When I was a teenager, my grandma decided to buy a pre-made, frozen Thanksgiving.
She reasoned that it was too much of a hassle for everyone to agree on what they would have, to divvy out the assignments, and to do all the cooking. It would be much easier to just pick up a meal that someone else had made. Many of us were horrified, but the decision of a family's matriarch always stands, so frozen turkey it would be! Here's the thing, though; it takes just as long to reheat a frozen turkey as it takes to cook one. We were expecting to eat in thirty minutes or so, and it looked like we would have to wait four hours. My blood sugar can be finicky, and I'm notorious in my family for getting hangry (hungry + angry enough to kill.) We were not going to have a good Thanksgiving with thirty starving people, especially if one of those people was me. I couldn't very well make a snack for myself without feeding anyone else, so there was nothing else for it. I would just have to make snacks for everyone. I've always been good at making meals out of whatever I have on hand, or "scraps," as we call them in my house. I scoured the shelves and found every platter we had and pulled out all the breads, cookies, chips, crackers, meats, cheeses, and spreads until there were nearly a dozen appetizer platters on the counter. (I could never do that in my own home, but my parents don't follow the "don't buy too much food" rule, so their kitchen was fully stocked.) I spread cream cheese on ham slices and rolled them up; I popped popcorn; I even put frosting in a bowl and arranged gram crackers around it to use as dippers. Everyone was grateful, and they still talk about the day I saved Thanksgiving. It was a proud moment for me. The point of the story: you can freeze your Thanksgiving leftovers. I should know. I had a defrosted Thanksgiving feast at 9:00 pm that night.
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I've had a hard time explaining to people exactly what I'm doing with No Scrap Left Behind.
Most of us try not to throw out good food but will do it whenever it's necessary. When I said I don't waste food, they often say, "I don't either." But that just isn't true. When I tell people the average American throws out 15 pounds a month -- which would add up to 60 pounds for my family of four -- they scoff because there's no way they throw out that much food each month. Because they don't understand the weight of food or how much gets tossed, I told people I only threw out 2-5 pounds a month and they weren't impressed. It sounds like more food than it is. (My cube weighs 3 pounds.) Then I started telling people I only threw out as much food as I could fit in my hands, but even that was too broad. I can hold a lot of potatoes, for instance, and I can hold a whole watermelon, but I can't hold very much rice. in my hands. Did it count if I put it in a bowl? How big a bowl are we talking about? Finally, it occurred to me; I should just show people how much I throw out! The idea came to me via Trash is for Tossers. The woman who runs that blog lives in an apartment with no room for a compost bin, so she puts all her compost in her freezer until she can take it to a facility. Brilliant! I started keeping my own compost in the freezer so I wouldn't have to run out to the backyard five times a day. Now, I keep my food waste and my compost in two separate containers in the freezer. Just as a reminder: food counts as waste and not compost if it fails the Hungry Kid Test. The Hungry Kid Test helps me decide which foods I have to eat and what I can throw away. If I would put the food in the garbage right in front of a hungry child, it's compost. If I would give it to the kid, it's food and I cannot waste it. Banana peels and apple cores are technically edible, but they pass the Hungry Kid Test, so they go in the compost container. A quarter of a hamburger, on the other hand, fails the test and would go in the waste container. From now on, I'm going to post monthly photos of the food my family wastes, and I'm going to share with you the lessons I learned that will help me to avoid the same mistakes in the future. Lessons I learned this month: - Don't assume you know how long restaurant leftovers will last. - Don't leave the cap off your milk because flies can get in. - Keep clips on all your bags so your kids don't get into the cupboard and spill lentils all over the floor. - Keep the floor clean so you can spill things without covering them in dog hair. - Read the instructions carefully before making popcorn from scratch for the first time. - When you turn a burner from high to simmer, make sure you're adjusting the right burner. |
I will never waste food againI've been tired of throwing out food for years - not to mention tired of our huge grocery bill! I decided to make a change and vowed never to waste food again. In this blog, I'll show you how I do it. RECIPESArchives
January 2020
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