Food waste on 'staggering' scale

[Geoff]

I must admit a lot of this is foreign to the way we live. We supermarket shop every 4 or 5 weeks and top up on Saturdays with fruit from a stall, if we haven't got our own, and eggs and meat from a local butcher. My wife cooks everything from first principles so we only buy long life commodities to make bread, pastry, cakes, pasta etc., fruit juices, longlife milk, some tinned goods, rarely anything where a use by date has much meaning. Left overs get reprocessed some how or other, we often have soup for lunch particularly in the winter, dog gets the bones, compost heap veg trimmings and birds the crumbs - very little to landfill. The Guardian article all seems so obvious, pity it has to be taught these days. I confess the large veg, soft fruit and orchard garden backed up by two 14 cubic foot freezers does make us a bit odd.
We love our dog but how much of the world could be better fed if the comparatively well off didn't keep pets?

[kwa50]

to do our bit and have say a week/month of really being careful re what we throw out/buy etc.

I think I will start next week and let you know how I get on.

kwa50
www.craftchallenge.co.uk

[Geoff]

The Guardian article generated some correspondence, not sure if this one is a hoax :
"The 4 million tonnes of food wasted each year does not take into account the additional food wastage from obesity. Each additional kilogram of fat carried is an additional 7,000 calories of wasted food. Given that the UK is the third fattest country in the world, with over 20% clinically obese, this is no small fry."

[Granny]

And a belated thanks to you, Geoff, for providing the links. It was a bit obvious, but I don't think it was aimed at vegetable growers who, if this forum is anything to go by, are past masters at re-using, recycling and making do!
----------------
Granny

[Franksmum]

Supermarkets have a lot to answer for on this one but I also think that people in general don't know how to cook properly, use leftovers usefully and are using the 'short on time' excuse to cover their laziness.

There's way too much prepacked stuff on offer, ready meals etc. Eating out is cheaper and easier than ever, it no longer seems to be a treat but more the norm.

I can buy a free range chicken on saturday and we're eating risotto made with stock from the bones on the following Friday (this is between two of us BTW).
Peelings & cut ends get composted. Making soup & freezing it is a fab way of using up leftover stuff in the fridge & cupboards, I don't understand why people don't do this anymore.

[Chantal]

This should lighten the mood a little

http://www.t-enterprise.co.uk/flashgame ... ordonbrown

The idea is to avoid the rubbish and grab all the good food being dropped by David Cameron