Satish is a software engineer, works for a multi-national company. He is a food lover. Every weekend he hits one of the best restaurants in the city along with his wife and two children. After spending 2-3 hours there, his two children not willing to eat any more. Then, he asks the waiter for a doggy bag to take home leftover food served to them. But most of us struggle with this idea.
Doggy bag is used for carrying home food that is leftover from a meal eaten at a restaurant. There is no such shame attached to doggy bags in the US, where they are clearly offered on a menu or freely handed out by the restaurant staff as part of the service.
Doggy bag is a rarely heard request in our country. We are feeling shyness about appearing to be greedy. In India up to 40% food rots on the way to market but we don’t help reduce the amount of food thrown away.
Restaurants in France are now legally obliged to provide doggy bags if requested by diners, in a move to cut food wastage. The new regulation, which came into force on New Year’s Day, applies to restaurants serving more than 180 meals a day. It is aimed at encouraging the French to overcome their reluctance to eat their leftover pot au feu (a boiled dinner of meat and vegetable) or coq au vin (Chicken in Red Wine) at home the next day. The French government wants to reduce the seven million tonnes of food thrown away each year.
Britons are reluctant to ask for a doggy bag regardless of how much is left on their plate. Paul Buckley, senior lecturer of consumer psychology at Cardiff School of Management, says doggy bags have an image problem in the UK.
"What others think and social conformity puts pressure on you as a customer. Anything they think poor people may do, they won't.”
"Others will ask for doggy bags and make excuses. They might want the thing to eat at home the following day but will say, 'It's only for the cat'."
"If every single human being on this planet had enough food, it would change our societies. It would stop wars, put an end to suffering and even change the course of human history." -- Selina Juul (Founder of Stop Wasting Food movement Denmark)
There's nothing embarrassing about asking for a doggy bag. Waste is no more a symbol of wealth and nobility.
Please share this article with your family and friends to create awareness and sensitize them against wasting food.
Source: The Telegraph-UK, BBC
