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Reducing food waste is vital for creating a better future. Each year, millions of pounds of food are wasted, which is abhorrent considering the rampant starvation in parts of the world. No, you won’t save them by eating an ugly vegetable, but you can still help offset environmental damage and pollution by being smarter about your food habits.
While the majority of pollution and destruction on Earth is the fault of corporations, you can still help. Yes, you’re not going to singlehandedly save the world, but does that mean you should continue to pollute it? At the very least, the majority of these tips also help you save money if that’s a bigger motivator. Whether it’s a sense of environmental responsibility or financial needs, here are ten easy ways you can reduce food waste in your life.
Buy Only What You Need
This should go without saying, but the amount of food in people’s garbage cans shows that it still needs to be said. Plan your weekly meals and utilize everything you have before heading back to the store for another grocery trip. You’ll also find yourself getting more creative and comfortable in your kitchen since you have to use different items you never would’ve thought to combine.
We definitely suggest meal prepping if you’re having trouble buying only what you need. Meal prepping is a great way to ensure you utilize all of your groceries to reduce food waste, and it’s an easy way to improve your diet.
Buy Ugly Fruits and Vegetables
You would be amazed and horrified at the amount of produce and food grocery stores throw out daily. Peppers, celery, carrots, meats, dairy, etc., all have to go in the dumpster if they’re not sold by a certain date. This often leads to less visually appealing produce ending up in the garbage to make room for fresher products.
There’s nothing wrong with these products; they just don’t look as appetizing. Buying an awkward-shaped pepper or an oblong orange is an easy way to help reduce food waste. There are even services that will ship you boxes of ugly fruits and vegetables for what they claim is a cheaper price. We suggest cutting them out as a middleman and hitting your local farmer’s market. Make some connections and talk to people, and you’ll be loaded with cheap veggies in no time.
Store Food in a Way That Makes Sense
We all know that feeling when you open your fridge, smell something rancid, and have to dig through everything to find the pepper growing a new form of penicillin in the back of your fridge. The easiest way to avoid that is by routinely keeping older products at the front of your fridge and newer products in the back.
This will make you grab or cook food that’s about to go bad as opposed to making groundbreaking medical discoveries every other week. After going grocery shopping, pull things out and check dates or freshness. Anything that’s going bad in the next few days should be put back last. This will reduce food waste in the end and help save money.
Understand What Expired and Best By Mean
Sell by, best by, and use by; what does it all mean? Understanding these three common expiration labels will help you save money and avoid wasting food. The important thing to remember is that a lot of expiration dates are more like guidelines than hard requirements. Just because your water bottle is set to expire in 2024 doesn’t mean the water will be bad. That’s just a requirement imposed upon the manufacturer to list a date.
Here’s a quick breakdown of the three common terms used with expiration dates:
- Best by – This product starts to lose its “freshness” past this date, but it isn’t necessarily bad. Use your eyes and nose to tell if it should be tossed. Any funky smells or new growths are definitely signs it needs to go.
- Sell by – This means that the store is required to sell this product by this date. This is often used on meats and other things packaged in-house. Most of these products are good for a few days to a week after this date, but again, you’ll have to judge for yourself.
- Use by – The product should be used by the date listed or tossed to reduce the possibility of foodborne illnesses. While the product may be good for a few days after this date, you’re better off not risking it, as foodborne illnesses are no joke.
Make Everything a Leftover
I’m sure a lot of people had one day growing up as kids where their parents threw all the leftovers together or something to that effect. If you didn’t, it might be a good idea to start. You don’t have to make a leftover casserole, but eating leftover food is a great way to save time and money, as well as reduce food waste.
If you’re making pasta on Sunday, maybe have chicken parmigiana on Tuesday. Making rice on Wednesday? That sounds like the perfect excuse to make a cheap but delicious egg-fried rice the next day. These are things you can do to immediately reduce food waste, and it takes little planning or effort.
Start Composting
It’s impossible to use every last morsel of food in your house. You’re going to forget about foods, you’re going to have parts of a vegetable you don’t use, and you’re going to have eggshells. While these things all normally get tossed in the trash, it’s not a bad idea to start composting if you have the ability to do it. While it might be hard to start composting if you live in an apartment, it’s not impossible.
Composting is a great way to give nutrients back to the soil around your home and get rid of food scraps in an eco-friendly manner. Just be careful because not everything is compostable. A lot of people use their composting pile to grow their own vegetables, which is a great way to be more self-sustainable and cut down on your grocery bills during the growing season. At the very least, a compost pile definitely helps reduce food waste.
Eat Eco-Friendly Caught Fish
While we all love tuna, we are, quite literally, driving it to the brink of extinction thanks to overfishing from parts of the world with less savory laws regarding sustainability. That’s not to put all the blame on them, as those fishing ships wouldn’t exist if there weren’t a massive demand for tuna. On the same note, products like Atlantic Salmon or King Crab are also not sustainable and have a large carbon footprint on the environment.
If you want to reduce food waste and go greener, you should definitely aim for more sustainably caught fishes like Cod, Haddock, and some sources of Tilapia. There are a few organizations out there that certify products as sustainable. If you’re interested, you can use the Marine Stewardship Council’s seal to judge whether or not a product is sustainable.
Learn How to Properly Preserve Foods
While learning how to use everything in your fridge is important, learning how to store foods long-term is just as valuable. Preserving foods is something humans have done for centuries to prolong vital stores of food that they needed to last during periods when food wasn’t as abundant. You can apply the same practices to your own life and lower your overall grocery bill and reduce food waste.
Learning how to can foods, vacuum seal meats, and properly freeze meals or leftovers is crucial if you’re trying to reduce your overall food waste at home. A vacuum sealer is an expensive piece of kitchen equipment and can pay itself back many times over if used properly. Likewise, canning jars and equipment can also save you money in the long run. There’s nothing like homemade jam or pickled cucumbers to brighten up your pantry!
Eat the Skin of Your Foods
Again, this seems obvious, but many people don’t like the skin of certain fruits, vegetables, or meats. Or you might not need the skin for whatever recipe you’re making. Peeled potatoes are commonly used in a variety of dishes, and you can’t exactly eat the peel by itself— without some added cooking, of course. Potato peels are great for compost piles, or you can turn them into a healthy snack by coating them lightly in olive oil, salt, and pepper and roasting them in your oven.
Besides roasting potato peels in your oven, you can easily save some of these byproducts for stocks, leave them in for added nutrition, or even turn them into compost. Avoid composting chicken skin and other meat products; it’ll just turn rancid in your compost pile.
Make Stocks
Instead of buying stocks at the grocery store, you can easily make some at home using ingredients you otherwise would have thrown out. Things like carrot peels, unwanted celery stalks, chicken bones, beef bones, and more are all great for homemade stocks. Contrary to popular belief, stocks are easy to make and are essentially just boiling scraps for a long period of time to extract all the flavor. You can easily start a stock in the morning and use it for chicken soup later that night or the next day.
