Food Waste

[Healing Hands]

I was listening to the news yesterday and I was amazed at how much food it thrown away, almost 10 million pounds, £450 per household.

I must say I really do try not to throw any food out and I am good at shopping and only buy what I need, but sometimes it cannot be helped. How many of you throw out food that has gone passed the sell-by-date or thrown away yoghurt pots that have not been eaten?

[franbee]

We throw NO food away so someone else must have our £450 sworth. Well, maybe the odd rotten grape but we plan our meals round what we have , so eat it all up.
I did hear that they included trimmings and peelings in the count, and we do throw those, onto the compost.

[Pippa]

I compost lettuce or toms that have gone off before I can eat them, obviously peelings, banana skins, fruit peel all go on the heap also. Even when we were a family at home, we rarely had waste food, I don't think many people plan meals in advance now.

[Oola]

Rich and I used to be terrible, me especially with yoghurts and left over passata. But he's very strict whenever he buys meat or fish. He'll only buy it the day he intends to use it, so that he's sure that nothing goes to waste.

My grandmother has the typical WWII 'waste nothing' attitude, as a consequence there's ongoing jokes about her furry oranges, cupboards brimming with dried pulses, rice etc. and cupboards full of jam! We cleared out her larder not long ago and found tins from 1993 in there...

[franbee]

You didn't throw them away, did you Oola? I think this must be a young person's thing, you know, being indoctrinated about sell by dates. In the old days, before sell by dates, if food looked right, smelled right and tasted right, you ate it. Yes, I know it's to do with bugs, but I don't think my family have ever had food poisoning from my house.

My MIL never throws away the old bottles when she opens new, so in her cupboard there are usually 3 or 4 of each ketchup, mustard etc with a drop in the bottom. OH jokes about the saucers in her fridge with 3 peas or beans on.

[Rustic Pumpkin]

Food wastage is one thing I cannot tolerate. When I see people throw out food unnecessarliy I can lose the plot. Millions starving world wide and we throw out stuff that would still be good in a week's time just because some idiot says it has to have a sell by date!

[Crocus]

My mum could not stand food or water wastage, or any wastage for that matter. It of course rubbed off on me and sis. We live in a dry country so when I see any wastage or water I get furious. Food I try as far as possible not to waste any.

[TIGGYWINKLE]

I never waste anything, but I think young people are very wasteful, and paranoid about "sell by" dates. I ignore them, and I have never had food poisoning. One of my daughters threw out the nutmeg she borrowed, because it was out of date, so I put a label on all my spices "renewed sell by date 2020" I called to a friend on Sat, and she was eating half a banana, her grand daughter has thrown into the garbage. I fished mandarins my daughter and her husband put in their waste bin before they went on Hols on Boxing Day. When they returned, I served Caramelized Oranges with Cointreau for dessert for their welcome Home Dinner. She loves this dessert, so you can imagine her face when I said "Its amazing what you can do with garbage" We all had a good laugh.