To not understand people that dont eat leftovers?

[Eliza9917]

I've seen a lot of people say this, and wondered why? What could eating leftovers possibly do to you? Is it a fear of poverty in some way?

My sister knew a girl that would roast a chicken for Sunday dinner and only eat the breasts and throw the rest away. To me, that's madness, I'd get at least 2-3 dinners and a soup out of a large chicken.

People care because rich western nations over consume the planet's resources.

Not using leftovers is just a great 'fuck you' to every other human being on the planet.

Why should I? It makes absolutely no difference to anyone else whether I eat it or throw it away.

Mumsnet never fails to horrify me. So many people throwing food away, boil washing laundry that has even been looked at, never mind is actually dirty, it's unbelievable.

I have had it drummed into my head since childhood not to waste food. Now I have passed this on to my kids and I hate them wasting food as there is so much poverty in the world, it really does feel so wrong to be wasteful.

I tend to freeze food if I think it will sit in the fridge and get eaten in the next day or so.

• not get eaten in the next day or so

"People care because rich western nations over consume the planet's resources."

Biggest problem in many western countries is that we eat too much. One thing I've resolved to do is not worry about waste in restaurants. If I'm full, I stop eating. The 'finish your plate' mantra has done a lot of harm.
Obviously, if there's a lot left I might try asking for a doggy bag.

Not using leftovers is just a great 'fuck you' to every other human being on the planet.

Ideally, pricing would send signals (although using pricing to send signals has the problem that it allows rich people to ignore them - see congestion charging and minimum alcohol pricing).

Unfortunately, the rise of BOGOF, "family" packs and the like means that often the signals are very confusing. Buying a larger pack and throwing away part of it can often make financial sense. Perverse incentives like that are unfortunate, to put it mildly.

It makes absolutely no difference to anyone else whether I eat it or throw it away.

That depends - if you buy additional food because you do not eat all of the food that you have purchased already, but instead throw it away, then it makes a lot of difference because all of the resources put into the food that you have thrown away are wasted.

If you buy and eat nothing 'extra' to replace the leftovers (so, for example, if instead of putting leftover chicken into a curry, you instead prepare and eat exactly the same curry ingredients in the same quantity but miss out the chicken, or instead of eating ham salad sandwiches you eat just the salad and bread) , then apart from the relatively inefficient ways in which we recycle / compost waste food vs the human digestive system, then it doesn't have an impact, I suppose. Iowever i suggest that that procedure is rare.

boil washing laundry

I wash pretty much everything at 30 degrees, 40 for sheets and towels.

Since it's not 1952, and we have effective detergents rather than soap flakes, why on earth do people need high temperature washes? What are they worried about?

What are they worried about?

Poo crumbs

@mabelstanley What I don't get is why people care if others eat leftovers? It's not like it's any less wasteful eating food that you don't want! It's not like I can send it over to someone who wants it, and if I paid for it surely I can do whatever the fuck I want with it

It's not about eating food you don't want, it's about eating another meal using the same food/ingredients.

And you can send food to others, check out the olio app.

When people are starving, not even elsewhere in the world but here in this country, it's disgraceful to be so wasteful. I'm sure there are people who have to reuse scraps off plates to make other meals and I'm pretty sure there are plenty of people for who their only meal is the scraps off their kids plates.

Grow the fuck up.

I'm with you Eliza.

My favourite Monday dinner is shepherds or cottage pie made with the meat left over from a Sunday Roast. If we have chicken I make curry.
I store the left overs in lidded plastic boxes in the fridge, it really isn't difficult.

Ideally, pricing would send signals (although using pricing to send signals has the problem that it allows rich people to ignore them - see congestion charging and minimum alcohol pricing).

Unfortunately, the rise of BOGOF, "family" packs and the like means that often the signals are very confusing. Buying a larger pack and throwing away part of it can often make financial sense. Perverse incentives like that are unfortunate, to put it mildly.

If the pricing of chicken, for example, accurately reflected the cost of repairing the damage resulting from the entire process, then people wouldn't waste chicken.

The earth has been subsidising the cost of our food, and the subsidy is about to run out.

And you can send food to others, check out the olio app

thanks Eliza, I had no idea. What a brilliant idea.

I do think that one thing which makes it harder to use up leftovers appetisingly is buying more food as 'ready made up dishes'.

So if you buy and cook a chicken, or mince, or a piece of fish, then the fully or partially cooked item - so for example mince cooked with onions but not yet in a sauce - can be easily used as an ingredient in a variety of meals. However, if what is bought is chicken curry, or a lasagne, or a chicken pie, then using the leftovers in an interesting way (rather than as the same dish reheated) is much harder - in the same way as avoiding restaurant waste from over-large portions is much harder than avoiding domestic food waste.

We have a roast chicken at the weekend. We use the breast meat to feed the two of us and throw out the rest. We don't need to stretch the cost of the chicken over multiple meals so why would we? When I was a student, I made a chicken last multiple meals but it's more hassle than I can be bothered with now. And no, we're not rich so this isn't some stealth boast.

We don't need to stretch the cost of the chicken over multiple meals so why would we?

For the same reason you don’t (presumably) throw out all of your dishes every time you’ve used them or clothes every time you’ve worn them.

Such a waste should be a criminal act.

The worst of it is that some people seem to be actively taking pride in their wastefulness.

In what other circumstances would people literally throw money in the bin?

We have food waste collected every week by the council. There's not much gets thrown out in this house and it's mostly potato peelings, onion skins and that sort of thing which couldn't be eaten anyway. Or scrapings from plates.

We are not hard up, not saving leftovers because we're down to our last 20p. But I like others was brought up to be respectful of food and not to treat it as disposable.

wrenika that is a shocking attitude. We are wealthy and i would never countenance that level of waste.

We finish a whole chicken, almost between 4. I then strip the carcass and boil the carcass for stock. I cook pasta in that stock, the remaining stock goes into the sauce. Add veg and you have a very nutritious cheesy chicken pasta bake.

Wrenika,

The thing is, you have wasted:

• The energy used to keep that chicken warm while it was reared, cold after it was killed, and to transport it to the shop.
• The energy used to cook it.
• The grain used to feed it, and therefore the land, water and fertiliser used to grow that grain
• The carbon dioxide that would have been fixed by the trees that would have grown on that ground had it not been cleared to grown grain

And you have also caused the pollution engendered by that waste meat now having to be disposed of (the human digestive system - and the use and recovery of waste from sewage plants - is MUCH more efficient than current food recycling, though the latter is improving in many areas)

wrenika because it is disgusting waste of food. Why not just buy chicken breasts?
I love having chicken on a Sunday. I then make a chicken and veg curry or stir fry on Tuesday and chicken pasta or pizza on Wednesday.
I really think it’s shameful to throw away most of a chicken.

We have a roast chicken at the weekend. We use the breast meat to feed the two of us and throw out the rest. We don't need to stretch the cost of the chicken over multiple meals so why would we? When I was a student, I made a chicken last multiple meals but it's more hassle than I can be bothered with now. And no, we're not rich so this isn't some stealth boast.

Shocking. Absolutely shocking.

Why would you throw out a perfectly good chicken? Do you have no sense whatsoever?

@Wrenika We don't need to make a chicken stretch but we do as it's wasteful otherwise, and why would we throw good food away?