Cutting Down On Food Waste At Home
Last Updated on: 10th August 2020, 09:36 pm
How Can I Be Cutting Down On Food Waste?
If you need to tighten your belt and save some money, the best thing is to start cutting down on your food waste. The first step to cut down on food wastage is to not buy so much food from the shops in the first place. This is why companies like Hello Fresh are good because they only send the food you need for that certain meal that you are cooking.
In Holland, they sell packs with food for a meal and you get no wastage from them. They cost about 4 euros so they are cheap enough to buy too. Unfortunately I haven’t seen packs like this in the UK. But it is an awesome idea.
Often it is cheaper to buy more food at a cheaper price, if you go for the budget brands. But that’s where you end up with the wastage.
Cooked Too Many Vegetables?
If you have cooked too many vegetables to go with your dinner, then you can keep them until the next day. You can either heat them up and serve them as a side dish of vegetables the following day. Or you can saute them in olive oil and seasonings and herbs to taste. These can be served as a side dish or in a quiche or stew. You can even freeze some cooked vegetables to use at a later date.
You could make a salsa out of old vegetables. Use some tinned chopped tomatoes, add left over sweetcorn, chopped onion and some seasoning. It makes a healthy and cheap dip for crisps or vegetable sticks.
Leftover Gravy or Casserole Sauce
If like me, you have left over gravy or casserole sauce. Then you can save it to use as a soup base (maybe with the left over vegetables). Or you can add some cooked chopped tomatoes, left over wine and some cooked meat (or vegetarian alternative).
Then add it to the blender to liquidise it and you have a pasta sauce that you can freeze or keep in the fridge for a few days.
Over Ripe Fruit
Use the over ripe fruit for baking. You can make banana bread with over ripe bananas. It doesn’t matter if they are brown, because nobody will see the colour of them. Other over ripe fresh fruit can be used in a smoothie, so you still get the goodness. You can also make jam with the fruit.
Freeze Cooked Meats
If you have cooked too many meats and casseroles, you can freeze them for another day. This is a great way of batch cooking too. If you buy reduced meat in the yellow sticker department of the supermarket, cook it and freeze it on that day.
Leftover Wine
If you ever have any left over wine, it is good for adding to casseroles to give it a kick. Don’t worry it having alcohol in it, because it will burn the alcohol off. You can also freeze it in ice cubes. So next time you do want to add a splash of wine to your cooking, you can add a wine ice cube. You can also use the ice cubes in a glass of wine when its hot. Better than water ice cubes because it won’t water your wine down.
You can also use left over wine as a marinade for meats. Leave it in the fridge marinading in the wine with the seasoning.
Make Soup
Any leftover food can be made into soup. Even better, it can be frozen for another time. Freeze it in individual pots for work, to save spending money on lunch at work. You can add what ever ingredients you have left over to make a soup.
