I recently discovered, to my delight, that wasted food isn’t a subject only cranky bloggers (ahem) find interesting. It seems that Ted Lee, the bespectacled half of the Lee Brothers’ Boiled Peanut empire (and catalogue), thinks about minimizing food waste fairly often. He was kind enough to speak with me about the topic.
You’ve likely heard […]

Some colleges have eliminated trays in an effort to get students to take, and waste, less food. At Portland’s Reed College, students are cutting waste by taking more–of fellow students’ leftovers. The school of about 1,500 undergrads has a tradition where “scroungers” scrape together a meal from what paying students don’t eat.
Before busing their trays, meal plan students drop off […]

Canadian writers Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon went a year eating only food produced within 100 miles of their Vancouver apartment. Hence the 100 Mile Diet, an idea and a book (although the U.S. version, oddly, has a different title–Plenty).  
The two locavores are on a book tour, and MacKinnon posted a blog entry from the road providing […]

I can hear the food waste alarm bells from a few states away, as a student blogger from an Alabama high school reports that his cafeteria won’t sell items a la carte. Seriously?
At lunch, you cannot buy any item of food separately, because it’s against Jefferson County regulations. You must buy a whole lunch, even if you just […]

In case you haven’t read it, check out this incredibly sensible Michael Pollan op-ed on the farm bill. He argues that the long-standing federal farm policy subsidizes fats and sugars, increasing obesity rates and making processed foods cheaper.
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An employee at Panera Bread blogged about sandwich shop food waste. OK, so maybe I requested she […]

British grocer Marks & Spencer is now powering a few of its stores with an anaerobic digester. The machine converts food waste to biogas, which it uses to create electricity. Plans are underway to build another, and the two digesters should power six stores. So don’t feel bad the next time you pay too much for the […]

Maui is facing a food waste crisis. A local pig farmer who took 3 tons of restaurant and hotel garbage daily lost his lease, forcing the island’s hospitality industry to find an alternate destination for their food waste.
The stakes are high, as
the county-operated Central Maui landfill cannot safely accept the combination of liquid and solid […]

Avoiding household food waste starts in the supermarket. While our big eyes and tempted taste buds are partly to blame, stores are adept at inducing excess spending.
Since we waste, on average, a quarter of what we bring home, it makes sense to rethink our shopping habits. Along those lines, this challenging quiz will keep you on your […]

Britain is going food waste wild.
From England to Scotland to Northern Ireland to Scotland again and again, food waste is in the news. This is mostly due to the recently released statistic that Britons waste one third of the food they buy.
This factoid comes from WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) that I’m told is a “quango.” Thanks […]

Some Britons have called for a return to World War II era values. Hmm. If that means being more careful with our food, I’m all for it. If it means eating more bubble and squeak–pass.
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Random food waste note of the week:
Weddings in Kyrgyzstan avoid food waste by making sure leftovers are split amongst attendees.
Each guest is given […]