Researchers who study food waste share the small habits that keep scraps out of the bin, from stock bags to smarter portions.
Wasting less food saves money and cuts emissions, but advice on the topic can feel preachy. TIME's Angela Haupt took a more practical route and asked people who study food waste for a living what they do at home. The article lists 13 habits. Here are the ones we found most useful, summarised in our own words.
Cook with what you have
- The kitchen-sink potato. Shelie Miller of the University of Michigan bakes a potato each week and tops it with whatever leftovers are around.
- Plan a second use. Before cooking, Miller and her husband decide where the other half of a cabbage or the rest of a can of tomato paste will go.
- Shop your freezer first. Check what is already frozen before buying or cooking more, so it gets used.
- Use the whole vegetable. Jonathan Deutsch of Drexel's Food Lab peels the woody outside of broccoli stems and cooks the tender centre with the florets.
Store smarter
- Refrigerate apples. Brian Roe of Ohio State keeps his in the fridge, where he says they rarely spoil.
- Freeze soup flat. Filling zip-top bags and freezing them flat on a sheet pan produces stackable packages that save space.
- Keep a stock bag. Deutsch collects onion trimmings, mushroom bits and herb stems in the freezer for stock. One warning: beet scraps will turn it pink or brown.
- Make leftovers appealing. Roe reheats them in an air fryer and stores them so they are easy to reheat.
Buy and serve with intention
- Ask for ideas. Deutsch suggests asking an AI chatbot for recipes, giving it your time limit, equipment and skill level, before buying more groceries.
- Match portions to appetite. Miller serves smaller portions of meat, since animal products have a larger environmental footprint than plant foods.
- Plan for guests, not an army. Roe estimates portions for company with the Guest-imator tool from the Save the Food campaign.
Keep perspective
One tip challenges a common instinct. Miller's 2022 analysis found that plastic packaging accounted for less than 10 percent of the environmental footprint for 23 of 30 foods examined, and a 2019 study of meal kits found that the food-waste savings outweighed the extra packaging emissions. The takeaway is not that plastic is fine, but that wasting food is usually the bigger problem. And for what you truly cannot eat, composting is a good backup, as long as eating the food comes first.
Source: TIME
