Panoramic Restaurant
On the 34th floor of Liverpool's tallest building, West Tower, Panoramic Restaurant faces logistical issues that mean manager Oliver Hawthorne has to be creative when it comes to waste.
"The Restaurant was built to spec so it is designed for purpose 100%, but that's going to leave us with other problems. It's meant we have to get practical. Just recycling glass and paper is never going to be enough.
"That practicality has led to a waste-not, want-not culture. It's not that we're thrifty, although saving the pennies does have its benefits, it's more to help reduce clutter.
"If you visit the kitchen here it isn't a massive space so it has to work in a well-ordered way or chef will have cooks under his feet. You can't run a top restaurant like that."
The restaurant does all its butchery and fish mongery on site. Once the cuts are taken anything leftover is used for stock - "None of this packet nonsense, this is a quality issue as well, self-made stock will transform the flavour of what you're cooking". This is win-win for Panoramic; more cuts, and quality control over those cuts, staff with a greater skillset and less waste.
Panoramic are advocates of the sous-vide cooking method. Essentially a water-bath, this method allows you to slow-cook, say meat. As Hawthorne says, again has benefits on a number of fronts. "With sous-vide the meat is more tender and evenly cooked so from a quality perspective it's more effective. Because the meat is cooked more evenly you reduce waste. Sous-vide is more energy efficient compared with a convection oven. The restaurant also uses induction hobs to reduce energy costs. Taking up less space it makes the kitchen itself more efficient.
It's an issue Hawthorne believes more restaurants will need to tackle. "Being the UK's highest restaurant was always going to make us stand out, but that doesn't give us an excuse to shirk responsibility. Every restaurant is different and has its own constraints - most aren't as acute as ours - but it is something the industry should be looking at closely. And when it starts to impact your bottom line, it's a no brainer."
Panoramic Restaurant and Bar is the highest restaurant in the UK. It opened in February 2008.
