I’m sure this subject has been dealt with before but I would like everyones opinion on pre-cut veggies…I know there more convenient but price wise are they worth it compared to saving on the equipment and labor costs?
One thing to remember about pre-cut vs. whole veggies is yield. When I get a 10 pound case of diced tomatoes, I get 10 pounds. A 25 pound case of whole tomates doesn’t necessarily yield 25 pounds of diced product. Onions and green peppers are the same. Also don’t forget about the lack of workman’s comp claims because people aren’t slicing off fingers or smashing them in a dicer. I run between 23 & 24% food cost. I use nothing but pre-prepped veggies. The main savings in labor are found in the weekends. We used to dice and slice for 2 or 3 hours just get enough product for the day.
Who do you buy your veggies from? Are they canned, frozen or fresh?
We use fresh pre-sliced mushrooms which help alot…everything else we chop manually
Perry
Where do you get the fresh pre-cut ones at?Also how much more in price are they?
Thanks
Derek
10lbs pre-cut $16.95…not sure what whole goes for probably $1-$2 less
anyone know a good way to keep them fresh" onions and green peppers?
thanks
RON
As soon as you slice tomatoes, onions, green peppers, and mushrooms they begin to breakdown, the oxygen has a funny way of screwing that up.
Your product life on veggies is about 2 to 3 weeks uncut, once you cut them you might get a week, if you are buying them pre-cut, how many days are they sitting in your suppliers refer, before they deliver them to you, what is the usefull life of the product after you receive it three, maybe four days.
When I worked for Dominos we got pre-cut veggies, and unfortunately we sold alot of crappy pizza with green peppers that had completely broken down. If you were at the end of a delivery line sometimes your veggies would come in frozen, when they thawed they turned to mush.
Dominos tried some herb pizza back in the 90’s, and they deliver frozen pre-cut red, yellow, and green peppers in a bag, when they thawed it was like scooping mush onto a pizza, what a fiasco.
I went to work for Papa John’s for a year before starting my own chain, and I really respect their fresh veggie mentality. We would pre-cut veggie everyday. The only thing we got pre-cut was the fresh mushrooms, its much easier and much more uniform.
Also once you cut a onion, green pepper, or tomato the cellular wall of the veggie begins to breakdown, the longer they sit the more moisture they let go of when their cooked. Ever seen the bottom of a pizza pox that was really wet? This is why?
We cut all our veggies every day the fresher the better and my staff is there anyways they may as well be working
10lbs - 11.50 whole we slice them on our hobart with the slices attachment in about 2 minutes or less.
pizzaguy,
Do you mean Hobar meat slicer?
We cut fresh veggies every day and brag about it.
I do it on a slicer with a TUBE and AUTO - takes more time to clean the slicer than anything else. We do it during slower periods. Let’s me give someone a 9-5 shift, and have them be usefule at 2 or 3 PM when they’d otherwise be unnecessary. We save a little on food cost, and spend a little on labor - but get a superior product.
Mushrooms, onions, bell peppers - everything goes in the tube and gets sliced. Then it’s placed in a food storage box with a drain bottom so that they don’t get wet and spoil. They’ll hold up that way for a couple days, but as mentioned - we only shoot for prepping 1 or 2 days worth…
Our diced tomatoes, onions and green peppers are from Fresh Express. 1.07 per pound for the toms, 1.01 per pound for the onions & 2.46 per pound on the green peppers. All of the produce comes in fresh vacuum sealed bags. We get it the same day it hits the distributor. They get the truck in at 3-4 am we have the produce in our walk in before noon. The tomatoes and onions have a great shelf life. The green peppers do not. It’s up to my staff and I to check the peppers daily. If they start to turn we toss 'em out. Occasionally this leads to hand slicing, but not much.
Those look like good, tempting prices on tomatoes and onions - close to what I pay for plain produce. The peppers though - granted there is waste in cleaning and slicing or dicing your own…but I’m at something like $0.60/lb. on bell pepper.
I have a Hobart Mixer with a hook for dough and a slicer attachment for mushrooms.
Yes it is also used to slice meat. I dont use it for meats as I have a meat slicer specificly for that and my attachment is the hopper style where you can dump the mushrooms in then push them through.
I would say your getting screwed on green peppers I buy a 30 pound box of choppers for $19.24 that like 64 cents a pound.
we only ise fresh veggies…if you have a farmers market close…go there!! cheap and fresh, also the more you use a particular farmer, the better the prices get!