to be shocked that 70% of food waste is from our homes? Do people not eat leftovers?

[MLMshouldbeillegal]

ahdb.org.uk/news/consumer-insight-positive-movements-in-uk-food-waste-reduction-reverse-as-covid-19-restrictions-are-removed

71% of food waste - 4.5 MILLION TONNES - annually is from our homes. Retailer and restaurants get stick in the press for throwing things away but really, they're not the problem, are they? Only 4% of food waste is produced by reailers.

It's us who are being wasteful. Throwing away 4.5 million tonnes of food each year is obscene. Do people not eat leftovers? Freeze what they're not using and keep it another day?

@HollyandIvyandAllThingsYule

I was told it was a build up of sulphur gas as it goes off. But thank you for clarifying. I won't use floaty eggs for baking or poaching but will open them to check for omelettes!

I found that cooking meals from scratch and eating mainly fruit as a snack, my food waste caddy fills up quicker than if we ate all ready meals because there are peels and inedible things like cores and pips. I put in all in home compost so no harm done, but I wonder what level of waste is acceptable per person. Avoidable waste is the thing.

Minestrone is a great soup, I mainly use frozen veg for it, as I tend to use the rest ones for 'nicer' meals!
Tinned toms, Tom puree, garlic, mixed herbs, frozen veg, bacon from a pack of cooking bacon, a tin of beans, or lentils and some value snapped spaghetti, a bit of grated cheese, or cheese on toast with it.

I do similar with value noodles, garlic, ginger, mixed frozen veg, cooking bacon again, soya sauce and a fried egg on top.

The jars of garlic/ginger etc works out cheaper and keep for ages.

Left overs! What are they? Don't other people have teenage sons with hollow legs?

This week I've thrown out half a tub of creme fraiche and two tangerines that had gone soft. Last week it was some celery gone brown.

Otherwise, everything in our house gets eaten. Most things will go between two slices of bread or in a pie.

Teenagers are a great help but need some direction to get beyond the bread bin and cereal shelf😂we certainly never have bread going stale or milk going sour.

Left overs! What are they? Don't other people have teenage sons with hollow legs?

Oh yes and what the boys don't finish the DH does (he's like a bloody bin).

We very rarely have any left overs and if we do it gets frozen or goes out for the birds/foxes.

I often throw away manky stuff. Eg strawberries that you get home, open the next day (having refrigerated) and find them mouldy. Hello Fresh seem to like to deliver mushy/bad/severely bashed veg so I often throw that and replace it. I’ve just thrown 2 avocados out that they delivered on Thursday. Last night I made curry and rice. One child left rice, have to throw that as shouldn’t keep rice as leftovers. All of it goes in council food waste bucket. Plus I throw away food when I have had unexpected problems disrupting stuff and I haven’t had a chance to cook it before it goes off. I think this is all pretty normal stuff, not that I want to chuck food out.

@Fizbosshoes

I'm amazed at how precious some people are about use by dates. Several work colleagues wouldn't consider eating stuff even a day past its use by date. Weve had yoghurt over a month past their sell by and they were fine. (Although DH is slightly the opposite of this and insists everything is safe to eat if it has not reached its sell by even if its opened and smells/looks off!) DS absolutely loves leftovers. He rarely has a freshly made lunch when he's at home because he'd much rather have leftover curry/spag bol etc. In fact he often tries to "reserve" any food we start putting in containers in the fridge, after a meal.

I used to be very lax with use by dates but I seem to have become much less iron-stomached in the last couple of years. DH found me passed out on the bathroom floor one evening last week - I'd eaten some English muffins that I knew were fairly old but looked and smelled OK. I get really bad stomach cramps every few weeks. It's all made me much more careful what I eat and how old it is. Kinda sucks.

I am very confused by all these comments that frozen bread tastes horrible

I bought a breadmaker this year , the loaves get scoffed in a day , even my (fussy like git) DS will rustle up toasted cheese .

I used to say to my DH "Oh its a shame to waste veg we should get some guinea-pigs" ( I used to keep them as a child .}
DD and I had piggies - they turn their little snouts up at anything sub-standard , a good chunk of my shopping was Guinea-Veg and DH eating their leftover celery once the leaves hadbeen eaten .

How do they work out how much food is wasted that could have been eaten? Do they include things that some people eat and some don't eat like broccoli stalks, the inner cauliflower leaves, apple and carrot peel? We eat all of those but I know some people don't. Just interested how it is defined.

We produce about a bag a week of food waste but it's banana, pineapple, avocado skins, egg shells and so on.

All these people eating all the scraps off their kids plates - what size are you? Because if I regularly ate all my kids leftover sandwich crusts, pizza crusts, half a fish finger etc as well as my own meals I’d be fat. I’m not willing to not have my own balanced portion of a meal just so I have enough calories spare to eat their crust or cold and poked at bit of cheesy pasta or chilli I’ve already reheated once so can’t reheat again. Some food just doesn’t reheat or keep well - oven chips for example. Some I’ve already kept and reheated once. I don’t extravagantly waste food and I’m horrified by the idea of just sweeping the entire contents of the fridge into the bin, but some of this is ridiculous.

And no, sometimes I can’t cook what I know they’ll eat - one in particular is underweight and very very fussy. They vary enormously day to day in what they’ll eat. My priority is keeping them sufficiently fed to stay well, not making sure that I don’t waste half a potato. (And no, I’m not pandering, they have autism and sensory issues.)

Is that amount all actual edible food waste? Or does the figure include things like apple cores, vegetable peelings and bones?
It is an awful lot.

@Dutchesss

Is that amount all actual edible food waste? Or does the figure include things like apple cores, vegetable peelings and bones? It is an awful lot.

Apparently it is defined as food which could have been eaten.

So no, not peelings and bones or egg shells.

Our Friday night supper is always created around whatever needs using up before I get our food shop the next day.

So you know that fresh food delivered will only last a couple of days but insist on ordering more than you can consume in that time period and throwing the rest away?

This sort of willful stupidity explains so much about why we have no hope of averting the climate crisis.

Or, when it's clear that people who shop online are doing a weekly shop, the supermarket could deliver food that isn't just about to go out of date. Many people cannot go to a shop themselves for various reasons. Almost all supermarkets state they'll deliver the product with the longest useby date available on the shelf but they do not do this. That's not the customer's fault.

@AutumnAlmanack

On a side note, has anyone found that the strawberries this year have been going mouldy incredibly quickly, whether or not kept in the fridge? Twice this week I have bought some (English) strawberries to use the next day, and by the time I get them out to use, nearly all have fluff and mould.

Yep. Raspberries too.

@BraveGoldie

Honestly, I find this a real challenge. I know I waste a lot and want to get better for the sake of my finances and the environment.

Why does it happen? I am naturally disorganised, I lose track of what I have in the fridge, and tend to grab things in the shop without thinking through what I will use when. I am rushed, and grab the easiest thing or the thing I am in the mood for in the shops or from the fridge, and don't notice that that means something else is going off. I am also an unhealthy, compulsive eater despite my best efforts.... so I often buy healthy, fresh stuff which ends up being passed over for less healthy stuff that won't go off as quickly... or I'm bloody tired after a full days work and give in to a microwave meal or takeaway which again means that food that would take longer to prepare ends up going off. I also find my family is an awkward size.... so the tiny portions of fresh stuff don't go far enough, but the bigger size up (Eg bags of spinach) don't get used up fully. I also have a DD who is a fussy eater so perfectly good leftover-based meals get passed over for something to her taste.... and/or she leaves lots on her plate, which gets thrown out.

I know it's not good but it is basically a reflection of my overall disordered life and eating.

Condemning it as 'obscene' etc is a bit over the top and stigmatising. We all have our challenges, and it's something I am trying to get better at.

^this

I keep trying to get on top of it but it just doesn't last. My job varies a lot in terms of how busy it is, when I have meetings, etc and it's often unpredictable. I find it's hard to meal plan because of that.
I'm so busy juggling so many things that often I end up switching to takeaway or a ready meal because I just don't have the energy to cook as well.
I've tried buying more ready meals but it makes little difference. I also find pack sizes a struggle and end up choosing based on cost, which is often a larger size.

Yes I've have found that any type of berry fruit is going mouldy quickly despite being in the fridge. Strawberries in particular.

@DottyHarmer

I read that bread and potatoes are the worst culprits (in terms of food waste, not the bread and potatoes throwing things out!).

I think for a lot of small/single person households, it is “easy” to waste stuff because you use a few slices of bread only, or half the potatoes. Ok, you can make breadcrumbs and freeze them, but then that’s an awful lot of breadcrumbs building up. Dsis has a frozen loaf and extracts one slice of bread every morning. That is very eco but at the same time a bit depressing long term.

I'm single and still manage to make 25kg sacks of potatoes survive long enough to be eaten with only a handful going rotten. If you store them properly they last ages.

I occasionally lose the odd slice of bread or the last inch of milk but otherwise waste very little.

I’m sure there is lots of waste that could be avoided but I’m not very trusting about how it’s all calculated - peelings, bones and used teabags for instance, they go into the compost collection - it is just weighed and then we know the food waste ? In that case, If you cook a lot from scratch your waste quota will be higher because a factory making ready meals didn’t throw it away for you.
On those odd occasions that something gets past us and has to go in the bin I feel a stinging sense of failure - but it’s rare. Like many we consider the dates on food more of an advisory to sniff before eating !
I remember watching a BBC documentary on waste a few years ago and saw a shot of some supposedly unnecessary food waste where a fair amount was peelings etc
I’ve scrubbed veg without peeling as much as the next guy - but it’s very conditional on the state of the veg.
I’ll happily be shocked if I can understand this percentage to be legit and not bumped up by a well meaning team with an agenda.

@cushioncovers

Thanks for your helpful comment nosy.

My point was that the supermarkets purposely send shorter life stuff when they and we the customer know that there is longer shelf life produce tucked behind it. People who do weekly online shops want food for the week not for two days. Many people do not have the time or money for fuel to keep popping to the shops every 3 days. That in itself is not environmentally friendly. My nearest big supermarket is 10 miles away.

Do you not realise how stock rotation works? They can't just reach to the back of the shelves for the newest stock just for you, they use the oldest first. Like we all do.

I reach to the back when I’m shopping for myself.

@HesterShaw1

I've always had a compost heap. If people realised how easy it is and how they don't attract rats, more people would I'm sure.

My compost heap attracted enormous rats, so I don't put food waste in it any more.

If you store them properly they last ages.
Our potatoes sprout within days. I'd love to know how to stop that. I keep them in the dark.

I did say no cooked food/food waste.

Potato and carrot peelings, onion skin, apple cores, banana skins etc.