Decreasing Food Waste

Here are some ways that we decrease food waste at our home.

1) I only fix amounts of food that I know we will eat at one setting unless it is something that I know someone will eat as leftovers.
2) I only buy fresh fruit, veggies, milk and other products that spoil quickly in small quantities or amounts I know we will use before they expire or spoil.
3) Cheeses that will be used for cooking is frozen until I use them.
4) Leftovers are remade or added into other things. I will make meals based on remaking leftovers.
5) Fruits or vegetables that are getting wilted but not moldy will be added to other things. Veggies into quiche, spaghetti, casserole, etc. Fruits into crisps or quick breads.
6) Scraps and leftover foods go to either rabbits, chickens or compost. There is very little we have to throw away that they do not eat.
7) When we go to restaurants, we bring home the leftovers (which we will eat later) as well as potato skins, etc which are then fed to the chickens. I also will bring home such scraps from church functions.

We have a long way to go but have really started to make some headway in decreasing our food waste.

Food Waste

One thing that I have been working on here at home is decreasing our food waste. This does not only include food thrown away that is not eaten or composted but overeating food our body does not need. I was reminded the importance of this by some statistics that I read in WorldArk Magazine put out by Heifer International. Here are some of the statistics they shared about food wasted here and in other developed countries.

1) In the United States, an estimated 40% of food gets thrown away.
2) The United States per capita food waste has increased 50% since 1974.
3) Worldwide, roughly a third of all food produced is never eaten.
4) All together, industrialized countries toss 222 million tons of food each year. That's enough to feed 925 million people.

Food waste is a sad reality. I will try to share some strategies we use to decrease our food waste here. We are doing better but have a long way to go.