Food waste

[shootingstar]

Nothing new. Guess that figure is based on several people in 1 household.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repor...ticle19923151/

“The average Canadian household wastes between 500 to 750 grams of food per person a day, or about $1,500 a year.”

My biggest problem at this time of year is trying to resist buying too much fresh veggies and fruit at good prices. No, I don't have a big enough freezer to freeze lots either. So some of the stuff does spoil.

[Donna1960]

Get a juicer!

[shootingstar]

We have one ..in another city nearly 1,000 km. away. No, I don't consider it an essential thing to lug it back on next plane trip. Actually he bought it to use it and used it for only 3 yrs. For juicing primarily carrots.

[PamNY]

Can you take the spoiled food somewhere for composting? Seems to be a growing trend. Where I live, farmer's markets accept materials for composting, and NYC is starting home pickup in some areas.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/31/ny...m-expands.html

[OakLeaf]

+1 on the juicer. I sold my Champion juicer years ago and now I really wish I had it back, though honestly I don't know where I'd put it. They do take a lot of counter/cabinet space.

Don't forget making stock either, most food scraps in our house go into the freezer to make random stock. You'll still need to compost the cooked and squeezed remains, but there's less of it with less nutritional value to compost.

And +1 on looking for someplace to compost if you don't have a place for a compost bin/heap of your own. If you're not in the habit of travel, a worm bin is a great indoor solution. If you're away too much to maintain a worm bin, then ask your favorite farmers at the farmers' market. You may find that some of them already accept customers' compostables, sometimes they even give a discount on produce in return!

Of course with composting we're not just talking about waste of edible (or formerly edible) food, but also scraps, tea leaves, coffee grounds, etc. which are wasted, too, if they're not composted.

[malkin]

Chickens!

[shootingstar]

I live in a condo. Our city rolled out food scraps recycling program to single detached homes in certain neighbourhoods nearly 2 yrs. ago as a pilot.

I don't really waste much food. I just have to make sure I don't overbuy much.

Our farmers' markets haven't gotten that far by offering a place as a temporary drop off for food scraps. Yea, I know. We are behind..in several different ways. And we're 1.3 million people, growing pretty fast. Ironically there are farms probably only 50 km. away from the downtown core....I mean the city is out in the middle of the prairies/foothills before you hit the mountains.

[pll]

was thinking about this thread yesterday, while shopping in Whole Foods. For a number of weeks, I have been unable to buy a small bundles of dill (they have those in a small box, in a section where they have other fresh herbs) and there is only a huge bundle, maybe 20 times the amount of the small packet... I could never use so much, since I live alone and just use it to prepare some salmon. Now, both bundles cost the same, but I hate to throw away food, so I'd rather take the small one. Sigh. No dill for me, then.

[OakLeaf]

Herbs freeze well. Either the complete stalks, rinsed, patted dry and separated to freeze quickly on a tray before packaging; or separate (or purée) the leaves, cover with olive oil and freeze in ice trays.

That said, dill is pretty much the only thing that really gets wasted when we get it in our CSA. If I remember to ask ahead of time, often they'll substitute a different herb in our basket. DH won't touch dill, and I can't eat enough for both of us!

[smilingcat]

thank you for participating in CSA.

excess cucumber, eggplants, turnips are pickled in brine or in thing called nukamiso. Nukamiso is made from rice bran/hull. nukamiso gives it a different taste than plain salt, or in brine solution.

If you want to try nukamiso, http://www.amazon.com/Bobs-Red-Mill-...ords=rice+bran one of the reivewer has a recipe to make nukamiso. I skip the sea weed part cause I just didn't feel like it. All you need is two packs to try it. Anything less and its too small.

Perpperoncini pickle in brine was a fail so I'm going to pickle them like dilly pickles in vinegar solution. Not crazy about using fruit fresh so I tend to skip using it. Besides, use lemon juice in its place if you must have it.

Excess are going to our local food pantry. Last week we donated in excess of 20 pounds. Not pickling any more zucchini for the season. Nor umeboshi.

Will start canning tomatoes in next few days. Yellow tomato, green tomato, red and purple. Yellow tomato sauce for pizza looks really pretty!! (Blond pizza!)
drying is good, freezing is good.

Asian pears are almost ready to picked and yellow raspberries (var is called fall gold) needs to be picked. Pink blueberries (var is called pink lemonade) are almost done. pink blueberry has a taste of blue berry with cranberry. Super good. I plan on putting in about 50 or so of these on my farm.

Unfortunately, some food are either ruined on the plant outside or don't quite make it in our house. They get recycled in our compost pile. So is this a waste?

[smilingcat]

Even though we are vigilent about food in our fridge, sometimes I feel like I have a controlled incubator for microbes.

[Owlie]

It's hard trying to come up with ways to get rid of food scraps if you don't have a garden! Back home, we'd compost some veggie scraps (broccoli stalks, the inedible things that got shoved to the back of the fridge...), but here, not really an option. I live in a small apartment in a community that hasn't figured out how to recycle cans and paper.

I've taken to pickling or cooking stuff like broccoli stalks, the weird leftover mini bell peppers, and radish leaves (also saves some money, since there's an extra veggie now!), but excess herbs end up in the back of the fridge to get pitched later. Same with coffee grounds and tea leaves. My grandmother, when she had roses, used to put her used leaves in the beds.