Avoiding food waste is something most of us are going to have on take on board. Food has been very cheap for a long time and now very quickly all that is changing. I am lucky enough to be able to remember some of my Mothers thrifty ways but I still need reminding every now and then. A timely reminder came with the organic fruit and veg box delivery last week. I love receiving my deliveries from Abel and Cole, not just for the food but also the wonderful newsletter which always has a couple of yummy recipes on it. This time Rachel de Thample has written a brilliant piece called "The Food Waste Manifesto" something to pin on the fridge and I hope she doesn't mind me putting the gist of it on here.
1) Identify items you are always left with at the end of the week and either add them to your dislike list or use them as soon as they are delivered.
2) Keep a list of things to be used up such as leftovers, jars of preserves that have been hanging around, stick this on your fridge as a constant reminder.
3) Choose some items to freeze each week for a supply to fall back on.
4) Make a soup of the week or a salad of the day to get your 5 a day.
5) Add pureed veggies to everything: pancakes, pasta, into a pate, simmered with stock for a soup, On Monday I cooked and pureed aubergines, courgettes, runner beans, tomatoes and peppers in a jar of passata with herbs and a good slug of red wine, we had this with some pasta and it was lovely and have 2 more containers of this still to use, the photo above shows the result of this in the slow cooker.
6) Make stock every week; the author has a paper bag in her fridge which she fills with veggie off cuts - bits of carrots, leek trimmings and the night before the next box is delivered makes a stock by pouring water over and simmering for half an hour.
7) Have a pasta or rice dish every week. Easy to sneak fading veg into these dishes. We tend to eat rice and pasta a fair bit.
8) Have a financial fast day or as we call them no spend days, where you don't buy any food (no top ups) Try the Ready Steady Cook approach.
9) Have a freezer day - taking out food already stored.
10) Have a tapas night. Making lots of little dishes is a great fridge clearer. Another idea from the Tightwad Gazette I think is to have a "party tray" night using up all the little bits as treats rather than boring leftovers.
4 comments:
I'm fairly fanatical about using up food - I absolutely *loathe* waste. It makes for some interesting meals sometimes, and some great ones at others, but I can rarely recreate them!
I actually really enjoy it - we call it Reactive Cooking, and I blog about it at here.
It's a fun way to cook isn't it? I have saved your blog to my bloglist, some really lovely recipe ideas there, I must go register so that I can leave comments.
GREAT POST!
The bag in the fridge for collecting veggie bits in is a really good idea. Must start one of my own. Thanks for the tip, Catz :)
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