Can we have a chat about what food/s you most frequently throw out from your fridge and how they could actually be used up?

[Mintyy]

I'll start:

Creme fraiche - I buy this to go in a chicken paprika casserole thing I do, but then can't think of another way to use the other half pot within a week.

Sweetcorn - the dc like tuna sweetcorn (ick!!) in wraps and sandwiches but again I only need half a tin. So the other half festers in the back of the fridge until it grows blue mould someone realises and chucks it.

Coleslaw - never eat the whole tub

Olives - ditto

Grapes - similar

Apples - quite often the apples end up going wrinkly

Potatoes - omg, I have thrown away so many potatoes and now we have full blown potato plants growing out of our compost bin

You can bung a tired lemon whole into a chicken before you roast it. Makes it ever so slightly lemony and tricks you into thinking you've thriftily and virtuously made good use of a lemon that would otherwise have just been thrown away, rather than being shoved in a chicken then thrown away.

Spinach I use half the bag for salad at one meal and cook the other half for another meal a day or two later. Saves buying spinach and salad

Lemons for cleaning as well.

And stinky microwaves.

Bung some lemon in a bowl of water and zap for 10mins. Any gunk on the inside of the microwave will just wipe off. Brilliant for when the house stinks of fish too.

Have given up using white or red cabbage to make a coleslaw, I use grated parsnip, with carrot and apple to make a slaw. Only DH and I eat it anyway and white cabbage appears to be endless.

Soup - lots of vegetable soup using what's in the veg drawer!

Supermarket basil - buy the growing pot and re-pot the little plants. More basil for your buck.

Spinach gets shoved into mince dishes or casseroles. Or chopped up in an omelette. Or in the food processor with chick peas/cumin/flour/coriander etc to make falafel.

Frozen chopped spinach - it's the future (convert). Only it doesn't work if you want a)the whole leaf b) salad. Otherwise it's fab!

Yeah, cabbage. Oh I do love cabbage, but unfortunately I am the only one in the house who does (dh will eat it but he doesn't love it like me). And I prefer dark green cabbage (like savoy) so its difficult. Who would want to be around me if I'd eaten a whole cabbage within the preceding few days?

I love cabbage and Brussels but the wind stomach ache it gives me is dreadful!

All cabbage, sweetheart, white, savoy, I just love cabbage.
With mash and sausages and bacon and gravy.

Tired/bland tomatoes can be drizzle with honey and balsamic vinegar and roasted for 30 minutes.

I had never though about freezing leftover sweet corn, what a good idea.

Crème fraiche gets used up here even if out of date & opened, whatever.

I make "Lentil soup with assorted veg & random fruits" at the weekend using anything that's looking a bit sorry for itself in the fridge. Last time it included 2 big tomatoes, 3 sticks of celery, some leftover cabbage, 1 small carrot, a dozen grapes & an apple, all cut up then added to a chopped fried onion, some red lentils, veg stock cube & enough milk & water to make the stock. Oh yes, & some leftover tomato salsa in a jar. Simmered then whizzed & pushed through a sieve. Delicious.

For the cabbage-lovers (like me) whose family tolerate cabbage but don't love it, try cooking it like this:

Shred it up & add to a pan with a knob of butter & a small amount of water, lid on & simmer till tender, stirring occasionally, takes about 15 minutes, then lid off to allow water to evaporate, small amount nutmeg or cumin or curry powder (if you like - not compulsory) plus salt & black pepper, plus, if you have it, a small glug of creme or créme fraiche stirred in then serve.

Even the cabbage-toleraters are converted

oops - I meant cream or creme fraiche

wrinkled tomatoes

Same here with humus and yogurts and wish they had longer expiry dates.

I never throw food out unless its gone off. I mean. Completely off, like mouldy, rotten, otherwise unconsumable

We have got a lot better in recent years, but the things we end up throwing away regularly are green peppers, half bags of rocket, packets of opened herbs and bread.

Left over savoy cabbage goes in minestrone soup. Wrinkly tomatoes become tomato sauce.

There is no hope for bagged salads and rocket leaves or bagged herbs. The only solution is to stop buying them. For £1 in Waitrose you can buy living salad which is salad leaves planted in a tiny bit of soil and you are supposed to keep them on the window sill but if you plant them in the garden they will last longer. I have tried growing salad leaves from seed but with the exception of pea shoots (which were supposed to be pea plants ) they had varying degrees of success against the slugs. Herb pots bought in the supermarket and chucked in the garden do very well here.

I don't buy fresh spinach any more either. I can't be bothered with the washing and sorting through it. If I had a freezer I would buy the frozen stuff for cooking.

Salads, bread, leftovers, that's it really, not much, but often. Don't think we could do any better...

HAs anyone mentioned those Lakeland potato/onion/mushroom bags yet? I throw away much less since we got those.

Teaching DH not to beat up the salad before putting it in the fridge helps.

Have never known creme fraiche to go off no matter how long I leave it!

Fruit goes in the toddlers, they're remarkably unfussy about squishy bits (fussy about everything else!).

Frozen sweetcorn and peas, then you can just use what you need.

Manky carrots and apples go in the dog!

Philidelphia is the thing that goes off in this house, I find it's more economical to buy the horrifically expensive mini tubs that the large ones and throw them away half used.

You can also buy the mini tubs of houmous although i just use the sniff test

Apples - stewed with a blob of vanilla ice cream

Bread - freeze and bring out as necessary

Carrots - shepherds pie/DC lunch boxes/grated in tacos/salads/Bolognese sauce

Lemons - waldorf salad sauce

As well as freezing lemon and lime wedges for G&Ts and stuffing a lemon up a chicken's bum, I put half of one in the cutlery tray of the dishwasher to combat smells.

This is a GREAT thread and one we don't want to lose, so we'll be moving it into food/recipes in a mo. Keep them coming!

Re bagged salad, you can just buy a normal whole salad (as fresh as possible), take it apart, wash it, then put the leaves in a ziplock bag, we do this and it lasts much longer and is far cheaper than the supermarket bagged stuff.