I have written about food waste before, but it always bears repeating since this problem is so acute. Reviewing the Bay Area Recycling Outreach Coalition website is what initiated this new post. All the graphics and quotes (italicized text) come from the Bay Area Recycling organization unless noted otherwise. Please check out their site for more ideas and suggestions. But more importantly, do all you can to join the millions fighting against food waste.
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The American Story of Waste
Americans, waste a lot of food. As one ordinary family living in the USA, even though I am focused on food specifically, I too find that food waste is hard to eliminate.
- In fact, over 40% of food is wasted in America.
- 25% of the food Americans buy, is never eaten eaten.
- 90% of Americans throw away food too soon.
- Each American tosses out nearly 300# of food each year
- Which is an average of $400/person.
It seems no matter how hard I try, there is still food in my compost or garbage bin. All the while, I am acutely aware of the growing hunger in our country and world. At some point I became aware that I needed to do something about this, and started to figure out my situation by looking at the food in my garbage can, and why it is being tossed. What I found were some interesting trends in my food waste.
- I had hidden layers of food in my pantry and fridge.
- “Double layers” of food (bags of veggies resting upon other bags) in my veggie bin and then forgetting what was below the top layer, the bottom layer would rot.
- Items in the back of pantry shelves resulted in double purchases of ingredients I could not possibly use up before expiration.
- Getting tired of the same leftovers
- As a result food sitting in containers in the fridge too long and growing mold.
- Not using fresh produce from my garden in a timely manner
- Occasionally some of my trees produce too much food
So what can I do to be better?
Fight + Prevent Food Waste
Above is a graphic to show the overall ideas usually given to help reduce food waste. In some cases this means a compost area in your back yard, for others it means dumping your food waste into your green bin (if your local waste company allows). But this graphic only shows a handful of ideas, from a list of thousands of options on things, me and my family can do to decrease waste.
I have written posts on many of these suggestions, in a variety of links below.
- Smart Shopping
- Smart Shopping Ideas
- Using Peels and Rinds: use up all what you may think of as scraps
- Is Zero Waste Possible
- Reduce Take-out Waste
- Food Storage: proper storage can extend the useful life of veggies and fruit
Other ways is to shop and buy veggies, fruit, and proteins, but only what you can reasonably use up within a week.
Another way is to get creative and create “dump dishes” which often are casseroles, soups or stews where you can use up the food that are about to turn bad. These may be limp carrots or celery, slightly wrinkled potatoes that are not green or sprouting, or cabbage that may have a bad leaf or two.
The last idea is to regrow your veggies (I have done garlic, onions, potatoes, and green onions) after you use up the good parts. For garlic look for when they start sprouting a green shoot, same for onions.
This means we can grow our own and thus leave things on the vine until we need them, rather than buy a bunch of things and hope we use them up in time. Or we can regrow veggies from the parts normally thrown away, or the veggies that have started “to seed”.
Use Your Land (or Balcony)
Some of us own or rent free-standing houses with a front and back yard. One way to reduce waste is to grow or regrow food by setting up a food-based garden and composting bin on your land. Some of us have apartments or condos with a balcony on which planter-based gardening can occur. Some of us only have windows, no balcony and no land; but even then there are indoor plantings that can occur.
For me, I have had mixed results on regrowing food. However, I have had great results with sprouting garlic, onions and various potatoes. Lettuce and celery has been harder, with only a few surviving.
Store Produce Wisely
Key to using up your food and not wasting it, is to store the food properly and plan your meals so that everything is used up before it goes bad.
This means learning what the various expiration dates mean, learning about the specific veggies and fruit so you can know when “past its prime” food can still be used and how, and learning about how to shop and cook what you have on hand.
Organizations To Help Reduce Waste
Falling Fruit Falling Fruit is an organization dedicated to providing locations for foraging food in cities across the world. They provide an “edible map” through interactive updates from its users.
Olio and Buy Nothing are organizations that share food. I am a member of Buy Nothing, and have seen posts from people giving away food they bought at Costco but did not like, or when they have too much. I have seen notices about free produce from an overactive fruit tree in their yard. For instance I have given away lemons and limes from my trees. We have also seen people give away plants, seeds, and seedlings as they do their garden maintenance.
FoodSafety.gov has a web-based food storage application worth considering. You choose your food, and it returns information on proper storage and how long the food is safe to consume.
ChowMatch is a software technology that connects companies (restaurants, grocery stores, caterers, farms) with surplus food to food assistance agencies/organizations (shelters, churches, schools, etc.). What an idea, match waste and surplus to groups that need the food to serve the hungry. ChowMatch is currently used in over 500 cities and towns in the United States to recover and deliver several tons of food daily to feeding programs. There are other similar programs such as RePlate, and MealConnect.
—Patty
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