Hilton trials zero waste menus at four UK hotels – Business Traveller

Hilton has introduced zero waste menus at four of its hotels in the UK, coinciding with Stop Food Waste Day.

The hotel group is responding to the UNEP’s Food Waste Index Report 2024, which found that one billion tonnes of food is wasted annually, with the food services industry responsible for over a quarter of the waste produced.

The ‘Taste of Zero Waste’ menus will be available at Hilton London Metropole, London Hilton on Park Lane, Hilton Manchester Deansgate and DoubleTree by Hilton Brighton Metropole for one month (from 24 April) as part of a pilot scheme.

While currently only active at four hotels, Hilton plans to roll out the initiative across more hotels in the EMEA region in the coming year.

Each menu will be curated by chefs at the participating hotels and feature five to seven dishes, along with zero-waste drinks.

The initiative is designed to show how hotel operators can significantly reduce waste through innovative techniques such as nose-to-tail cookery, which involves using whole ingredients – from salmon cheeks to ox heart, or fermenting vegetable stalks, trimmings and peelings to make sauces and stocks, or bruised and overripe fruit for cocktails.

The teams will also be repurposing leftover items such as pastries, bread, fruit and coffee beans from breakfast buffets to create desserts, while also preserving surplus fruit and vegetables through pickling.

The £40 menu at Hilton London Metropole’s Tyburn Kitchen, for instance, includes:

• Charcoal-grilled Applewood Ox Heart with potato skin risotto and pickled magnolia petals
• Poached Scottish salmon cheeks with seaweed stock, tomato and asparagus stalks
• Vegetable korma with sticky rice biscuit, tomato and coriander stalks
• Chicken mince on toasted sourdough with grilled chicken heart, soft herb pesto and seeds
• Crisp-fried cod tongues with sauce gribeche and nettle leaf tomato salad
• Bread and butter pudding with blueberry and fudge, and caramel sauce

Hilton will also donate a meal to a person in need for every dish purchased from the new menus, via The Felix Project. Hilton London Metropole has been working with the London-based charity since 2020, when hotels were forced to shut due to the pandemic. Restaurants were instead transformed into community kitchen hubs, with surplus ingredients used to prepare thousands of meals for those in need across London. The partnership continues to this day and the hotel has cooked more than 75,000 meals for those in need.