North Lincolnshire Council is supporting the Love Food Hate Waste campaign, which encourages us to get the most from the food we buy.
Each month, the average family throws away £50 of food that has been bought but not eaten.
This means that around a third of the food we buy gets thrown out - a whopping 8.3m tonnes of food each year.
Food facts
· Forty per cent of food thrown away that could have been eaten is fresh fruit and vegetables.
· Most of the food we throw away ends up in landfill, where it produces methane, a highly potent greenhouse gas. But, this is not the whole picture - if you take into consideration the energy used to produce, package, transport and store all this unused food, the equivalent of 15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO²) is wasted per year.
· If we all stop wasting food that could have been eaten, the CO² impact would be the equivalent of taking one in four cars off the road.
So why do we throw away so much?
There are two main reasons for throwing away food:
· cooking and preparing too much;
· not using food in time, for example, having to throw away fruit and veg because they've gone off, or not eating food before it goes past its use-by date.
Savvy storage Love your fridge
One of the most important places to store food is in the fridge (along with the freezer and store cupboard) so remember to keep the right food in your fridge and keep it well wrapped. Cool leftovers as quickly as possible after cooking and store them in the fridge. Eat within two days or freeze for another time.
Is your fridge cooler than you?
Remember to keep your fridge temperature below 5oC. Research shows that up to 30 per cent of our fridges are too warm, meaning food won’t last as long as it could. Milk goes off much quicker if your fridge is just a few degrees too warm.
Keep the right food in the fridge
· It’s best not to put bread in the fridge as it goes stale much quicker. Bread keeps better in a cool dark place such as the bread bin or a store cupboard. Bread does freeze well for use another time.
· 17 billion ‘five a day’ portions are thrown away each year. The fridge is the ideal place to store most of your fruit and veg (except bananas and pineapples – keep these cool but don’t refrigerate; potatoes and onions - keep them in a cool, dark place like a garage, potato/onion bag or a pantry).
· Apples last up to two weeks longer in the fridge and peppers up to a week longer.
· Eggs need to be kept at a constant temperature below 20oC and they keep best in their box stored in the fridge.
Wrap food in the fridge
· Remember fresh fruit and veg need to breathe in the fridge so don’t store them in completely sealed containers. Fruit and veg packaging has been designed to help it stay fresh for longer, so don’t take the packaging off until you’re ready to eat the food.
· Once opened, food like cheese and ham keep better if they’re well wrapped by re-closing the pack, wrapping in cling film or foil, or putting it in an air tight container.
Wrap and save
Wrap lettuce, carrots, courgettes etc. in kitchen paper then put them in plastic bags in the salad compartment of the fridge. They keep fresh for ages. The paper stops the condensation from softening the veg and stops mould.
Find many more tips at Love Food Hate Waste.
Making the most of your freezer
If you aren’t going to eat it, remember you can freeze food before the ‘use by’ date. Defrost when you need it and use within 24 hours.
Here are some handy tips to help you make the most of your cold storage, which can save you time and money.
· The look and texture of some food can change when it’s frozen (like yoghurt and cheese) but this doesn’t mean it’s not safe to eat. Try using it in a different way. Yoghurt that’s been frozen makes great smoothies, cheese makes great cheese on toast or a topping for pasta bake.
· Try freezing food in portions, it defrosts quicker and you’ll have just what you need for an easy meal. This could include bread, meat portions (for example chicken breasts) and leftover meals.
· It’s good to wrap food properly before freezing to keep it at its best. Use freezer bags or plastic containers and minimise the air around the food. This helps avoid ‘freezer burn’ which can affect the texture and taste of your food.
· In the freezer, food can be safely stored forever, but the quality deteriorates. So it’s best to try and eat frozen food within three months.
· Defrost food in the fridge, use within 24 hours and cook thoroughly making sure it’s piping hot all the way through.
You CAN freeze it
· Eggs – don’t freeze in the shell. Beat into a mixture or freeze whites and yolks separately. De-frost in the fridge, not at room temperature. Adding salt (for savoury), sugar (for sweet) stops yolks going lumpy. Use as you would fresh eggs.
· Milk - freeze as soon as possible and thaw in the fridge. Plastic containers are okay for freezing milk in, but the milk will expand so pour out a small amount to allow for this.
· Cheese – try grating Cheddar cheese before freezing and use as toppings on pizza or shepherd’s pie from frozen. Stilton can be frozen without grating.
· Fruit – slice and freeze lemons then use them straight from the fridge in iced drinks.
· Cooked meat - such as chicken and turkey. Thaw in the fridge and use as normal, in casseroles, curries and stews.
· Bread - use from frozen as toast or make sandwiches for work – by lunchtime they’ll be de-frosted.
· Potatoes - parboil and freeze them for later, thaw and roast. Mashed potato freezes well.
· Yoghurt – pots can be placed straight in the freezer but the yoghurt will expand, so make sure there’s enough space in the pot to allow for this. If there isn’t, transfer to another container before freezing. Defrost and use in smoothies or straight from frozen as a frozen yoghurt dessert.
· Tomatoes - remove their stalks and freeze whole in freezer bags. They can then be used in place of canned tomatoes, in a tomato or Bolognese sauce or chilli con carne. Just put the whole frozen tomatoes into the pan at the point when you would add the canned tomatoes. No need to defrost them separately as they fall apart.
Portion planner
A portion planner removes the guesswork out of cooking and reduces food waste. Useful suggestions of how much to cook, depending on who is coming for dinner can be found on Love Food Hate Wastes Perfect Portion Planner.
For Christmas and other occasions when you may be serving many types of vegetables in one meal the individual portion sizes may be smaller.
Have you got ideas or recipes on making the most of food? Log on to Love Food Hate Waste and share them.
Useful links
· Love Food Hate Waste now has its own Facebook page.
· Home composting is a great way to prevent unavoidable food waste such as peelings, cores and teabags ending up in landfill, and can do wonders for the garden. See our home composting pages for more information.
· If you have a small spare patch of land you could also consider creating a keyhole garden to grow your own veg. Visit our keyhole garden pages to find out more.