Waste Not, Want Not
I’ve been watching a fair bit more t.v. lately than usual. This is the time of year when I actually have some time to do so. 
I love watching food-related shows and can generally find something on Food Network worth watching. What I saw Sunday night was an eye-opener, even for a know-it-all like me.
The show was “The Big Waste.” The premise was to take four big-named chefs – Bobby Flay, Michael Symon, Alex Guarnaschelli and Anne Burrell – and charge them with making a gourmet multi-course meal for one hundred people using nothing but FOOD WASTE.
According to Wikipedia, Food Waste is defined as “food that is discarded or lost uneaten.” As of 2011, 1.3 billion tons of food, about 33% of the global food production, was lost or wasted annually in all stages of the food supply chain. Folks, that’s over 2 TRILLION pounds of food. It’s hard to fathom.
Like me, I think most folks figure the majority of this waste is comprised of what we throw away after we’ve cooked or prepared it. Telling kids to “clean their plate” is an old mantra. “There are starving kids in …” whatever part of the world is another one. While this may be true, much of that food waste happens well before the food even gets to our plate and, often, before it gets to the store.
As a sustainable farm that uses no pesticides or herbicides we rarely have much “store perfect” produce. Bumps, cracks, bruises, etc. are all part of what we sell. Some customers come to our stands and dig for what they think is the perfect tomato, cucumber or squash. Most of our customers don’t mind that our produce is sometimes a little ugly because it tastes so darn good.
This is not the case in most instances. Grocery stores will only accept what is considered “Number 1 Grade” produce for their stores because that’s all most customers will buy. No cracks, no bruises, no blemishes, perfectly symetrical, perfectly colored. As Chef Guarnaschelli said during the program, “We’ve trained the consumer to look for visual perfection.” But how much produce actually looks like that when it comes out of the field? And what happens to all that food that’s not perfect, gets bruised in delivery, or may be slightly wilted? Trash. One of the you-pick farms Chef Flay visited stated they had 40 to 50% waste in their orchards and fields, simply because the fruit or vegetable looked less than “perfect.” 40 to 50%??? That’s an enormous number for any farm. On our farm that would equate to probably 10,000 pounds of produce, and we’ve only been operating on 5 acres. Imagine what that translates to on a farm of 80 acres – or 800 acres!
Even I didn’t realize how bad this problem is. You really need to see the show in order to understand what mounds and mounds of wasted food really looks like. Beautiful tomatoes, crisp cabbage, fresh fish, heritage chicken, eggs that were the wrong size or shape … all bound for the garbage or, if lucky, a compost pile. It’s sad, disgusting and discouraging. All in the name of “perfection.”
These four chefs managed to make fantastic meals out of nothing but unwanted food. Meals that three notoriously tough food critics and a host of chefs and patrons were praising. From “garbage.”
What can you do to help save some of this food from the garbage or compost pile? First, shop your local farmers market or go directly to the local farm. Tell them you’re willing to buy their “seconds” or “culls.” There is nothing wrong with these items; they are still fresh and tasty. They just don’t have the prisitine appearance we’ve been trained to look for as consumers and most of it will be chopped up anyway when you prepare your meal. More than likely, since there is very little demand for these items, the grower will charge you less for these items. You’re saving this food from the garbage and you’re also helping the farmer earn back a little bit more on their investment. And, if you buy it in bulk and preserve what you don’t eat right away (either through canning, freezing or dehydrating) you’ll be saving yourself even more money in the winter months.
Second, find uses for more parts of what makes up your meal. Ask the butcher what do to with end-cut beef short ribs or pork trotters. Adventurous? Go even further and find a use for heart or tongue, even if it’s just to flavor stock or stew. Use more of what’s in season to create your meals. Farmers will generally have periods where they have a large amount of one crop for several weeks so more of this is likely to get wasted if customers don’t buy a lot at once. Again, buy more than you need right now and preserve the rest for later.
Proponents of genetically engineered foods (like Monsanto and Pioneer Dow) claim we can’t feed the world without the help of GMOs or chemical pesticides and herbicides. I disagree. If we can save billions of tons (trillions of pounds) of food from being wasted there will be much more left for those that can’t produce their own. If the “food police” would get out of the way, much more food could be donated to shelters and food banks instead of ending up in the garbage.
It means standing up and being heard. Use your food dollars to send a message … we don’t need our food to look pretty. It needs to be healthy and flavorful. Remember the generations that came before us and what they’ve known for decades. Waste not, want not.
~Karin
