Manhattan, NY – Restaurant Imposes Surcharge for Uneaten Food

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    Manhattan, NY – Did your mother tell you to clean your plate?
     
    If so, you’d be a good candidate for the all-you-can eat special at Hayashi Ya.
     
    The Japanese restaurant on Manhattan’s West Side imposes a surcharge for wasted and unfinished food.
     
    A chalkboard sign in front of the restaurant advertises all you can eat for $26.95 per person, sake or soda included.
     
    But the sign says there’s a 30 percent surcharge for wasted or unfinished food. That would add about $8 to the check.
     
    Chuck Hunt, a spokesman for the New York State Restaurant Association, said he has not heard of any restaurant imposing a similar surcharge. “I’m not aware of any other places that have done it,” he said.
     
    But Hunt acknowledged that food waste is a problem for restaurants and home cooks alike.
     
    Roughly 30 percent of food in the U.S. goes to waste, costing some $48 billion annually, according to a Stockholm Water Institute study released this summer. A 2004 University of Arizona study put the total higher, estimating that 40 percent to 50 percent of U.S. food is wasted.
     
    Joel Berg, the executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger and a former U.S. Department of Agriculture official in the Clinton administration, said food waste ranges from crops left to rot in the field to vegetables that consumers buy and don’t get around to cooking.
     
    “All throughout the process of producing food there is waste,” Berg said. “I think Americans would be shocked to know the amount of food that is left on fields.”

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    21 Comments
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    Joseph
    Joseph
    15 years ago

    So if I don’t finish my veggies, how will my forking over $8 help the $48 billiom dollar annual waste of food??? It wouldn’t help it anymore than it would help “those starving children in China” we were always told about when we were kids. That was also (somehow) supposed to convince us to eat everything.

    murray
    murray
    15 years ago

    as long as it is the restaurant’s idea, thats fine, but if Mayor Blumberg is behind this, or gets any ideas from this you will see this at every restaurant in NY….yep, another brilliant tax to raise money for a dyeing city, like fines and taxes for stores that allow cool air to escape from an open door, plastic bag fees, now this? Whats next?

    nut job
    nut job
    15 years ago

    Why not hang up a sign all you CANT eat $34.95 ,and solve all the problems

    Babishka
    Member
    Babishka
    15 years ago

    Like my bubbie used to say “hostu oygen gresser vi dain boych.”

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    15 years ago

    he should put up a sign ” all YOU can eat ” not all YOUR PLATE can eat.

    Oy Gevald
    Oy Gevald
    15 years ago

    Hey, why not just ask for a plastic bag – even if it is taxed 6-cents and take it with you. You can even dump it in the corner trash and all it cost was a bag!

    what the problem
    what the problem
    15 years ago

    It says All you CAN eat not all you DO eat

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    15 years ago

    you all didn’t get it..!..
    the point it since its a flat rate that you shouldnt take more and too much

    Porky
    Porky
    15 years ago

    I have seen a place do this before… It just keeps you mindful and watch what you eat…Plenty of people have BIG eyes and will take huge portions and then after one bite..Ugh.. I am full… A waste of a meal…

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    15 years ago

    oh how many poor people can eat from ones leftover, w/o paying the extra $.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    15 years ago

    when someone takes more than they can eat at an “all you can eat” buffet the restaurant has to make more which costs them money. I think its fair.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    15 years ago

    Stupid*** let him give up his stupid restaurant if he can’t run it

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    15 years ago

    Its a good thing

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    15 years ago

    I have been to many buffets that the customer had no reguard for bal tashchis i spoke to an owner and he told me that the last refill is usually left over and the amount that gets thrown out is unbelievable. Its amazing that we see so many frum people that arnt chas on momoin yisroel. then of course there is the person that fills a plate before going home then asks to pack it up so he can have supper tommorow night which of course isnt in the spirit of the all you can eat which means here and now.

    do not forget
    do not forget
    15 years ago

    I think this is a really good idea. Maybe making people aware of this problem will help them avoid baal taschis at home as well!!! I have been to so many homes where there is waaaaay too much food that gets thrown out. Its chaval. Many of the individuals in the previous generation knew what it is like not to have any food and were careful about wasting. Let us never forget.