• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Simply Being Mum

Simply Being Mum

Family Life Simply Done

  • Home
  • About
  • Other Stuff
  • Contact

Food Waste Friday / The Usual Suspects

November 29, 2013 by SimplyBeingMum

It’s Friday Guys – My turn once more to host Food Waste Friday!

FoodWasteFriday

Each week since March 2008, in order to motivate her to waste less food, Kristen The Frugal Girl, has posted a picture of any food that has gone bad over the last seven days. She found this embarrassing practice so helpful, to her, that she invited other bloggers to post their own photos, and Food Waste Friday was born.
I started participating in October 2010 and have found, that 3-years on, the amount of food I waste is minimal. In fact every Friday, as part of my No Waste Tastes Great routine, I account (and devise a plan) for all my potential food waste as well as confessing to any items that I failed to save.
Kristen has kindly asked me to host Food Waste Friday, alternate weeks (when she doesn’t post herself), and her initial invite for everyone to join in is cordially extended here!

———————————————————————————————————————————
Simply Being Mum’s Friday Fridge

IMG_3970

Moo-ve along, nothing to see here…

(It’ll be a fish and chip supper this evening rather than a #nowastetastesgreat dish)

Does this mean zero-waste?

Alas no.

The usual food-waste suspects have reared their head, once more, this week.

You’d think I’d have learnt by now, wouldn’t you?

Suspect 1 – Grapes

IMG_3966

I’ll salvage what I can and dispose of the rest. What should I do going forward to make a save?

Suspect 2 – Bagged salad

IMG_3965

A handful of leaves have once more gone to waste. It’s little consolation that I’m not alone is my inability to save salad. Tesco recently reported that it’s estimated across the UK food industry, 68% of salad sold in bags is wasted – 35% of it thrown out by customers.

I’ve been told that storing on top of kitchen paper helps. I. Must. Remember. To. Try.This.

Both grapes and salad are notorious at Chez Wright for going to waste. I blame it on their inflexibility to adapt to other uses 😉 Only joking, I need to keep my eye on the ball a little more.

Ending on a positive note, I generally have more success with vegetables.

There’s usually the option to make a save with soup.

There was just a little waste off a cauliflower head as I trimmed the black spots.

IMG_3962

The other 95% of the cauliflower has been quickly slowly cooked into a freezable soup for frugal and nutritious packed lunches…

Not all bad news then?

As always I’ll leave the last word to Kristen…

“How did you do this week? If you blogged about your food waste, link us up by entering your info into the widget below. You’ll save money, reduce your trash output, and get a little publicity for your blog! And if you don’t blog, you can still share about your food waste by leaving a comment.

**I’ve decided not to include the LINKY for the foreseeable. My blog doesn’t allow links on the actual post, and being redirected to another page isn’t ideal. Please drop your link in the comments section.** Jo

Those of you who participate in Food Waste Friday can now grab a fancy-schmancy button to perk up your posts. If you copy and paste the following code into your Food Waste Friday post, this little graphic will appear.”

Simply Being Mum
<img src=”https://simplybeingmum.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/food-waste-with-leaf-v2.1.jpg” alt=”Simply Being Mum” style=”border:none;” />
Simply Being Mum

If you blog on WordPress, just make sure you’re in html mode when you copy and paste the code, or it won’t work

Filed Under: food waste friday, No Waste Tastes Great, Uncategorized Tagged: food waste, food waste friday, No Waste Tastes Great, reducing grocery spend, reducing waste, salad, slow cooking, soup, tesco, the frugal girl, Wasted Food

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Lizzie@herhomeworld says

    November 29, 2013 at 12:05 pm

    http://lizzieshomeworld.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/bleugh.html
    I am doing much better sicne following you guys, so thank you.

    Reply
  2. Lizzie@herhomeworld says

    November 29, 2013 at 12:05 pm

    http://lizzieshomeworld.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/bleugh.html
    I am doing much better sicne following you guys, so thank you.

    Reply
  3. Live and Learn-Toss and Turn says

    November 29, 2013 at 12:49 pm

    The last little bit of grapes and lettuce are always hard for me also. We have been working on a kitchen project for the last month so our eating has been very unusual. This week I didn’t even check to see if there was any waste. However, I finally have a working kitchen again. Yea!

    Reply
  4. Live and Learn-Toss and Turn says

    November 29, 2013 at 12:49 pm

    The last little bit of grapes and lettuce are always hard for me also. We have been working on a kitchen project for the last month so our eating has been very unusual. This week I didn’t even check to see if there was any waste. However, I finally have a working kitchen again. Yea!

    Reply
  5. Nell Fitzsimmons says

    November 29, 2013 at 1:01 pm

    Grapes!! Grrr. They catch me out too! I must do better – I had some rather bendy, grey looking carrots too. About 4.
    Currently winding down the freezer ready to stock up for Christmas.
    Have a great weekend Jo xxx

    Reply
  6. Nell Fitzsimmons says

    November 29, 2013 at 1:01 pm

    Grapes!! Grrr. They catch me out too! I must do better – I had some rather bendy, grey looking carrots too. About 4.
    Currently winding down the freezer ready to stock up for Christmas.
    Have a great weekend Jo xxx

    Reply
  7. Jo H. says

    November 29, 2013 at 6:33 pm

    The only time I have ever repeatedly been able to use up grapes is when I religiously prepped them upon bringing them home. I would pick them all off the stems, separating any that were already inedible (compost) or soft (immediate eating after a wash), wash and dry the firms ones with paper towel or a kitchen towel. Then I would store them in a large open dish – paper towel in the bottom, then a few layers of grapes, then more paper towel, etc. and loosely cover, so they stayed dry. (I usually had two or three layers of paper towel, so, not a lot.) I think this worked for three reasons – first, the less-firm grapes were identified and removed, second, the paper towels absorbed any leftover moisture from washing/sitting, and third, the grapes were ready to grab on a moment’s notice so we were more likely to have them as a snack – even when the kids were young they could get their own because they were ready to eat.

    As for the salad, that is often a problem here too; my solution was to stop buying it 🙂

    But every once in awhile, I’ll really, REALLY want a salad, so I’ll buy a small bag. Then I’ll successfully use it up and decide the big bag is a better buy and buy that instead and … you know the rest!

    Reply
  8. Jo H. says

    November 29, 2013 at 6:33 pm

    The only time I have ever repeatedly been able to use up grapes is when I religiously prepped them upon bringing them home. I would pick them all off the stems, separating any that were already inedible (compost) or soft (immediate eating after a wash), wash and dry the firms ones with paper towel or a kitchen towel. Then I would store them in a large open dish – paper towel in the bottom, then a few layers of grapes, then more paper towel, etc. and loosely cover, so they stayed dry. (I usually had two or three layers of paper towel, so, not a lot.) I think this worked for three reasons – first, the less-firm grapes were identified and removed, second, the paper towels absorbed any leftover moisture from washing/sitting, and third, the grapes were ready to grab on a moment’s notice so we were more likely to have them as a snack – even when the kids were young they could get their own because they were ready to eat.

    As for the salad, that is often a problem here too; my solution was to stop buying it 🙂

    But every once in awhile, I’ll really, REALLY want a salad, so I’ll buy a small bag. Then I’ll successfully use it up and decide the big bag is a better buy and buy that instead and … you know the rest!

    Reply
  9. Lauren Moody says

    November 30, 2013 at 9:35 am

    I freeze grapes when I feel they’re coming to their used by date. They can be popped straight into smoothies (no ice needed either) and also eaten straight from the freezer as a snack. Make sure you freeze them separately on a baking tray before popping them into an air tight box or bag.

    Definitely wrap your herbs and salad leaves in damp kitchen roll. Wash them when you get them home, shake or spin out the water and wrap. It keeps them fresh much longer.

    Reply
  10. Lauren Moody says

    November 30, 2013 at 9:35 am

    I freeze grapes when I feel they’re coming to their used by date. They can be popped straight into smoothies (no ice needed either) and also eaten straight from the freezer as a snack. Make sure you freeze them separately on a baking tray before popping them into an air tight box or bag.

    Definitely wrap your herbs and salad leaves in damp kitchen roll. Wash them when you get them home, shake or spin out the water and wrap. It keeps them fresh much longer.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

Welcome to SimplyBeingMum – one mother’s personal website documenting the journey toward a family life simply done.Here you will find a collection of recipes, ideas, musings and philosophies related to families who feel a pull toward a more conscious, mindful and simpler way of life.

You don’t have to homeschool or bake your own bread daily (I do neither of those things – well actually I do homeschool now we are in lockdown!) to hang out here. At whatever stage of your journey, you are on, you are very welcome. I personally still have a long way left down my own path and find that by blogging about it, it helps to keep me on track.

Please stay a while, have a meander around, see what takes your interest, and do join in the discussion.

Connect With Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • YouTube

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 594 other subscribers

Recent Articles

  • Let’s talk fairytales and cake
  • Simple Indian Butter Chicken and Naan Bread Recipe
  • That Was Then, This Is Now
  • Tips For Reducing Air Pollution Outdoors
  • Reading a bookWhat Will You Do For 1 Day?
  • The Most Wasteful Time Of The Year
  • Old School Food Waste Friday
  • Spicy Butternut Squash One Pot Recipe
  • Slow Cooker Five Bean Vegetarian Chilli Recipe
  • Apple, Fig and Pumpkin Cheesy Crumble Recipe

Topics

Copyright © 2022 · Simply Being Mum. All Rights Reserved. Contact | Design by Pixelloop.