We’ve all felt the pinch asfood prices have been risingduring the recession, so it’s

little wonder that families are looking forsavvy ways to cut their grocery bills. Asa childcare provider, you’re no doubtfeeling the squeeze on your foodbudget too, but I suspect you feel theneed to be less overt about how you’retrying to cut costs. The public has adifferent view when care providers arelooking to make savings on food: lessmoney spent implies lower standards.But saving money needn’t meanreduced quality.

Efficiency in catering is nothing new.It’s what any business which providesfood to its service users has to practisein order to survive. Yet, when Grub4Lifehas worked with both private and localauthority early years childcare providers(EYCs), we’ve been amazed at theabsence of standard cateringmanagement practices. It’s this simple:you cannot feed 30 or 130 children allday, every day without observing somesimple rules on budget management.The good news is, you most definitelycan have an efficient, flexible foodprocurement system, and a menuwhich reduces waste and enables youto accurately cost your meals withoutcompromising on taste, presentation ornutritional quality.

Saving money on the weekly food billneedn’t mean reducing the quality ofyour menu, says dietician and founderof Grub4Life, Nigel Denby...

Cost-cuttingCOMPROMISE

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Looking after the penniesThe old adage of looking after the pennies sothe pounds can look after themselves is not abad philosophy to follow. There is no singlestrategy to save money when it comes tofood, but by implementing a few simple stepsyou can save small amounts here and therewhich can make a real difference overall.

Menu planningBefore you start on the fine detail, you haveto operate with a menu and standardisedrecipes in place. This should be a rotationalmenu which operates over 3–4 weeks withaccompanying recipes that specify thenumber of portions they produce. The menucan, of course, be changed once or twice ayear to reflect the seasons, and can be

Some settings are unsure aboutwhether they should usesupermarket budget ranges orstick to premium brands only.Budget fruit and vegetables arejust as nutritious as premium ororganic fruit and veg; they’re justnot a uniform size and shape. Butprocessed foods such as cereals,fruit juice, cold meats and bakerygoods may vary nutritionally fromthe mainstream brands. Fat, salt orsugar levels can also besignificantly higher in budgetranges, so it’s important tocompare labels before choosing.

Budget buys

flexible in order to take advantage of specialoffers – for instance, you may want to includea weekly roast on the menu but leave themeat choice optional to take advantage ofchanging meat prices. Similarly, fish pie canbe made with a wide range of fish withoutadversely affecting its nutritional value.

This flexibility can be used in a wide rangeof dishes and accompaniments. Suggestingthe colour of vegetable mealaccompaniments, rather than specificvegetables, allows you to buy in seasonwhen vegetables are cheaper: e.g. Fish Piewith green and orange vegetables. Thisensures the meal is providing specificnutrients (all green veg contains folate andiron, all orange veg contains beta carotene)but allows you to vary what is servedaccording to price and season.

Portion controlThere are some truly inspiring cooks workingin the early years, and you’d be amazed howmany produce terrific meals without everreferring to a recipe. However, when the cookcarries all their knowledge in their head, asetting is vulnerable. What happens if thecook is sick or leaves? All that knowledgegoes with them. From a budgeting point ofview, you cannot cost a menu without arecipe – you need the recipe to tell you thequantity of ingredients needed to produce aspecific number of meals. Grub4life.org.ukfeatures free recipes which produce yields of10 toddler portions, making it easy toproduce meals for larger numbers if required.It also means you have all the information youneed in order to negotiate discounts andspecial deals with local suppliers orwholesalers. If you don’t know how much

you use of an ingredient, you will alwaysstruggle to get a good deal. Waste can alsobe significantly improved using a portion-controlled recipe: it ensures you produce theright amount of food for the number ofchildren, and acts as a very useful tool forchild carers or dining room staff to serve theright sized portion for each child.

From a nutritional point of view, portion-controlled recipes and standard menus areessential. Nutritional analysis relies onaccuracy of ingredient weights and recipeyields; without these it’s impossible for you to demonstrate the nutritional value of your food.

Purchasing powerWhether you’re an independent nursery, a local authority EYC or part of a nationalchain you have the power to negotiatepreferential rates with your suppliers –providing you have standard menus andportion-controlled recipes.

IndependentsYou might be small, but have you consideredapproaching other independent nurseries tojoin forces in purchasing? Like cooperativeretailers, cooperative purchasers can operatemore efficiently than individuals in themarketplace. You don’t all have to use thesame menu, but by buying in bulk from localsuppliers, discounts of 10–25 per cent arevery achievable. Local suppliers are oftenkeen to advertise their links with localbusinesses, too, so you might want toconsider displaying your local food supplynetwork in the nursery. It’s a good marketingtool and USP for the nursery and goes downvery well with parents.

For moreinformation

on howGrub4lifecan help

with any area of your food

provision, email

nigel@grub4life.org.uk

findoutmore

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Local authorities The vast majority of local authorities havenegotiated central food purchasing fromcontracted suppliers. While this can beeffective at achieving discounts, it doesrestrict EYCs from taking advantage of anyother opportunities. Grub4Life saw a primeexample of this in one London children’scentre which is situated next to a fantasticfruit and vegetable market. The borough hadcontracted fruit and vegetable supplierswho, at one stage, were charging over £2for a pineapple when the next door marketwas offering three pineapples for £1. But thechildren’s centre couldn’t buy the cheaperpineapples because they no longer had apetty cash facility. We’re glad to report thissituation has now changed and a lovelyrange of different fruit is available at thechildren’s centre.

Nursery groupsGrub4life has worked with some of themajor nursery groups in the UK. Originally,we were amazed to see that many had verycomprehensive policies on education, CPDand child safety, but almost nothingestablished when it came to food. Somewere using online supermarket shoppingand delivery. On the face of it, this seemslike a convenient idea, but many nurseriesreport problems with this approach. If anitem is out of stock, inappropriatealternatives can be sent instead. This can beas simple as diet yoghurt being sent insteadof full fat yoghurt, which affects thenutritional balance of a meal, but can bemore serious: cereals and snack foodscontaining nuts have been sent as analternative to nut-free brands. This could

very easily be overlooked by staff and havedisastrous implications. Fresh foods,particularly cold meats, are often deliveredwith imminent use-by dates. This results inwastage, or the nursery having to alter menusto use up ingredients.

Grub4Life has worked with a number ofnursery groups to help them plan andnegotiate food supply from cateringwholesalers. While this can be a bigproject, the savings that can be madewith economies of scale cannot beignored. The key tools you need areplanned menus, recipes and very clearingredients requirements. You’ll alsoneed an accurate estimate of yourannual or monthly group food spend.Some wholesalers are clued up to theneeds of EYCs, others are not. Somecommon ingredients to ask if awholesaler can supply will soonenable you to sort the wheat from the chaff.

Ask a wholesaler if they can supply:● Tuna in spring water● Canned pulses in unsalted water● Low-salt stock cubes

If you get a negative response tothese simple requests, we’d suggestyou move on.

Providing good quality, nutritiousfood that young children will eat isnot easy; having skilled cooks isparamount to achieving this. Manycooks may not have the experiencein managing budgets and suppliersin the same way other caterers do,

COOKING!getVegetableCurry withRice and

Cucumber Raita

Ingredients (10 servings)

The curry

50g unsaturated margarine

2 (200g) onions peeled and finely chopped

125g mushrooms, washed and quartered

2 (200g) carrots peeled and cut into sticks

½ (120g) cauliflower cut into florets

1 (120g) head of broccoli cut into florets

25g flour

1 tbsp (15g) mild curry powder

½ tsp (3g) ground ginger

½ tsp (3g) ground cinnamon

285ml milk

140ml Kallo low salt vegetable

or chicken stock

1 tbsp (15g) mango chutney

1x 400g can chickpeas in water

The raita

150g natural yoghurt

2 tsp (12g) dried mint

200g cucumber, diced

300g Basmati Rice

■ In a large saucepan, melt the butter.■ Add the onion and carrots and cook for4–5 mins until the onion has softened.■ Add the flour, curry powder, ginger andcinnamon. Cook gently for a few secondsbefore blending in the milk and stock.■ Stir in the chutney.■ Now add the cauliflower, broccoli andchickpeas and bring to the boil.■ Simmer for 20 mins.■ Meanwhile, cook the rice according to thepack instructions and make the raita...■ Mix the yoghurt, dried mint and cucumber.■ Serve the curry on a bed of rice, with atablespoon of the raita.

Try this tasty recipe...

but this can be learned and shouldn’t stopyou gaining competitive suppliers who canprovide what you need at a price that’s right.

By combining common cateringmanagement skills with your cook’s expertiseyou can provide excellence in the food youserve. Just in the same way as any other areaof the nursery, you can also minimise theamount of money being needlessly wasted.

cook’s tip...Prepare extra cauliflower and broccoli tomake a purée for weaning babies. For milk-free diets, use soya milk in thecurry and soya yoghurt to make the raita. For wheat-free diets, use wheat-free flourto thicken the curry.

Nutrition analysis per servingEnergy (kcals) 137, Protein (g) 5.3, Fat (g) 4.4,Carbohydrate (g) 19.4, Sugar (g) 3, Salt (g) 0.2, Iron (mg) 1.7, Calcium (mg) 72