Food Waste: Eating the Inedible. (Part 1)

As an Anthropologist (ha), I have always been fascinated by what people deem to be suitable as edible food and what they consider inedible. I have read many fasicnating articles on topics relating to food we eat and food we neglect. As part of my blog I am going to do several posts on the different aspects of this topic.
For me, inedible food means anything that isn't vegan. That means items which are (or contain) meat, fish, dairy, eggs, honey, and any by products, etc.
This post is going to focus on our seemingly ever increasing throw away culture, how I am doing my bit to curb that, and hopefully to encourage and inspire you to do yours.

For years food has had "best before", "sell buy" and "use by dates" on their labels. In my opinion we've all gone a bit insane when it comes to food waste. Every year the UK apparently wastes 8.3million tonnes of food. I think the figure is probably higher. Its shocking.
Yes I am guilty of wasting food, we all are, but I try my best to reduce my waste as much as possible. The best way to do this (apart from the obvious of buying less food) is to use your iniciative rather than go off food dates. So many people see something has past its "best before" date and imediately chuck it. Why?!
The only date anyone should pay attention to on food labels is the "use by" date.
To be honest, "use by" doesn't come up much for me, as these tend to be more on meat, dairy, fish and other "foods"* I don't buy.
"Sell by" is literally only for the shop/supermarket, as it's a guide for them to sell the product by so it's still at it's "best".
"Best before" is the most obscure of the lot. This basically means the food is at it's best, before the date which is shown. Once we reach or pass the date of the best before it doesn't mean the food is off! It's pretty obvious when food is off as mould starts to show, and/or it's smelly/stale. Buying food very close to, or on it's "best before" date is fine, just eat it quicker than a longer "life" product.

For me, the best time to go shopping for food is on an evening. I love** running straight to the reduced sections of the supermarkets, and know exactly where they are for each bit (fruit & veg, fridge, tins, etc) in all my local supermarkets. I turn into a bit of a crazy person running around the asiles looking for yellow reduced stickers. It's amazing finding food that you love at such a reduced cost. 90% of the time I go food shopping more than half my basket/trolley will be reduced. Granted this often means its a bit hit and miss with what I buy, and I sometimes have to do more shops, but it's totally worth it due to the food you find! Also, the majority of the reduced food is going off the "sell by" date, so it's fine to keep or eat for even longer than though.
I honestly don't think I would have survived living in London for three years without my thrifty food shopping skills. I get this quality from my mam who is an avid bargain hunter. Now I am back home I am usually the one who's relied on for finding the cheap food as I'm an expert swooper.

Here are some examples of the bargains waiting to be found:

20p for organic, on the vine tomatoes. These were AMAZING! I bought two packs and they lasted at least a week!

Here I managed to get my favourite peas at a whopping 90% discount! They only lasted a few hours as I ate them for my tea after buying haha!

I'm not really a fan of rocket, so this was purely a purchase for my mam. 5p is amazing though!

One of my best finds recently was some leeks. I had a bit of a bad tummy and really fancied some tomato soup for tea. I nipped into my local Tesco at about 8.30pm on a weeknight, as they sell tomato soup without cream (yey!). As always, I did my little swoop by the reduced section and I found a three pack of leeks. I had to buy them:

TEN PENCE!!! I hadn't had leeks for ages as they are always so expensive. They lasted us a good two weeks and we still just as fresh! I was amazed!
I bought my soup happy, and also got from french stick bread for 20p each (I bought brown and white). They were still soft in the middle too! Perfect.


A few days later I set on my mission to making leek and potato soup.
This was the first time I had ever made this soup, so I sort of made up the recipe. My dad says I can't call it a recipe as I just "throw random amounts in" rather than waste time meassuring, but heck it tasted amazing!

I chopped up one leek and a handful of shallots (we had no onions!). I fried them for a couple of minutes in some fry light. I also pealed and chopped a handful of new potatoes. Boiled them in water for about 5 mins.
Next I made some veg stock and poured it into a pan with the potato cubes, and leeks and shallots. I added some salt and black pepper and cooked for about 25 (ish) minutes.***

Once the potatoes were soft enough I took it off the heat. Once cooled I blended my soup with a hand blender. Then I heated up and served.
This served me and my parents, but we had fairly large bowls!

Over the next few weeks**** I am hoping to post in more detail about food waste and eating the inedible.
This post is ending, some what abruptly now, as it is well past my bedtime.
Enjoy!


* In my opinion these things are not food!
** I know I'm really sad.
*** Can you tell I'm not a fan of recipes?!
**** Probably months.