in 2016, according to Restaurants 

Canada’s Foodservice Facts 2017. 



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ICONS & INNOVATORS 

Known for fostering 

ties between 

farmers and chefs, 

chef Jamie Kennedy 

is revered in the 

industry as the 

godfather of 

Canadian cuisine 

INTERVIEW BY ROSANNA CAIRA 

ROGER YIP [ICONS & INNOVATORS EVENT] 

Rosanna Caira: You got your start 

at the Windsor Arms Hotel in 

Toronto. Tell us about that experience 

and what led you there. 

Jamie Kennedy: I’d just finished 

high school. My family had been 

living in the U.S. for six years 

— my dad had been teaching at 

Yale University and his contract 

there was done, so we all moved 

back to Toronto. I graduated 

and wasn’t going to university 

so I started pounding the pavement. 

I did have this interest in 

cooking. During high school, for 

example, I founded a culinary 

club. It was an eye-opening experience 

for me into this world of 

gastronomy and I loved it. So, 

when we moved to Toronto and I 

was looking for a job, I gravitated 

towards kitchens. I walked into 

the Bay Streetcar, which was a 

subsidiary of the [Windsor Arms 

Hotel] — a grab-and-go place 

on The Path level, below Bloor 

Street. It was just after lunch 

service and the woman there said 

‘No, there’s nothing here, but go 

to the hotel.’ I wandered up to 

the maître d’ stand and said ‘are 

there any jobs in the kitchen?’ He 

took me to the chef’s office and 

chef Herbert Sonzogni was in 

there, speaking with a couple of 

his sous chefs. [At the time] there 

was an apprenticeship program 

that was tied in to the industry 

and there was funding that would 

match, dollar for dollar. I think 

my starting wage was $1.78 an 

hour, and so the government 

matched that. He said, ‘if you’re 

willing to give three years, I’ll hire 

you as an apprentice.’ And I said 

‘sounds great to me.’ 

RC: What was the biggest 

lesson you learned in the 

hotel environment? 




JK: There was this para-militaristic 

thing, which I got to understand 

was, historically, Escoffier — our 

modern, demigod chef that we all 

look up to. And the whole system 

in the kitchen is modelled after 

what he brought in with his experience 

as being a chef working for 

officers, and understanding the 

ranking system. I was yearning for 

a bit of structure. 

RC: You then moved to 

Scaramouche, where you worked 

with Michael Stadtländer. What 

was it about him that made you 

two work so in sync? 

JK: I found in Michael something 

I was looking for in myself. We 

actually met in Europe when we 

were both working as commis 

chefs de cuisine at the Grand 

Hotel National in Lucerne. He 

had just come out of the military 

and I had just arrived at the hotel, 

having finished my apprenticeship 

in Canada and looking for 

European experience. Michael 

also felt he was trying to bust 

out of the established path for 

young cooks in Germany, because 

he didn’t see much opportunity. 

All our conversations were 

about what was happening in 

nouvelle cuisine in France and 

in Europe, at that time. Around 

that same time, I had an invitation 

to come back to Toronto 

and interview for the chef’s 

position at Scaramouche and 

it occurred to me that Michael 

should come to Canada. It took 

me a while to get him into the 

country. In the meantime, I was 

hired, but Morden Yolles, owner 

of Scaramouche, being the detailoriented 

man he is, hired both of 

us. He felt he could work with us 

— he was hiring us based on our 

passion, not on our experience. 

But bottom line, Morden gave us 

this incredible opportunity. It was 

difficult to make the decision to 

break out of that young, bohemian 

vibe [in Europe] and come 

back to Canada to take on this 

very serious job, which decided 

the rest of my career. 

RC: Do you still collaborate 

with Michael today? 

JK: Being really young and carrying 

on this partnership of sorts as 

co-chefs, it’s very difficult to do. 

Especially for young people, with 

all of the attention and adulation 

we were getting — where do you 

put that? And so almost inevitably, 

it challenged our relationship. 

I probably garnered more of the 

attention, being the hometown 

boy, and we realized very quickly 

that we probably should stop 

working together in order to preserve 

our friendship. So, I started 

my own small catering company, 

called Menus Gastronomiques 

and Michael went on to open 

Stadtländer Restaurant. We’re still 

great friends. 

RC: You went on to open your own 

restaurant, Palmerston, which 

became a seminal restaurant in 

Toronto at the time. What was 

the impetus for you to open it and 

how did Palmerston come about? 

JK: I felt isolated, having gone 

from Scaramouche into this small 

catering company. I was able to 

produce beautiful food in a very 

controlled environment. Because 

it was catering, I always knew 

how many people I was dealing 

with, how much food I needed 

to buy — there was plenty of 

time to plan and execute. But I 

missed the restaurant; I missed 

that community of people all 

moving towards service together. 

I met Eric Savics, who had come 

to Scaramouche and was really 

supportive of what I was doing 

philosophically with food, and 

he said he would back me in a 

restaurant venture — that’s what 

Palmerston would end up being. 

RC: You were instrumental in 

the notion of Canadian cuisine 

and local products, which was 

revolutionary at the time. What 

prompted you to do this? 

JK: I remember taste experiences 

— corn, tomatoes, blueberries, 

those kinds of things that, when 


36 FOODSERVICE AND HOSPITALITY NOVEMBER 2017 


they’re in season here, are just 

explosive on the palate. We were 

all used to purchasing from other 

places, other than Ontario, for all 

kinds of reasons, but it was really 

a taste thing. This started to make 

me look at what was possible, 

plus interviews with my great 

aunts — and I say interviews, 

because it was really like that. I 

started to notice their tradition of 

canning — you know those old 

Mason jars with the broadband 

lid. It occured to me that this 

was a way people dealt with getting 

through the winter when we 

didn’t have the luxury of being 

able to buy from anywhere else 

in the world. And so I thought, 

okay, this is a pathway to defining 

culture for a place, Southern 

Ontario, and the canning jar 

became emblematic or iconic 

of my own brand. That brought 

along with it this limiting of 

myself to write menus according 

to seasons and according to 

what was possible in Southern 

Ontario at any given time of year. 

Those were the parameters for 

my creativity in the menus. So, 

I imposed limits on myself, in 

order to further the culture along 

and in doing so, teasing out the 

sources of supply. 

RC: Was that difficult to do, given 

where Canada was back then in 

terms of the supply system? 

JK: In the early days, yes, it was. 

That’s what prompted Knives and 

Forks, which was an organization 

that was [formed] to allow 

chefs in the city to have access 

to growers in the rural areas 

around Toronto who were equally 

as invested in this passion for 

developing a dialogue and local 

provenance of food. This was 

a breakthrough for us, because 

these people were operating on 

the fringe and this allowed them 

to come into the city. 

I remember having our first big 

conference at the O’Keefe Centre 

and these growers came in, got 

on their soapbox and said what 

they wanted to say. That led to 

the formation of the Knives and 

Forks farmers market, which 

was an industry-only market at 

the beginning. The idea was that 

chefs would convene at the market 

and buy produce from these 

local suppliers, and also have a 

chance to socialize. The socializing 

part never really came to be, 

nor did the adherence to it being 

a professional market — there 

wasn’t enough traffic — 

so it became a public market. 

But it was a viable market; it 

really worked. 

One of the events that came 

out of that was Feast of Fields, 

which was aimed at the public 

and designed to bring people out 

of the city to experience the rural 

environment. But it was also 

about bringing the chefs from the 

city into the rural environment 

to collaborate with the farmers. 

The chefs were partnered with a 

farmer and the two would stand 

at booths and serve food. By the 

time you’d gone through the 

whole thing, you’d experienced 

a full menu of food that was 

sourced locally. 

RC: With all the focus on 

local and Canadian cuisine 

today, do you think local food 

is sustainable? 

JK: Yes, I do. I’ve seen great 

inroads and a lot of us had 

started off [pushing back] against 

the established modes of receiving 

food. It’s about changing 

the demand, so if Sysco, or any 




company like that, would respond 

to whatever chefs really want, 

it’s a very simple answer. But the 

most work that’s been done, in 

the last 20-odd years I’ve been 

paying attention, has been largely 

through education. Changing 

people’s mindset about the value 

of food, supporting local economies, 

getting over the barrier 

that, yes, it’s more expensive. It’s 

more expensive because we have 

a wonderful social contract in 

this country that demands we 

Kennedy with Sarah 

Middleton and Jay 

Jackson of Windows 

by Jamie Kennedy in 

Niagara Falls, Ont. 

pay people fairly for their work. 

Which leads us to the philosophy 

behind slow food, for example, 

which is about good, clean and 

fair — ‘fair’ meaning all the 

things we almost take for granted 

living in Canada. 

RC: Are we where we want to 

be with Canadian cuisine? 

JK: The age-old question is 

what is Canadian cuisine? This 

is something I’ve been asked 

forever and now I respond by 

saying Canadian cuisine is a 

cuisine of the regions of Canada, 

like the vastness of the country, 

geographically, coast to coast to 

coast. We’re a country that represents 

the world now, in addition 

to our Indigenous peoples who 

have a food culture to offer to 

the mix as well. So, to define it is 

like trying to tie down this beast. 

For me, it’s about celebrating 

taste of place. That’s how I would 

describe Canadian cuisine — 

practice it coast to coast; get 

away from the homogenization of 

food culture. 

RC: You had a great run with 

Jamie Kennedy Wine Bar and it 

was a really popular destination. 

Unfortunately, the restaurant had 

financial issues. Can you speak 

to that? 

JK: The Wine Bar — that whole 

era for me — was a cautionary 

tale for an entrepreneur. Because 

of the critical success of the Wine 

Bar, I felt I could do anything, 

and you start to believe in your 

own hype a little bit. That’s a very 

dangerous thing and it caused us, 

at that time, to expand beyond 

our capacity. 

I made a decision to build 

a commissary kitchen, Gilead, 

because we were starting a catering 

business in addition to the 

Wine Bar and were going back 

into the Gardiner Museum as 

an exclusive caterer. It was in an 

exciting, new building that was 

getting accolades for its architectural 

design. We were being billed 

as the exclusive caterer there and 

this gave us the confidence to 

invest in Gilead. However, what 

we didn’t plan for was the additional 

cost to the company to run 

a commissary kitchen — let alone 

pay for the expansion or the 

build-out of that space — and we 

didn’t build enough capacity into 

that space once it was going. 

Plainly said, we didn’t create 

enough business for ourselves. 

Because we were so exposed with 

the number of staff we had hired 

and additional costs every way 

conceivable, we got into trouble 

very quickly. 

In addition to that, our ability 

to broker the interest we had 

in catered events at the Gardiner 

was not good. We didn’t staff our 

front office enough to take the 

calls; we were missing meetings 

and we got a reputation very 

quickly. It hurt us badly, enough 

so that, in the end, I had to sell 

the Wine Bar, which was the jewel 

in the crown of the company, in 

order to address debt. 

It was a very tough time of my 

career. But I insisted that we not 

declare bankruptcy — that was 

a route we could have gone but 

I felt an allegiance to all of the 

suppliers around me that I owed 

money to, that I wasn’t going to 

let them down. That became our 

MO for the next 10 years. And, 

quite honestly, there still remains 

some of that difficult financial 



legacy. But I’ve learned so much 

about business. 

RC: What was the biggest lesson 

you learned? 

JK: I was naively successful for the 

first 30 years of my career. I did 

very well, but it was always about 

having these ideas and the ideas 

being good and people wanting 

to support them, but we just kind 

of made it through the business 

part without paying attention 

all that much. And so, when this 

happened, all of a sudden I had 

to really start paying attention as 

the owner and operator of this 

company. So now I’m a much 

better business person as a result. 

RC: Staffing is always one of the 

most difficult issues in this industry. 

How were you able to be so 

successful when so many other 

restaurants have a hard time 

hiring and retaining people? 

JK: A lot of that was creating 

upward mobility within 

the company as much as possible, 

starting with apprentices. 

Developing an apprenticeship 

program — because that was 

my model — and I believed in 

the model. I hired apprentices 

for a three-year program and 

they moved between departments. 

I required them to write 

their CFQ at the end for their 

Red Seal because we need to 

establish some importance in 

the educational component; the 

importance of it, in hiring later in 

their career. A chef sees Red Seal, 

it means something. And then, 

I’d kick them out. I didn’t allow 

them to stay after three years. 

After they’d written their CFQ, 

then out they’d go. They needed 

to go and work for other chefs, 

become journeymen [and follow] 

that path. 

It’s also about establishing a 




and I bring people up into the 

vineyard at the beginning of the 

event to decompress from being in 

the city, from the drive from the 

city, because most people who are 

coming are either from Toronto, 

Ottawa or Montreal. 

There are 60 people at each 

dinner. What I bring to the table, 

as it were, is all those years of 

experience creating and preparing 

food, but in a much more 

focused sense, using ingredients 

that are actually grown on the 

farm. It’s an opportunity to speak 

to the local-food movement in a 

gentle way. It’s not preachy; it’s 

just allowing people to discover 

for themselves the amazing abundance 

of beautiful food we’ve got 

available to us, right here. 

RC: What made you want to write 

cookbooks? 

JK: Each of [the three cookbooks] 

are a snapshot of what’s going 

on; what I’m thinking, So, in a 

way, they become a journal or a 

souvenir. The last one deals with 

more stories around food, the 

culture of respect in the kitchen 

and being very actively involved 

myself, checking in on that all the 

time and not letting things get 

out of hand. 

RC: In 2015, you closed the restaurant, 

moved to Prince Edward 

County and immersed yourself 

in the farm. What prompted that 

decision? 

JK: It was a difficult decision to 

close Gilead. To tell my staff — 

long-time employees of mine — 

I’m closing this place and have 

no offer of employment after that 

date, was a very difficult point to 

reach. There was a lot of emotion 

attached to it, but it was clearly 

the right decision. When I look 

back on it now, it was not working. 

I was still servicing debt and, 

at that time, the catering contract 

at the Gardiner had ended and 

so Gilead itself was put into this 

position of having to shoulder 

the cost of doing business. 

RC: But it pushed you into doing 

your Summer Dinner Series at J.K. 

Farm. Tell us about this series. 

JK: It was a nice place 

to land after this emotional 

departure from 

Toronto. I also have 

to mention the relationship 

I had with 

Windows by Jamie 

Kennedy in Niagara 

Falls — that was another 

wonderful project to 

keep me in the restaurant 

world. [At the farm 

dinners] we create these 

emblematic, rural experiences 

with open fires 


culture of food and photographs. 

Jo Dickins, who provided all the 

photographs for it, essentially 

documented, through photographs, 

my work of the last 10 

years while I was at Gilead. 

RC: How do you want to grow your 

business today? 

JK: The farm will inform my next 

moves — I’m going to start growing 

food. There will always be 

events on the farm, because it’s a 

beautiful place to come to. But at 

this point in my career, not having 

a restaurant that is my daily 

‘I go to work at,’ has afforded me 

more opportunity to travel and 

get involved in other projects 

that are meaningful to me and 

are only possible because I’m 

more mobile. For example, I’m 

about to embark on a cultural 

and scientific expedition that has 

been going on since June 1, called 

Canada C3 — a 150-day expedition 

from Toronto to Victoria via 

the Northwest Passage. 

RC: You have four children, a girl 

and three boys. All three of the 

boys have followed in your footsteps 

to some degree. Can you 

tell me a little bit about 

what they’re doing? 

JK: The boys worked with me 

this summer, waiting tables at 

the Summer Series. They poured 

wine, usually, and they also work 

the market in Wellington, Ont., 

selling fries on Saturdays. So, a 

word on the fries — [J.K. Fries] 

have always been this bridge into 

the larger customer base. 

Operating within the fine-dining 

milieu over most of my career, 

I’ve always yearned to reach a 

broader audience. This kind of 

food, which is emblematic of our 

culture… everybody likes fries, so 

to me, the challenge was just to 

differentiate from the norm and 

bring it up into a point where you 

can start to identify the ingredients 

that go into them and where 

they come from. 

I remember selling them at the 

Santa Claus Parade, setting up 

inside the ROM grounds with my 

kids, freezing cold, selling fries 

through the fence. 

RC: How do you get inspired to 

innovate these days? 

JK: Interaction with people. What 

drove me to create a dining series 

on the farm, for example, is what 

really gets me jazzed. And, as long 

as I can still do things I get jazzed 

about, I’ll stay with it. Using 

food as a means to that end is 

very powerful. You bring people 

around a table and discussion 

happens, because you’re providing 

this experience that allows 

them to not worry, for the time 

that they’re at the table, about 

anything so much as what’s on 

their minds. What are the ideas 

they have that they’re sharing 

now with their tablemates? It 

gives me a lot of satisfaction to 

provide that vehicle for thought 

and exchange. 

RC: In today’s social-media 

environment, is the power of 

food even more powerful? 

Has it changed the way we 

approach food? 

JK: It’s made us long for a tactile 

experience with food. In a way, it 

becomes more meaningful — the 

actual eating and sharing around 

a table — because it’s analog, 

it’s not virtual. Although many 

people just stop and take photos 

endlessly of their food while 

they’re eating it and I don’t really 

agree with that — people should 

be paying attention to themselves. 

RC: What do you think makes a 

good leader? 

JK: When I was growing up, my 

mom and my sister were big people 

in my life. And I remember, 

during the late ’60s, there would 

be neon orange and neon pink 

signs that they would put on the 

fridge, the stove, the dishwasher, 

the washing machine that said 

‘this exploits women.’ So, my 

dad and I and my brother were in 

fear and awe of this new-found 

women’s liberation, people adhering 

to those values. My mom and 

my sister taught me a lot in the 

early days about inclusiveness and 

not getting too defined in who we 

are; that there’s this equal nature 

we need to observe in the kitchen. 

I certainly have done that in the 

kitchen — I’ve always given 

equal opportunities to individuals, 

period. 

It’s about the culture that, we 

as leaders, are putting into our 

workplaces. It starts at the top. 

People look at what’s tolerated at 

the top and they act accordingly. 

RC: What kind of advice would 

you give to people entering the 

industry today? 

JK: Showing up for work every 

day is the main thing. But in a 

broader sense, it’s [realizing] 

what you may have come to 

understand through media about 

expectations of grandeur, simply 

isn’t reality. 

Like in any industry, it’s about, 

to use the cliché, ‘paying your 

dues,’ but working at something, 

as long as you’re into it, and 

recognizing, first of all, whether 

you’re cut out for this kind of 

work. Do you really think that 




Kennedy and Michael Stadtländer (left) 

receive the Order of Canada from 

former Governor General Michaelle Jean. 

you want to be a cook? That’s a 

fundamental question you need 

to ask yourself at the beginning. 

For me, the most successful 

apprentices and young cooks I 

deal with are the ones who are 

like sponges — they just want to 

learn. They’re 

not about their 

own opinions 

at this stage in 

their career; 

they’re about 

absorbing 

whatever it is 

that you have 

to offer. When 

students position 

themselves 

in that way, 

that’s when I want to teach and 

share. It brings something out 

in me. 

I look back on my own career, 

early on in the apprenticeship 

days, and that’s what I did. I just 

shut up. I may have had thoughts 

in my head, but it didn’t matter, 

I just kept on doing what I 

was doing. Because at the end of 

the day, or the end of the years, 

you look back on that time, and 

there was incredible value to that 

experience. And, you may have 

learned also what you wouldn’t 

want to do as a leader — I would 

not want to be a racist, sexist, 

misogynist chef, because I’ve 

seen that; I’ve seen that it doesn’t 

work. I see the reaction that people 

have. I see they are living in 

this environment of fear and it’s 

so counterproductive to bringing 

out excellence in individuals. 

If you can nurture an individual 

who’s got great chops, then you 

have done that person a great service 

and it’s incredibly satisfying, 

as a leader, to see people emerge 

in that way. 

RC: You’ve won the Order of 

Canada and are the godfather 

of Canadian cuisine. How 

does it feel to look back over 

a lifetime of work and see 

your role in this movement? 

JK: You just don’t stop, right, you 

just keep going. You don’t give 

yourself time to reflect on these 

things. I’m responding to what 

drives me and what gives me 

pleasure, too. It’s been a wonderful 

trip so far and it’s not over yet. 

And if that’s what it takes to get 

people to come to the party, well, 

I’ll just keep doing that. FH 

HUGE 

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OPERATORS ARE TAKING A NEW APPROACH TO HOW FOOD IS PLANNED, 

PREPARED AND DELIVERED TO HEALTHCARE FACILITIES 

STORY BY LAURA PRATT 

iSTOCK.COM/TADAMICHI 

Foodservice in retirement homes, long-term-care facilities (LTCs) 

and acute-care hospitals is a unique beast, beset by challenges and held 

to standards that its public-domain restaurant counterparts could never 

fathom. But change is in the wind in this segment, especially as activists 

raise their voices about the medicinal value of food and the all-powerful 

baby boom transfers its bulk into its embrace. 

In a conversation about how food is planned, prepared and delivered to 

healthcare facilities, it’s important to make a distinction among the various 

healthcare providers that undertake the task. Broadly speaking, they 

can be divided into three categories: retirement homes (or independentliving 

homes), LTC facilities (or nursing homes) and hospitals. 

“I think it’s more of a continuum,” says Brad McKay, CEO at Healthcare 

Foodservices Inc., an Ottawa-based provider of prepared meals for hospitals 

and LTC facilities in Canada. “It’s all institutional feeding for patients 

who aren’t making decisions about the food. There are common threads.” 




CANADIAN 

HOSPITALS 

outsource 

30% 

of their 

food prep, 

LTCs 

outsource 

14.2% 

and 

13.1% 

of 

RETIREMENT 

HOMES 

contract out their 

foodservice 

Hospitals 

Hospitals are a category unto themselves 

for their short-term engagement 

with their “clients” and the exclusively 

publicly funded model that supports 

them. Hospital food — the butt of 

jokes everywhere — suffers a challenging 

reputation, say those in its 

defense, mostly because of the financial 

constraints that check it. Every hospital 

sets its own food budget, since health 

ministries don’t give hospitals cost 

guidelines. The North York General 

Hospital in Toronto, for example, spent 

$11.51 for food each day, per patient, 

in 2014/15. 

“Foodservice is the hospital department 

that gets squeezed first because 

it’s not thought important to the clinical 

experience,” says McKay. Too often, 

hospital food is conceptualized as 

hospitality rather than medical treatment 

or an essential for good health. 

Management attempting to cut dollars 

from their budgets will often hone in 

on foodservice. 

“The culture of food in institutions 

is that food is an irritating necessity,” 

agrees Joshna Maharaj, a chef and food 

activist from Toronto. “Foodservice is 

generally lumped in with maintenance 

and housekeeping. It should be much 

closer to patient care.” 

“No one expects food in public 

institutions to be gourmet,” says 

the commentary in the Food in 

Institutional Settings in Ontario: Health 

Equity Perspectives report, prepared 

by the Wellesley Institute in July 2017. 

“However, we should expect it to be 

nutritionally adequate, socially and 

culturally acceptable and safe.” 

But studies have found patients 

often eat less than half of the food on 

their meal trays. “Making improvements 

to the delivery method and 

timing of meals, focusing on culturally 

appropriate food, and to the meal 

environments, could improve patient 

dietary intake,” the Toronto-based 

Wellesley Institute report concludes. 

But it’s essential, says Maharaj, that 

funding gets increased to facilitate this. 

“[The industry]did a ton of work and 

found paths through in really exciting 

ways, but everything comes back 

to whether the ministry would invest, 

because there’s no way around that. We 

need money to make any changes in 

hospital food.” 

Long-Term Care Homes 

Excluding Quebec, approximately 

143,000 people live in nursing homes 

in Canada, some 80,000 of them in 

Ontario. More than 90 per cent of 

residents are over the age of 65. Still, 

these people are not sick. They’re well 

enough to be on their own for extended 

periods of time; their complex 

health conditions and support needs 

aren’t dire enough to require hospitalization, 

but neither can they be met in 

the community or at home. 

Their average stay in an LTC home 

is three or four years — the last three 

or four years of their lives. Here, says 

the Long-Term Care Homes Act, residents 

get to live in dignity while having 

their physical, psychological, social, 

spiritual and cultural needs met. 

Their dietary needs, one might 

argue, are another matter. Typically, 

LTC homes are subsidized by the 

provincial government. That means 

residents pay only partly out of pocket. 

This past summer, Ontario gifted the 

province’s 77,000 nursing homes a 

financial injection that bumped the 

$8.33 daily allowance for residents to 

$9 (still less than the 

$9.73 that Ontario 

inmates get). 

“It’s not enough,” 

says Maharaj. And it’s 

why lots of LTC homes 

serve cheaper protein 

foods and fewer fresh 

fruits and vegetables 

— and are still unable 

to meet residents’ 

special dietary needs, 

says the Food in 

Institutional Settings 

in Ontario report. 

That makes frozen and 

canned vegetables, fruits and meats 

mainstays at these facilities. 

Retirement Homes 

Retirement homes are arguably the 

most autonomous, well-funded 

and comfortable of the healthcare 

foodservice lot. They are also, 

says Geoff Wilson, a principal with 

Toronto’s fsStrategy Inc., “the foodservice 

category where there’s the most 

evolution, innovation and movement.” 

That’s because these institutions are 

universally privately funded, which 

means residents foot the entire bill. 

It’s a tiered system of both quality and 

expense. Across Canada, monthly fees 

for retirement-home suites range from 

$1,453 to $3,204, on average. But some 

accommodations are much pricier. A 

one-bedroom independent-living suite 

in London, Ont., costs $5,800 a month 

and a two-bedroom in Vancouver is 

$7,695. The varying fee is a function 

of lots of things, including the size and 

location of the accommodations, the 

number of amenities and the quality 

of food. 

“The retirement-home industry 

has become extremely competitive 

and one of the big selling points is 

the food,” says Wilson. You bet, says 

Richard Bailey, Business Development 

manager in healthcare seniors living 

at Centennial Foodservice, based in 

Calgary. “Food is everything in these 

homes — that’s all these seniors talk 

iSTOCK.COM/KATARZYNABIALASIEWICZ 



iSTOCK.COM/WAVEBREAKMEDIA 

RE-THINKING 

RETHERM 

Brad McKay, CEO 

at Healthcare 

Foodservices Inc. in 

Ottawa believes the 

first generation of 

feeding healthcare 

residents on an 

institutional level 

— the cold-plate 

retherm process 

— is nearing a 

close. Here, food 

is manufactured 

offsite and shipped 

to a hospital in bulk 

where it’s plated, 

reheated and 

served. In its day, it 

couldn’t be beat for 

a combination of 

quality and cost. 

But people are 

bored with coldplate 

retherm, 

McKay says. Enter 

the Combitherm 

oven, says John 

Curtis, national 

director of Culinary 

Services at Revera 

Retirement. These 

devices, which 

replace a convection 

oven, kettle, 

steamer, fryer, 

smoker and dehydrater 

“are a great 

staple piece of 

kitchen equipment. 

That’s part of the 

way we help our 

costs. Cooking the 

right way with the 

right equipment to 

get the full value.” 

In the front-ofthe-house, 

Curtis 

acknowledges 

the point-of-sale 

advances that have 

facilitated tableside 

service. All of 

his company’s new 

builds will outfit 

servers with tablets 

loaded with menu 

descriptions and 

illustrations, along 

with real-time client 

information on 

dietary restrictions. 

about. It’s like a cruise ship. You eat, 

you complain about being stuffed, then 

you talk about what’s for dinner.” 

“A few years ago, retirement living 

had a reputation in the general 

marketplace for food that was bland, 

straightforward and overly preprepared,” 

says John Curtis, national 

director of Culinary Services at Revera 

Retirement. “But we’re making great 

strides in fresh, from-scratch cooking. 

We’re transitioning [far] away from 

people’s perceptions.” 

Hiring top-quality kitchen talent is 

a big part of that, says Curtis. Many of 

the culinary professionals at Revera’s 

131 cross-Canada residences are Red 

Seal-certified chefs. It’s the same story 

at other retirement residences, where 

the foodservice arm is upping its game 

by hiring chefs who cut their teeth at 

luxury private enterprises to man their 

kitchens. Paul Marshall, the executive 

chef at Westerleigh Parc in Vancouver, 

is fresh off a 35-year run in Vancouver’s 

luxury-hotel kitchens. In 2015 and 

2016, he scored the top spot at the Best 

of the West annual food competition 

—the sole contestants representing a 

retirement community. “We must’ve 

shocked the hell out of the chefs there 

from all the leading restaurants in the 

North Shore,” Marshall says. 

Shifting their talents to retirement 

communities is a natural move for 

career chefs, says Bailey. After years of 

enduring restaurant hours and forfeiting 

quality of life, a post with a retirement 

home looks good. Marshall calls 

his move to Parc “the most gratifying 

thing I’ve ever done.” Cooking opportunities 

at retirement communities are 

still pretty unexplored, he says, but are 

evolving. And Marshall’s doing his part. 

“I know most of the chefs who operate 

professional cooking schools and this 

is definitely a career path. You can put 

retirement communities on the same 

level as restaurants and hotels.” 

And this category of chef still gets 

to innovate. In fact, it’s expected of 

them. A late-summer meal on the 

Westerleigh’s dinner menu featured 

a duck-confit crêpe appetizer, and a 

choice of an anchochili 

chicken casserole 

with saffron rice or 

fresh haddock with a 

Moroccan-preserved 

lemon and green-olive 

vinaigrette. 

Another development 

on the retirement 

front includes a movement 

to replace the 

three daily meals with 

on-demand eating. 

The single dining room is being augmented 

by multiple dining opportunities, 

including on-site bistros where 

residents can grab a snack or a beer. 

“If you’re a resident, we recognize that 

sometimes it’s nice to eat in a different 

environment,” says Curtis. Revera’s 

three new residences set to open in the 

spring — in Edmonton, Regina and 

Ajax, Ont. — will feature bistros with 

grab-and-go counters, outdoor patios 

and pubs, along with full-service dining 

rooms. “That’s the retirement community 

of the future.” 

In-house Versus Outsourced 

Foodservice in a healthcare setting 

is “in transition,” says Michael May, 

vice-president of Operations at Nutra 

Services Inc., a large dining and nutritonal 

services-contracting company 

focusing on the seniors’ market. “While 

the ’80s and ’90s were all about making 

food offsite and operating ‘kitchenless 

facilities,’ there has recently been more 

focus on in-house prepared foods.” 

According to fs Strategy Inc.’s 2017 

Canadian Institutional Foodservice 

Market Report, Canadian hospitals outsource 

30 per cent of their food prep, 

LTCs outsource 14.2 per cent and 13.1 

per cent of retirement homes contract 

their foodservice out. 

There are pros and cons to both 

paths, with the relief that comes with 

transferred oversight of responsibility 

being the biggest tick in favour of 

retaining outsiders. “It can be a very 

formulaic thing, and these operators 

are great at cranking out a program,” 

says Maharaj. “Having someone walk 

in and offer you a turnkey solution for 

your food is a gift.” 

More than that, says May, outsourcing 

buys peace of mind around food 

safety, reduces liability for the home 

and exposes clients to the collective 

knowledge of a large company with 

developed policies and procedures, 

menus, volume-purchasing opportunities 

and external corporate support. 

But at the end of the day, says 

McKay, there’s actually scant economic 

advantage to either option. Surveys 

his company has conducted show 

contracted hospitals compared to ones 

that prepare all food under their roof 

experience no difference in either performance 

or patient satisfaction. 

Still, Maharaj urges health institutions 

to do it themselves — and to 

do it mindfully. “The problem is that 

foodservice isn’t aligned with the 

hospital’s organizational values, the 

commitment to excellence that oversees 

care and research is not applied to 

foodservices. What needs to happen is 

for a hospital to say ‘this is our vision 

for food, this is the role we believe 

food plays in nurturing wellness.’ Don’t 

leave your vision in the hands of a 

third-party operator.” 

And servers and chefs at a residence 

get to know their clients better this 

way. “We’re in your home,” Curtis says. 

“We worry that with outsourcing, you 

lose that personal touch. Our chefs 

know how Mr. Curtis likes his eggs and 

when in the meal to bring him his coffee. 

That would be hard to duplicate 

when you outsource.” FH 


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REGISTER NOW www.foodserviceandhospitality.com/key

Tim Johnston 

Owen Sound, Ont. 

oh Canada! 

Jason Bangerter 

Cambridge, Ont. 

Tomahawk steak at 

Cobble Beach Golf Links 

Garden jewels 

a la plancha 

Steak frites at 

Cobble Beach 


Tim Johnston 

Owen Sound, Ont. 

At the start of 2017, in honour of Canada’s 

150th birthday, Foodservice and Hospitality 

launched its exclusive Made-in-Canada 

photo contest. The goal was to highlight 

excellence in the Canadian foodservice 

industry — from iconic chefs, suppliers and 

culinary innovators, to regional ingredients 

and culinary offerings — through the 

lenses of our readers. Now, as 2017 draws 

to a close and we prepare to choose our 

Made-in-Canada contest grand-prize winners, 

we’ve brought together some of our 

finalists in this three-page pictorial, offering 

readers a glimpse into the country’s 

foodservice landscape. 


Cindy Leung 

Toronto, Ont. 

Heirloom-carrot salad 

with caramelized 

tomatoes at Lisa Marie 

Nina Nguyen 

Ottawa, Ont. 

Canada 150 cookie 

at Boko Bakery 

Dessert featuring 

edible fried maple 

leaves at Canoe 

Restaurant 

Lobster Nachos at Good 

Catch Boil House 

Cindy Leung 

Toronto, Ont. 

Cindy La 

Toronto, Ont. 

48 FOODSERVICE AND HOSPITALITY NOVEMBER 2017 


oh Canada! 

Andrew Evans 

Vaughan, Ont. 

Canadian 

beef cheeks 



POURING FOR PROFITS 

RUM RUNNERS 

A familiar spirit is finding 

popularity among 

cocktail enthusiasts 

BY DANIELLE SCHALK 

Rum may not be Canada’s 

most popular spirit, but it 

is a familiar and approachable 

one. And, with consumers 

seeking new and 

exciting flavours and expressions, 

Ontario’s LCBO notes rum sales are 

reflecting a declining trend in the 

purchase of mainstream brands. 

In fact, the LCBO’s 2016-17 Year in 

Review indicates sales of white rums 

were down 0.6 per cent for the year 

as a result of this trend. However, 

this was countered by a 4.5-per-cent 

rise in spiced-rum sales, resulting in 

a modest 2.1-per-cent year-over-year 

increase in category sales. 

White rums represent the largest 

portion of rum sales — 36 per cent 

of category sales at LCBO and 47 per 

cent of the BC Liquor Distribution 

Branch’s rum sales to hospitality by 

volume for fiscal year 2016/17. 

“[Rum] is a popular cocktail 

ingredient — there are a lot of wellknown 

and classic drinks made with 

rum,” says Andre Scherbina, AGM 

and Beverage director at Torontobased 

SpiritHouse. He says the 

majority of the bar’s rum sales come 

through its cocktail program. “We 

don’t sell much rum on its own” 

he explains. “If people drink it on 

its own, it tends to be a bit older 

[rums].” 

SpiritHouse offers aged rums such 

as Ron Zacapa 23 ($79.95 at LCBO) 

and Plantation XO 20th Anniversary 

($76.55 at LCBO), which Scherbina 

points to as the popular choice to be 

Noxx & Dunn, a Floridamade 

rum, is a blend of 

two, four and five-yearold 

rums made from 

Florida-grown sugar cane 

and aged in American Oak 

barrels ($29.75 at LCBO). 

Vaughan, Ont.-based 

Last Straw Distillery 

produces the first rum in 

the Greater Toronto Area 

since Gooderham & Worts 

closed in 1990. The smallbatch 

distillery makes 

blackstrap rum, which is 

distilled from blackstrap 

molasses rather than the 

usual fine/fancy molasses 

($40 at LCBO). 

Hawaiian rums have also 

been pointed to as a 

possible up-and-comer. 

This New World rumproducing 

region boasts 

producers such as Hawaii 

Sea Spirits, Manulele 

Distillers (Kō Hana) 

and Kōloa Rum Company. 

ordered straight up. 

Aged rum has also become a common 

feature in spirit-forward drinks. 

And, Scherbina says he’s seeing an 

increasing number of bartenders 

include rum in their craft-cocktail 

offerings — a trend he likens to the 

mezcal movement. 

“In our case, the [more craft] the 

drink, the better it sells. For example, 

the deconstructed mojito…we separate 

ingredients, present them in a 

different way and add some interesting 

ingredients like ginger and 

passionfruit. That changes the drink 

visually, but it has the same flavours. 

People see something like that and it 

intrigues them,” says Scherbina, adding 

this type of drink tends to resonate 

most with young professionals 

looking to try something new. 

This said, many of the classic 

rum cocktails, such as mojitos and 

daiquiris, are considered “refreshing 

drinks,” which tend to be most 

popular during the warmer months. 

“Because rum comes from warm 

countries, there are a lot of exotic 

and tiki-inspired drinks made with 

rum and these have an association 

with summer,” Scherbina says. 

However, the BC Liquor 

Distribution Branch reports show 

the months of April through 

September garner only slightly higher 

by-volume sales, representing 53 

per cent of rum sales for the 2016/17 

fiscal year. These are also the peak 

months for white-rum sales, but during 

the last two fiscal years, the highest 

volume of spiced rum has been 

sold to hospitality establishments 

between October and December. 

“It may not be the most popular 

spirit but people are talking about 

rum — talking about new expressions 

and brands — so there is 

interest there,” says Scherbina. 

“There is more craftsmanship now 

and more variety available, which 

helps. As long as companies [continue 

to] supply new expressions to 

keep the consumer interested, things 

will keep growing.” FH 

iSTOCK.COM/SANTYPAN 


EQUIPMENT 

WASTE NOT, WANT NOT 

As North America scrambles to find a sustainable solution 

to food-waste disposal, commercial food-waste 

handling technology is evolving rapidly 

BY ERIC ALISTER 

iSTOCK.COM/ANANALINE 

In the past 15 years, food-waste 

handling technology has advanced, 

allowing operators to reduce 

waste volume and the amount of 

resources required to handle that 

waste. But, once the waste is collected 

and compacted, it’s still disposed of the 

same way it has been for decades. “The 

industry standard in North America is 

still to bag all the waste and take it to a 

landfill,” says Michael Pavlovic, senior 

systems planner at Meiko, USA. For 

small operators, composting continues 

to be an effective means of repurposing 

food waste, but for large operators 

who produce hundreds or thousands of 

pounds of food waste daily, composting 

is no longer a viable solution — 

North American demand for compost 

simply cannot match the volume of 

waste produced. In 2014, Value Chain 

Management International estimated 

that more than six billion tonnes of 

food waste worth $31 billion is dumped 

in landfills every year in Canada, an 

increase from $27 billion in 2010. 

In contrast, parts of Europe use the 

organic matter in food waste, called biomass, 

to create bioenergy — a renewable 

source of energy often used to generate 

electricity. Today, there is an infrastructure 

in place for foodservice operators 

to sell their waste to biomass facilities, 

which turn it into energy. “All of that 

food waste is collected and agitated over 

time to break it down into a reasonably 



EQUIPMENT 

KEEP IT CLEAN Restaurant kitchens are taking 

advantage of waste-handling technology 

& Co. foodservice consultancy, 

who was commissioned to design 

the kitchen. “We have five stations 

throughout the facility,” 

Lummis explains, “where food 

waste is scraped into a big box 

and the vacuums work, one after 

another, sucking the waste to a 

central location where a truck 

comes, once a week, to pick up 

the slurry.” 

For small-scale operators such 

as Big Wheel Burger, food-waste 

management becomes a more 

creative pursuit. The B.C.-based 

burger-and-shake restaurant was 

designed to be as sustainable as 

possible. “To become sustainable, 

you must be creative and use 

your investigative skills in finding 

suppliers that can provide the 

right materials,” says Big Wheel 

Burger owner, Calen McNeil. The 

QSR produces minimal emissions 

and offsets it through compost- 

homogenous slurry and, once a 

week, that waste is transported 

to a biomass energy production 

facility,” Pavlovic adds. “So now, 

you’re actually reclaiming the 

energy in the food waste.” The 

system sustains itself by providing 

both the operator and the foodwaste 

collector with a profit. 

“The problem in North 

America is that we don’t have the 

infrastructure yet to support this 

system,” says Pavlovic. We are, 

however, at a technological crossroads 

where foodservice operators, 

especially large ones, have 

The Meiko WasteStar 

system uses a vacuum 

instead of water to 

transport waste 

several options for significantly 

reducing the waste that they create 

on a daily basis. 

For example, Meiko offers a 

waste-pulping system that uses 

a recirculating water trunk to 

transport waste, which is then 

macerated and run through a 

de-watering press, thereby compacting 

the waste volume by up 

to two thirds. For large-scale 

operators, such as army-base and 

corporate-campus kitchens, the 

volume of food waste is such that 

it takes more water per hour to 

transport the waste than is used 

in ware-washing, alone. So the 

WasteStar system uses a vacuum 

instead. “The operator scraps 

food waste directly into a bin 

and periodically a valve opens 

at the bottom of the bin that’s 

connected to a vacuum piping 

system, which yanks all that food 

waste to a macerator and a collection 

station.” It’s also much easier 

to clean and maintain a vacuum 

system than a water-transport 

system. “If you have a leak, the 

system just goes down because 

it’s just a ruptured vacuum pipe,” 

Pavlovic explains. “You fix the 

pipe and you’re back in service. 

So, you don’t have to clean up 

hundreds of gallons of water off 

your floor.” 

In Ontario, CFB (Canadian 

Forces Base) Borden — Canada’s 

largest army training base — uses 

the WasteStar system in its new 

kitchen, which opened in 2016. It 

is the largest institutional kitchen 

in the country, according to Gary 

Lummis, president of Lummis 

“To become 

sustainable, 

you must be 

creative and 

use your 

investigative 

skills in 

finding 

suppliers 

that can 

provide 

the right 

materials” 

CALEN MCNEIL 

MEIKO [WASTE PULPING STATION, INSET IMAGE] 


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EQUIPMENT 

NEXT GENERATION This food pulper 

from Meiko is one example of 

how waste-handling equipment 

has evolved 

ing to attain carbon 

neutrality. “The 

actual cost of being 

a sustainable business 

is only marginally 

higher than 

a non-sustainable 

one,” says McNeil. 

“And even now, 

we’ve got it down 

because we actually 

save a lot of money 

on garbage disposal. 

Everything 

that comes into 

our building gets 

diverted, so we 

produce almost 

no trash.” Most of that diversion 

is accomplished through 

composting, which is becoming a 

more attractive option for small 

operators as associated costs 

decrease over time, thanks to 

wider adoption. 

A great example of getting creative 

with food-waste reduction 

is Big Wheel Burger’s approach 

to eliminating disposable food 

packaging and wares. “Our 

idea was that everything in our 

customer area was going to be 

compostable,” says McNeil. “We 

don’t supply any of our products 

in disposable packaging. We don’t 

sell bottled water, for example. 

It took us a long time to find a 

compostable straw but we eventually 

found one.” 

Larger QSRs are reducing 

waste by taking a step back to 

washable wares in place of disposable. 

“Food courts typically 

use disposable wares that get 

dumped at the end of the day,” 

says Gary Lee, Meiko’s director 

of Sales. “We’ve installed a couple 

of our ware-washing systems in 

Toronto at Yorkdale Shopping 

Centre and Scarborough Town 

Centre, where they’ve moved to 

using recyclable wares in their 

food courts. They now have trays, 

plates, bowls, cups and utensils 

that are washed and cleaned in a 

backroom and then brought back 

out to be reused at all the different 

vendors in the food court.” 

While food-waste pulping and 

composting are like the hybrid 

car, says Pavlovic — a viable solution 

for the present while the 

groundwork for the final solution 

takes place — North America 

has work to do to catch up with 

Europe on developing a biomass 

system. “We’re at the point where 

there are alternatives but we’re 

waiting for the technology to 

catch up. So, you’ve got things 

today in the foodservice sector 

equal to the hybrid car, because 

you can’t tell a customer who 

wants a great solution, ‘Call me 

back in 20 years.’” FH 

MEIKO 

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CHEF’S CORNER 

RISK TAKER 

Chef Jason Morris gives Montreal 

a taste of something different at Le Fantôme 

BY TOM VENETIS 

When chef Jason Morris opened Le 

Fantôme in 2015 with his business partner 

Kabir Kappor, his goal was to make 

Montreal a dining destination. 

When it first opened, the intimate 

30-seat restaurant — located on William St. in the centre 

of Griffintown’s Montreal Art Centre — featured an à 

la carte-style menu. Today, it has evolved into regularly 

reinvented tasting menus, offering diners six to nine 

courses with an emphasis on fresh ingredients. It opened 

to great acclaim and was named one of Canada’s 10 Best 

Restaurants of 2016 by enRoute magazine. 

“The way we approach our menu is that we try to 

change it more often than anyone else,” says Morris, who 

admits his menus sometimes border on the whimsical. 

“Last year, we did more than 42 different menus. Our 

tasting menu may begin with some ‘snacks,’ then possibly 

a cold seafood dish, a pasta dish, a grilled fish or meat, 

then dessert.” 

There are a few staples on the tasting menu, including 

a pasta of the day; fresh sourdough bread; a peanut but- 

BITS 

& BITES 

Favourite 

food 

memory: 

Fishing and 

cooking that fish 

on an open fire 

Favourite 

ingredient: 

Salt — it’s 

the key to 

everything. 

Favourite place 

to visit: Kyoto, 

Japan where 

I had a chance 

to try the 

kaiseki cuisine 

ter, foie gras and jelly sandwich; and 

a selection of cheeses. The food is 

served on ceramic dishes made by 

his mother, Pauline, and the wine 

list changes from week to week. 

“When [Kabir Kappor] and I 

decided to start the restaurant, we 

knew it would be a risk and we 

wanted to make sure we were going 

to be bringing something new to 

the restaurant scene in Montreal,” 

says Morris. 

This willingness to take risks 

comes naturally to Morris. He developed 

his love of food and cooking 

at an early age, but never thought 

of pursuing it as a profession. It 

was while attending business school 

he decided he needed something 

more challenging — something that 

would let him be truly creative. He 

enrolled at the Institut de tourisme 

et d’hôtellerie du Québec and also 

began working the fish station at Milos in Montreal. 

He then did an internship at Corton in New York, 

specializing in New-French cuisine, before landing 

at the two-Michelin star Maaemo — a Norwegian 

restaurant in Schweigaardsgate, Norway. When he 

returned to Canada, he worked with famed chef 

Daniel Boulud at Maison Boulud in the Ritz-Carlton 

Montreal before deciding he wanted to operate his own 

restaurant. 

“Daniel was, and is, a huge inspiration to me and 

wonderful to work for, but I’m more of a small-restaurant 

person. I want to connect with the diners,” he says. 

Le Fantôme is a narrow space, featuring a six-footlong 

bar and walls covered in artwork by Morris’ late 

grandfather, Lee Morris. 

Morris is happy with how diners have taken to Le 

Fantôme and its tasting menu but he’s most proud when 

a member of his staff takes the risk to strike out on their 

own. “I like it when someone moves on and does good 

things,” he says. “I believe my personal job is done when 

I hear someone on my staff is doing well.” FH 

DREW HADLEY [JASON MORRIS] 


Campbell’s ® Verve ® Carrot Parsnip Bisque with Ginger 

©2017 CSC Brands LP 

By early 2018, our Frozen Soup Portfolio will be free from: 

High-Fructose Corn Syrup 

Artificial Flavours • Artificial Colours • Disodium Inosinate & Disodium Guanylate 

Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein • Partially Hydrogenated Oils 

Visit campbellsfoodservice.ca to learn more.

FEBRUARY 25-27 | ENERCARE CENTRE | RCSHOW.COM 

TORONTO

FH1117

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