Food waste?

[observer]

Seems the average houshold wastes around £680 per year in thrown away food. Farmers plough around 20% of their crop back into their fields, as it doesn't fit the criteria set by the super-markets. Hotels and restaurants add to the pile, with customers with eyes bigger than their bellies. Seems we're wasting around 25% of all food produced, which finishes up in landfill. However, with food prices increasing globally, perhaps economic forces will change our habits?

[Cleopatra]

It's a lot different today from the early post war days, when very little food was wasted.

Left-overs were saved and served up in a different guise. Even peelings and rotten food was saved and fed to the chickens and pigs etc.,.

I remember how my mother would boil up the peelings on the stove and maybe add some oats. Then when it had cooled down it would be mashed and served to the chickens we kept. Then come Christmas there would be a dozen or so dead chickens hanging on the back door before being sold to neighbours.

A neighbour collected waste food in bins that would be collected by a pig farmer. Often my mother would send me with a bucketful of pigswill and the neighbour would give me a penny or two.

You could buy a lot for a penny in those days.

[Stallard12]

My evening meal : A slice of bread smeared with 'drippin'. We tried whale meat once - inedible. Strain the potato peelings out of the home made soup and use them to 'back-up' the fire overnight.

[observer]

The super-markets base their supply requirements on norms - but if/when demand drops (EG. cold snap could reduce demand for soft drinks/ice cream), perfectly good produce is literally thrown away. Some charities are tapping into this surplus to feed the less fortunate, many of whom have raided s/market waste bins for some time. For food that is past "use by date", some Councils are investing in anerobic digesters, which produce gas = energy. In the good old days, I recall a leg of lamb lasting 3 days - Sunday -hot, Monday - cold; Tuesday - hot pot. Any waste spuds and veg, could be fried up next day as "bubble and squeak". Maybe folk just arn't interested in cooking anymore, hence the queues outside take-aways and full Carveries? But, when the price starts to rise, due to the emerging Indian and Chinese middle class eating meat; maybe folk will start to be cautious again? :mellow:

[Grace]

The super-markets base their supply requirements on norms - but if/when demand drops (EG. cold snap could reduce demand for soft drinks/ice cream), perfectly good produce is literally thrown away. Some charities are tapping into this surplus to feed the less fortunate, many of whom have raided s/market waste bins for some time. For food that is past "use by date", some Councils are investing in anerobic digesters, which produce gas = energy. In the good old days, I recall a leg of lamb lasting 3 days - Sunday -hot, Monday - cold; Tuesday - hot pot. Any waste spuds and veg, could be fried up next day as "bubble and squeak". Maybe folk just arn't interested in cooking anymore, hence the queues outside take-aways and full Carveries? But, when the price starts to rise, due to the emerging Indian and Chinese middle class eating meat; maybe folk will start to be cautious again? :mellow:

 

 

We waste nothing; things learned in just after the war years hold good. Growing vegetables means that all peelings etc get composted and we have two dogs fed purely on raw and home cooked food. Meat costs too much for us; we get a very rare gift from our landlord who is a beef and dairy cattle farmer, Else it is chicken from a local factory. A box of ten k of necks costs E3. I haunt the reduced sections at Dunne;s etc. Never eat takeaway - period. We were properly taught in the 40s...Good new days here!

 

I used to bake all my own bread but the cost is too high compared with the cheapest shop stuff. We have family who work with abandoned kids overseas so every cent we save on food goes to them.

 

And nol kids are not taught how to cook properly these days!

[Peter T]

The super-markets base their supply requirements on norms - but if/when demand drops (EG. cold snap could reduce demand for soft drinks/ice cream), perfectly good produce is literally thrown away. Some charities are tapping into this surplus to feed the less fortunate, many of whom have raided s/market waste bins for some time. For food that is past "use by date", some Councils are investing in anerobic digesters, which produce gas = energy. In the good old days, I recall a leg of lamb lasting 3 days - Sunday -hot, Monday - cold; Tuesday - hot pot. Any waste spuds and veg, could be fried up next day as "bubble and squeak". Maybe folk just arn't interested in cooking anymore, hence the queues outside take-aways and full Carveries? But, when the price starts to rise, due to the emerging Indian and Chinese middle class eating meat; maybe folk will start to be cautious again? :mellow:

 

 

But they will still be able to go to the Supermarket and buy ready prepared veg and mashed potatoes, so they still won't learn how to cook.

[observer]

So perhaps such basic life skills should be taught in schools - as we can't rely on modern families to pass down such skills?

[Grace]

So perhaps such basic life skills should be taught in schools - as we can't rely on modern families to pass down such skills?

 

Are they really not?

 

And yes they should. Simple basic foods, not the modern fads! ie not foreign all the time. There are so many good local recipes in every county. Using what is most available. I was on a gardening forum and they had to dress everything up with pine nuts, garlic, olive oil etc etc.