19 May 2008
One of the biggest yum cha restaurants in Melbourne’s west expects to slash its water use by up to four million litres a year by making changes to the way it uses water in the kitchen.
And City West Water wants other Asian restaurants in Melbourne’s CBD and western suburbs to follow Gold Leaf’s example, and will launch a program tailored to help them save water on Friday.
The 300 seat Gold Leaf restaurant in Sunshine has worked to make big water savings over the last six months. Manager Colin Long estimates the restaurant has slashed its water use by around 12,000 litres a day.
“Before, our commercial steamer, wok stoves and preparing seafood used a lot of water,” Mr Long said.
“Our water bills were very expensive. After speaking with City West Water, we tried some ideas to save water. We have replaced our commercial steamer because it is old and not water efficient and trialling a new waterless wok.”
Like most wok-stoves in commercial kitchens, the Gold Leaf’s three 5-burner stoves were cooled by a constant flow of water to keep the work top cool enough for the chef to cook. Each stove can use up to 5,000 litres of water a day.
Gold Leaf is trialling a waterless wok, which uses air to cool the stove top. With advice from City West Water, they have also found a way to reduce the flow to their old water cooled stoves.
The staff also learned to read the meter each night to look for any unusual increases in their daily water use.
Mr Long said it was also important to raise awareness of water shortages with his restaurant staff, many who don’t speak English as a first language.
“Since I’ve been in Australia, I have a better understanding of the drought. My nine year old son learns about it in school so tells me off if I take a long shower at home,” he said.
“We’ve also talked to our staff to let them know how important it is to save water, not just for the sake of our business, but for everyone in the community. And we translate the water bill into Chinese so staff can see the savings for themselves.”
City West Water’s Managing Director, Anne Barker, said the water company was finding many Asian restaurants did want to save water but had simply never been told how.
“Studies show Asian style restaurants can use twice as much water as other restaurants, due to steaming and cooking with wok stoves,” Ms Barker said.
“Colin and his team have done a great job finding ways to save water without compromising the quality of their restaurant. They’ll also make big savings to their bottom line too, with their water bill reducing significantly.
“Following on from our work with the Gold Leaf, we’ve developed a program for Asian restaurants throughout the CBD and western suburbs of Melbourne, including workshops and brochures about how to save water and money in Asian languages,” Ms Barker said.