Posted by Snow in 
I was shocked to hear a recent statistic that nearly 15% of all food was thrown away by people instead of consumed. Despite the media broadcast of a recession, our culture remains a consumer culture through and through.
I was shocked because in my guilty heart I know the figure is much larger, especially where green produce is consumed. I throw away much too much fresh stuff. I also have a tendency to bruise or preserve unevenly what I do buy. We, as responsible consumers should sustainably make a smoothie the second discoloration even starts.
I have been trained to eat my vegetables, but this adage comes when I am at the dinner table. The problem is that some foods, especially organic produce, spoil faster and thus become even harder to guard against waste. But as I throw out the contents of my crisper, I always vow not to have any more waste. But it keeps happening.
It is simply so much easier still to stop at fast food and pick up dinner versus preparing it and cleaning up after. But if you start the day emailing a picture of your crisper you can remember on the way home to pick up dressing or green onions or cheese or nuts, whatever makes good salad add-in fodder.
Greens should be consumed the day after purchase. Fresh fruit should examined for spoiling signs or smells, and the storage inside the fridge or two more. The produce from the store shoulde be set in the fridge with masking tape warnings of its expiration or atop the fruit bowl should be a note spelled out with an expiration date.
Frankly, trimming bruised parts of root vegetables can preserve them another day. And leaving fruit and food out while oven is on or sun is out exposes the outer skin to heat, accelerating bacteria formation and spoiling.
But the light at the end of the tunnel is that some of it might be used for composting. Happy the worms will be! Composting removes the whole wastage concept behind throwing out green food. Agricultural guilt from tossed rancid produce is not something sustainable householders want to live with.
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