To not see the need for food waste bins?

[Notinmylifethyme]

I mean the plastic bins councils supply where excess cooked food is dumped.

I live on a budget. I cook. Veg scraps go in a composter (I have a garden so obviously referring to my situation). I sometimes batch cook. I rework leftovers. I use my freezer. Basically, it doesn't really matter how much I cook, we only put on our plates what we are going to eat.

Am I so unusual? My council are about to spend a couple of million on food waste bins. I'm quite shocked by it.

The average person throws away 70kg of food a year.

But that aside, we soon fill our food bin with things like melon cores, fruit and vegetable scraps. I cook exact amounts so there aren't leftovers but we still put out a bag (about half the bin) full a week just from the aforementioned.

Internet poster scratches their head about why anyone would need something, just because she doesn't use it.

Isn't the answer obviously that not everyone is like you?

I would say the majority of people don't have composters and it's hard to avoid leftovers when you have picky kids, who leave things. Or sometimes leftovers just go off in the fridge before you can eat them.

Where would you put chicken bones?

What About banana skins, orange peel, tea bags, watermelon rind, the cob from corn on the cob, onion/ garlic/ potato/ carrots skins etc. So much that can go in a food recycling bag and lots of people don’t have a garden! Given the council isnt rolling this out just for you, no, I don’t think they are being unreasonable

Not everyone has a composter. Most of my food bin waster is fruit/veg debris (can't think of right word) or chicken carcasses.

My big bin doesn't smell anymore. No maggots. We've had them for ten years. Haven't had to replace yet.

You can't put raw or cooked meat into your compost.

We've moved from a LA where all food waste was recycled to one where none is collected. I'd much rather have a good waste collection, I hate throwing things like tea bags in the rubbish bin

I've never had a food waste bin until we moved house but I think it's a great idea.

I don't have a compost bin & we couldn't put cooked food in that anyway?

Plate scraps, chicken bones, the bit of wet salad left in the box, last week's leftover rice and so on. It really works for us and stops the general waste bin getting smelly if only dry things go in.

We do have food waste sometimes from things we haven't used. I think that's normal tbh.

I have a council "food waste" bin but very little that goes in it is actually food waste, it's veg peelings and apple cores and fish skin etc. I don't have a garden so can't compost and even those who do have a gardens, many people don't compost so it would go in the bin. And not everything is suitable for garden compost anyway (or at least not according to my mother who regularly tells me off for putting the wrong things in theirs!)

She obviously makes a delicious banana skin and orange peel soup. Eaten with the cob which has been carved into spoons. Teabags are great for cleaning both yourself and your house. How does everyone not know this already!!

As a vegetarian I don't use one.

Any vegetable/fruit peels and left over tea leaves go into my garden 'Dalek' compost bin.

i have garden compost but can't put meat / cooked food in because it would attract rats. the council food bins are very useful to stop the general bin smelling, as well as making people more aware of what they throw out.

I don't really understand your question / point. You even say you're only talking about your own situation, which is different to lots of people.

Everyone has food waste, even if they genuinely eat everything they buy - peelings, onion skins, egg shells, tea bags and coffee grounds, banana skins, apple cores, peach stones. That's just off the top of my head, there's loads more.

The aim is for that not to go to landfill, so it needs to be seperated out. People live in flats with no garden, or don't do 'gardening' that needs a supply of compost, or are worried about rats being attracted to food scraps in a composer. There's 101 reasons for people to want or need their food waste to be collected kerbside.

Sweetcorn on the cob.
pineapples
banana skins

We are a family of 5. don’t have a compost bin (small garden). We don’t chuck out good food but these are the kind of things that seem to fill up our bin.

can you really not imagine that some people live differently to you!!!

70kg of food waste a year is quite appalling. As I said, I'm on a budget, that would throw my finances.

Fruit waste goes in the composter. I'm a mn chicken lady, I get lots of meals out one, boil the bones, they they go dry into the bin. I could grind them for plant feed, but have yet to do that!

I'm just shocked that a council so recently announced as bankrupt would not spend their / our money better.

It’s surprising what goes into the food bin that isn’t actually food. I’m talking about teabags, eggshells, fruit and veg peelings, fish and chicken skin. There’s only the two of us but the scraps soon mount up. You’re not cheating your council if you choose not to use your bin but compost instead.

Not everyone has a garden though.

How can anyone not know that people throw away food?

Do you live off grid expect for access to Mumsnet yet never come across a thread entitled "It's 00.10, will if die if I eat a slice of bread that was best before yesterday"

We don't have a food waste collection but I wish we did as only so much and not everything can go into compost in the garden.

So you do create food waste (in the technical terms of what is supposed to go in the caddy), you’re just not putting it where it is supposed to go. I love that our black bin has no food waste in it. Much cleaner.

22% of the English live in flats, a compost bin is of little use to them.

I'm just shocked that a council so recently announced as bankrupt would not spend their / our money better.

It's far cheaper for a council to have food waste bins, make compost, and sell the compost or use it on their parks etc. than it is for them to dispose of that waste through the general waste stream. Landfill, quite rightly, costs.

boil the bones, they they go dry into the bin

Well now you can put them in your food waste bin,

Ta da! You have a use for it!