October 25, 2020

5 Ways to Fight Food Waste

It’s estimated that up to 40% of the food produced in the US is wasted. That’s an immense amount of energy and resources gone to waste. We emit carbon dioxide in the production, transportation, and even disposal of food. By fighting food waste, we are reducing carbon emissions and saving money. Here are five ways to fight food waste.

Make a Meal Plan & a List

As a hyper-organized engineer, I love a good plan. A meal plan is a great way to make sure the right foods get used. Before heading to the grocery store or farmer’s market, see what’s in your fridge and pantry.

What needs to be used?

What do you feel like cooking this week?

Doing a quick inventory makes sure there’s not a bunch of soggy kale in the back of the fridge. I have a sample meal plan in this post:

Olivia for the Ocean - Plastic-Free Living

After you’ve made a meal plan, make a grocery list and check it twice. 😛

Buy What You Need (And Will Actually Eat)

While you’re at the grocery store or farmer’s market, stick to your list. This is a bad time to make new diet resolutions. If kale is not on your list, don’t decide all of a sudden that you’re only going to eat kale salads for lunch everyday. You can be inspirational at home when making a plan but at the grocery store, be realistic. Only buy what you think you will eat and in a reasonable amount of time.

Store Food Properly

Now that you’ve purchased your food, make sure you get the most out of it! Here’s a short summary of food storage tips:

Herbs in water like cut flowers
Fruits and vegetables in the crisper but not together!
Potatoes and onions in a cool dark drawer but not together!
Avocadoes on the counter to ripe; in the fridge if already ripe
Bananas on the counter
Tomatoes on the counter
Cheese in airtight silicone bags

Here’s one of the shelves in my fridge:

I love using Weck Jars to store raw chicken. I buy a month’s worth of chicken and freeze what I don’t use that week in these 3/4 L wide-mouth Weck Jars:

I also have a dozen 32 ounce wide mouth mason jars. These are great for berries, grapes, soups, dried goods and basically everything.

One of the best things to happen to my fridge was I put a kitchen towel to line the vegetable drawer. This draws the moisture away from your vegetables and prevents them from getting soggy. It also saves me the hassle of cleaning my vegetable drawer of the soggy scraps that normally accumulate on the bottom.

I put all my leafy vegetables in organic cotton mesh bags. The knit is a little thicker so they absorb the extra moisture that makes your vegetables soggy and gross.

First In, First Out

Now that your food is optimally stored, create a system in your fridge that prevents you from pushing items to the back. You can do this buy putting new items on the right side of your fridge and eating from the left side first. As you eat items, continually push everything towards the left. Whatever your system make sure you eat the older items first.