Category Archives: Friday Buffet

Ins and outs from the week in food waste

Friday Buffet

Publix supermarkets recently announced a program to compost meat, produce and bakery items from 56 Broward County stores and all 237 S. Florida stores by mid-2009. Organic Recovery will convert the supermarket waste to a soil supplement by enzymatic digestion. Great news, but I’d love to see this kind of top-down approach to donating the […]

August 22, 2008 | Also posted in Composting, International, Supermarket | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

Gotta love this well-executed leftovers humor, courtesy of The Onion. — Welcome news: Due to rising food prices, 62 percent of shoppers at the British chain Sainsbury’s are concerned about wasted food. Even more heartening, about 1/3 of those polled report that they’re doing something about it–by making food stretch over a couple of meals. […]

August 15, 2008 | Also posted in Composting, Household, International | Comments closed

Friday Buffet: Lucky 8-8-08 Edition

I agree in spirit, but this might be taking things a tad too far: Don’t Play with Your Food. — — Then again, cleaning your grill with an onion seems a bit silly. Why not a wire brush or rag (as some commenters on the Lifehacks post wondered)? — — A new zero-waste initiative at […]

August 8, 2008 | Also posted in Composting, Household | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

Because seeing is believing: Here’s the booty from a dumpster diving expedition that shows how much good food grocery stores throw out. — — Don’t waste that pigeon squab?!? UPDATE: I noticed that Berkeley’s famed Chez Panisse is featuring squab on August 9th. — — San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has proposed fines to ensure […]

August 1, 2008 | Also posted in Composting, Supermarket, Waste Stream | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

If a farmer harvested inefficiently, would you say it was a criminal act? In light of the mounting food shortages, the Belarusian president thinks it’s a prison-worthy offense. — — I’d love it now, but I guess I can wait two years for a waste-powered car. — — Why spend $1,350 to do the wrong […]

July 25, 2008 | Also posted in Composting, Farm, Food Recovery, International | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

Behold, the Mount Everest Rushmore of cheese sculptures. Maybe they heard me coming, because the article notes that this cheddar masterpiece will eventually be eaten. (I’ve got dibs on Washington’s schnauze.) — — Check out this useful article on extending food shelf life from the increasingly waste-centric food writer China Millman at the Chicago Sun-Times. […]

July 18, 2008 | Also posted in Food Recovery, Household, International, Tree Gleaning | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

Despite its odd tone, this NY Times Magazine article was encouraging because food pieces in mainstream (some might say highbrow) publications rarely discuss leftovers. OK, so it’s lobster leftovers, but the author does advocate boiling the shell and assorted remnants to flavor a risotto. So that’s neat. — — Jamaicans have stopped bobsledding long enough […]

July 11, 2008 | Also posted in Household, International | Comments closed

Thursday Buffet

Japan wastes one-fourth of their food, according to Japan’s Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry. As reported in China Daily, Japan tosses 19 million tonnes of food waste annually (about one-third of which is edible at the time of tossing). That percentage is a bit less than the U.S. (estimates range from one-fourth to one-half and […]

July 3, 2008 | Also posted in Food Recovery, International, Supermarket, Trayless | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

Don’t waste bananas–they might not be around much longer (at least not at $0.49/lb.) — — This just in: Australians waste $6 billion worth of food. Maybe it’s time Aussies *not* ‘put an extra shrimp on the barbie.’ Apparently those in the Australian capital of Canberra waste the most. Fortunately, Australia’s first food recovery operation, […]

June 20, 2008 | Also posted in Composting, Food Recovery, Household, International, Restaurant | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

This Marketplace (radio) piece introduces Billy Vasquez, a.k.a. the “99 cent Chef,” a food blogger who makes meals from ingredients sourced at 99-cent stores. I enjoyed this exchange on buying spinach there (no idea if it’s canned, frozen or fresh): Newnam: Do you have to worry about the dates? Vasquez: Hey, it’s still green. That’s […]

June 13, 2008 | Also posted in Events, Food Safety, International | Comments closed