What are your greatest Food Savvy tips?

As many of you will know, I have been taking part in the #FoodSavvy challenge organised through the environmental charity Hubbub in conjunction with Suffolk County Council and Norfolk County Council.

What’s it all about?

The campaign is to create awareness around Food Waste and Single-Use food plastic, issues which totally fit in with the Life Diet Health way of life! 😀 If you missed my first post of the campaign, check it out here!

What have I learnt?

For me this challenge so far has been more about single-use plastic, than food waste. I’ve discovered that the main food waste we have in our house, is when we don’t like something! Usually with food which we make ourselves this is not a problem, as we like what we make, and we do (or at least I thought we did!) make a lot of our own food!

However, recently we’ve been trying all the new vegan products which have appeared on the market – most unfortunately of which are in plastic trays or packets! Sometimes we like the foods. Sometimes we don’t! Sometimes we pass the rest of it on for someone else to try, or try and add it to something else if possible, but if it’s really awful (and there are quite a few that are), it might just go straight in the bin!

#LoveYourLeftovers

We’re pretty good with leftovers. We cook what we think we’ll need, usually with a bit left over for lunch the next day. If it’s something which takes some cooking, we might deliberately make a big batch and freeze part of it – labelling it and putting it where we can see it. Another thing we’ve recently started doing, is keeping a list of what’s in the freezer, so a) we only buy what we need b) we can quickly see what’s available to eat without getting the freezer too warm and c) save time and energy not cooking something we already have! Leftovers are great for throwing in a soup! 🙂

Do you throw anything away?

We have noticed little bits of food waste, like: the last Brussels sprout on the plate which is covered in gravy and was one too many; the couple of chips which were end pieces and too crunchy; the end of the cereals which got too soggy; the squishy bit of the banana which has got bruised and tastes so banana-ey; the burnt bit of toast which is more like charcoal, or the last of the cake which has got too dry and stale. Occasionally we might have a bit of rice or bulghur wheat which doesn’t get eaten – this gets rinsed and given to the birds (be mindful if you’ve used a lot of salt when cooking though).

What about food plastic?

The plastic! I was so disappointed! There are a lot of changes we have already made for example, we make all our own fresh bread and rolls – mostly using a sourdough starter (kept in the fridge in glass jars), with flour in paper bags (which we keep to store the bread in), and haven’t bought ourselves a loaf of sliced bread since before Oct 2018! That is a LOT of plastic bags we’ve saved from landfill! That’s over 70 weeks ago – so I’d say at least 100 bags we’ve saved! Hoorah! 😀

Then there’s cling film! People use this without thinking and we certainly used to, getting through roll after roll as we wrapped sandwiches and leftovers to store or give away. Now we have a selection of alternatives which we use, my latest favourite being silicon squares which generally end up just being flung over whatever it is! We have stretchy silicon circles, reusable covers with elastics in a range of sizes and soya wax wraps for covering foods and we use foil for keeping sandwiches fresh (we re-use the foil as much as possible, then re-cycle it).

What plastic did you use in a week?

We certainly did not expect this much single-use plastic to be used just through food use in one week! We have a LOT of work to do here! Of course, some of this can be recycled, but even so – have a look…

This picture shows the plastic roughly divided into categories: Drinks; Breads & Pastries; Vegetables; Meats/Alternatives; Snacks; Desserts. There’s a lot of work to be done here but we’ve started already! Look at how much of this can be recycled…

Unfortunately, our local council no longer accepts Tetrapacks in their recycling (wheelie) bins, but they can still be taken to the Local Recycling Centre. We have rinsed and flattened the Tetrapacks and have stacked them ready to go. We are now trying to source alternatives for these, which although not too difficult, comes with sometimes double or treble the cost! The recyclables went in the recycling bin and there was still quite a bit of non-recyclable plastic (mostly plastic film and bags) which sadly has to go to landfill!

As part of this FoodSavvy challenge, the following items were #gifted to me. If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen these already. All of these products are a great help when reducing single-use plastic use. Check back soon to find out which I think are most useful and how I used them!

Make recycling easy!

Do you have separate bins in your kitchen for recycling? We have a Bokashi bin for food scraps, a paper/card/tin/plastic recycling bin and a black bin for anything which can’t be recycled. This article popped up in my emails the other week – so much choice for recycling bins!

There are lots of bins about, we like these ones:

Here’s a few FoodSavvy suggestions for you!

Easy plastic swaps:

⭐Plastic Drinks bottles: Reusable bottles or buy cans.

⭐Take out coffee: Reusable coffee cup or drink in.

⭐Plastic straws: Stainless steel / bamboo / pasta straws or go without

⭐Cling film: Foil / silicon / soy wax wraps / lidded containers or cover with a plate

Easy steps to reducing food waste:

⭐Check your fridge before shopping – take a photo or write a list of what you already have.

⭐Only buy reduced foods if you can a) freeze them b) eat them before they go off c) they fit in with your plans!

⭐Plan your meals! Go through your fridge/freezer/cupboards/pantry and plan a few days worth of meals based on what you already have.

⭐Freeze leftovers the same day (unless you can use them for lunch the next day).

⭐Use portion controls so you minimise leftovers – only cook what is needed.

What are others doing?

Since taking on this challenge, I’ve become more aware of what others are doing and have had some great conversations!

For example…

In the Isle of Man, they have the FIRST plant-based milk cartons made out of sugar cane (I know it’s dairy milk – but it’s a great move)! They are even starting a recycling collection service to customers too!

There are several great apps you can download which offer food and drink items going to waste to the public at reduced prices. Check out Olio or Too Good To Go or find other options here!

Testing was carried out on supermarket milk to check the use-by-dates were correct. As three million pints of milk a year are thrown away in Suffolk and Norfolk alone! use-by dates are pretty important. The result of the tests… milk was still safe for up to SEVEN DAYS past the use-by date!

Some countries have very limited general recycling facilities (in 2018, Turkey only recycled 1% of general waste), whereas others have recycling built into their culture – (in 2019, Germany recycled 66%)!

If you’re gifted something you don’t like or won’t eat, then how about donating it to a foodbank (or re-gifting it).

Are you joining in?

Are you doing your own FoodSavvy challenge too? What’s the most difficult thing you have found about minimising Food Waste? Do you have any tips to share? Do you have any go to ‘leftovers recipes’?

What about single-use food plastic? Do you find certain items difficult to avoid in plastic (cucumbers and lettuce for me!)?

Join in below! Leave your comments and suggestions!

Speak soon

Laurena x