A topic dear to my heart! We have a large fridge and a humongous chest freezer, and for us that actually helps us cut food waste. Especially after our son left home and there are only two of us. We used to make dinner for three people, of which one was a ravenous teenager who would just top up with junk food if he was still hungry later, so we'd always slightly overestimate how much food we needed to cook, to be sure. Now we either cook for just two, which is easier to calculate, or if I'm making for instance a stew or a stir-fry, I'll just pick out one more portion of elk meat from the freezer, chop up all the vegetables in the fridge and make a huge amount. Neither of us really likes to cook much, so having ready-made dinners in the freezer is a godsend.
Almost everything can be eaten safely well after the expiry date, I don't really read dates any more. I've eaten yoghurt that was two months over, unopened, though. Cheese just improves, but I cut off any visible mold. We rarely keep fresh meat or fish in the fridge, but I've read that entire pieces of meat keep very well, and that any discolouration can also be cut away before deciding if it's edible. The only things I'm careful with are processed meats, like sausages or mincemeat, especially sandwich spreads that go in and out of the fridge many times. If I'm uncertain or think I can imagine an iffy smell, I toss it. And I'm fussy about bread, at most I'll eat day-old bread. But we make our own, so I feel that the "resources lost" are pretty local!
The people I know who seem to throw away the most food seem to be people who are avid cooks, who want to try new recipes with odd ingredients, and end up with odd leftovers, and people who want to save tim e or money by stocking up without considering that for instance root vegetables and salad vegetables have very different shelf lives. It's easier to not waste food if you're a bit boring foodwise ;-)
Winter riding is much less about badassery and much more about bundle-uppery. - malkin
1995 Kona Cinder Cone commuterFrankenbike/Selle Italia SLR Lady Gel Flow
2008 white Nakamura Summit Custom mtb/Terry Falcon X
2000 Schwinn Fastback Comp road bike/Specialized Jett