— —

Students at Missouri are apparently cool with trayless dining. Also–there’s a student paper called The Maneater?!

— —

A UK restaurant was caught dumping food waste into their neighbor’s dumpster. Oops.

— —

Unilever is hoping to help food service companies Wise up on Waste.

— —

Let me know if I missed anything else in the food waste world late last week–I was busy welcoming my second child into the world (while trying hard not to notice the abundant hospital food waste)!

— —

Dana Gunders at the NRDC blog considers how we’re composting $175 per year unnecessarily.

— —

UK retailer Marks & Spencer will soon carry new ethylene-absorbing packaging that will keep fruit fresh for a few more days. Because every little bit helps…

— —

Not to be outdone, British baked goods company Warburtons is making a push to make its supply chain less wasteful.

— —

A UK professor has the dirt on the EU’s strict standards for veggies.

— —

For those of you on Netflix–you can now instantly watch Dive! the quintessential American dumpster diving doc.

— —

No need for a caucus to determine that composting school food waste in Iowa makes sense!

— —

Wait, what?! A report out of LA says that 62% of students there don’t have enough time to eat all of their lunch? That can’t be good for food waste.

— —

Glad to hear that the city of Tacoma has given residents an early Christmas present–curbside composting, coming this spring.

— —

This article has it all: general green tips for the holidays, a discussion of
packaging waste vs food waste and minimizing holiday food waste.

— —

Similarly, here’s more on the topic of food packaging vs. food waste. Unfortunately, it can be one of the only times reducing food waste conflicts with another green cause.

— —

Token Hanukkah bit: I’ve been surprised by how seamlessly (If I do say so myself) I was able to sneak some leftover veggies into latkes. Just sayin…

Happy Holidays, folks!

— —

This article on Bon Appetit Management food waste minimization at Penn is music to my ears.

— —

Wish you had a sleek kitchen compost container? Now UCan.

— —

Finally, it’s nice to see the big boys like Waste Management getting more and more interested in composting.

— —

Donating prepared foods can be harder than you think, but it’s important! As is reducing the overall excess at holiday or other gatherings.

— —

If you’re gonna build a casino, getting a $2.5 million federal renewable energy grant to defray the cost of an on-site anaerobic digester is like hitting the jackpot. It’s a solid ideas, as there’s sure to be plenty of buffet food waste to convert to energy…

— —

Finally, congratulations to the National Hockey League’s Food Recovery Program. The NHL program, which diverted arena food that would have been thrown away into 163,000 meals last year, won the Sports for the Environment Award.

— —

Statistics New Zealand just released some interesting…statistics on food waste. For example, produce makes up more than half of (capital K) Kiwi food waste. And 27% of the country composts–wow!

— —

A  partnership between Publix supermarkets and Waste Management has yielded a new composting facility in Florida. The Organics Recycling Facility in Okeechobee will turn food waste from 42 Publix stores into a useful soil amendment.

— —

This piece in The Hindu begins with this hammer blow:

Wasting food is a crime against humanity.

The rest of the story works, too, detailing food waste in India.

— —

British supermarket chain Sainsbury’s is now sending all of its food waste to anaerobic digesters (to create energy). Bravo!

— —

And speaking of anaerobic digestion, or biodigesters, there’s one in “the kitchen of the future,” allowing it to run on leftovers.

— —

Notre Dame’s Waste-Free Wednesdays are back this year, after a successful run last November raising awareness and lowering waste. The best news: the starting measure of 4.63 ounces of food waste per student per meal is about 25 percent less than last year’s baseline figure.

— —

Food deserts present a real problem these days. This piece addresses the different solutions, from Walmart to urban agriculture to food recovery.

— —

You want tips on how to avoid waste and (save money)? I’ve got plenty.

— —

The stats are a bit old, but this video nicely summarizes the food waste problem:

Not surprisingly, the United States owns ‘most wasteful nation’ status with food.  (Although I am confused by the data source…)

— —

In case you were curious, here’s what curbside composting looks like in Portland, with their tasteful brown kitchen caddies…

— —

Sticking in Oregon, here’s a heartening fruit tree gleaning tale, complete with some awesome images.

— —

It’s always great to hear about casinos composting what is sure to be a massive amount of wasted food. Delaware’s Dover Downs is the latest.

— —

On the down side, cost is a real barrier to composting in Illinois, despite a 2009 bill aimed at making the practice easier.