1. Don’t cook too much food. Thanksgiving celebrates abundance. As far as I know, none of the winter holidays do. Get a good guest count and try not to go overboard. After all, we can only eat so much goose.

2. Don’t serve too much. Let family and friends serve themselves so they can take as much or as little as they want. Beware the “good provider syndrome,”

3. Be proactive with leftovers. Share the love and leftovers–redistribute them to other guests.  And then repurpose what you have leftover. It helps to have an idea of other dishes you can create with leftovers (i.e. roast chicken to chicken soup).

Bonus: Eat some fruitcake–nobody else is going to!

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Don’t throw out that carcass! First, you can make a great soup with it. Then, if you’re in Rhode Island, you can compost it via EcoRI News.

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British Eco Chef Tom Hunt cooked at last week’s Feeding the 5K. In his neat blog, he discusses Ribollita, a traditional Tuscan leftover soup, and pens a culinary call-to-arms on using old bread in The Life of a Loaf.

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I’d heard about Concrete Jungle before, but this article reminded me of their awesome Atlanta tree-gleaning-ness.

I ain’t seen some good trash since I…since I don’t know when…

While I can’t make out any specific references to taking food from Dumpsters, edible booty is a given, right?

Anyone know of any other songs about Dumpster diving or food waste?

We grow far more food than we need, averaging 3900 calories per person per day.* One result of our abundance is that we’re inundated with food. Supermarkets have a seemingly bottomless supply of food (When was the last time you saw a store out of something?). And grocers favor heaving, heaped displays.

Yet, increasingly, we see food at other locations. We’ve grown accustomed to food taking center stage at gas stations. But another trend, as The NY Times notes, is increased food offerings at big box retailers and pharmacies.

These added offerings aren’t necessarily harmful. Pharmacies can be an oasis of fresh foods in urban food deserts. That’s if they’re stocking fresh fruits and vegetables. Big box retailers are redefining the retail food business, lumping food purchases in with other household goods (a trend happening in reverse at some traditional grocers).

Yet these increased food options communicate our abundance in a somewhat harmful way. They contribute to the sense that we have so much food that we don’t need to treat it carefully. And so we don’t.

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*Amazingly, despite this abundance, we don’t manage to get food to all of those in need. Redistribution remains a problem, although it’s improving via food recovery. And the USDA doesn’t help as they once did in the 90s.

I’d only previously seen one of these posters, so you can imagine my excitement–especially as I’m a bit of a propaganda geek. The Navy’s Bureau of Supplies and Accounts produced this set of posters in 1944 as World War II was in full blaze.

With some, the rationale for not wasting is fairly war- or Navy-specific. But the message is universal: Watch Your Waste!

There are some nice ones in the set, but this Chow Hound one is my favorite. My dog doesn’t have any trouble eating all that she “takes,” but I’m still working on getting her to walk upright while holding her cap on her tail.

In this obesity-heavy era, it’s easy to scoff at the idea that we should eat all that’s on our plates. There are the eating disorder worries. And with today’s portion sizes so huge, eating all we’re served can be a dangerous proposition. 

At the same time, the ‘clean your plate’ ethic teaches a healthy respect for food. Especially if we’re served (or take) a modest amount of healthy food.

The K.C. column features a neat little tale toward the end. It’s worth reading, for a chuckle and a little inspiration on getting kids not to waste food (Hide the ketchup!).

What do you make of the ‘clean your plate’ idea? Does it have any value or is it just a harmful relic?

I don’t have much experience with Christmas trees, but it sounds like a neat idea. After all, spruce and fir needles seem very rosemary-ish. Why not deploy them as an herb to spice up veggies, seafood, meat or even butter (see the article’s recipe).

Wackier yet, the author suggests drying and processing needles into a powder. Mixing that evergreen essence into cookie dough just might make the perfect winter cookie. I wouldn’t bet on it, but I’m willing to give it a shot (especially if a tree-shaped cookie cutter is involved). Stay tuned…

Regardless of how those culinary ideas sound, you have to admit that the author’s logic is compelling:

Nature takes enormous time and effort to produce something that we use only briefly. Why don’t we make greater use of this living tree, as we make use of so many other kinds of plants on earth, by eating it?

Anyone have any experience using their Christmas tree in the kitchen?

Thanksgiving celebrates abundance. And we should absolutely enjoy the celebration. At the same time, I don’t think we honor anyone or anything by wasting food.

I’m calling on you to help ensure that your family or friends do their best to eliminate or minimize waste at your Thanksgiving feast. Here are a few ideas:

• Be sure to distribute the bounty. If you’re the Thanksgiving host, suggest that your guests bring along a few plastic containers of various sizes to fill with leftovers (or have a bunch on hand). There’s no sense centralizing so much food that we’ll struggle to put to use. Being so overt about leftovers may feel a bit odd, but that slight discomfort will pale in comparison to the disappointment from having to toss pounds of once-good food.

• Celebrate abundance, not excess. Don’t take too much when you serve yourself. You can always go back for seconds! Keep in mind that the average Thanksgiving dinner today comes in, conservatively, at 2,057 calories. And remember, what’s on our plates is seldom saved.

• Properly save those leftovers. And do it quickly. Not letting foods sit out too long in the bacteria danger zone (40-140 degrees F) will mean they’ll be safe to eat and also last longer.

• Plan for your leftovers…and eat them! Whether it’s a turkey pot pie, turkey soup or turkey tacos, find some fun ideas that’ll get you excited to use up your T-day remains.

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Share Your Tips and Tricks

Help others reduce waste around Thanksgiving by sharing your insight. We’ve already received a few helpful tips, including Rachel’s idea to make notes on the number of guests, the amount of food eaten and the amount remaining to help prepare the right amount next year.

I’m directing people to the Wasted Food Facebook page where we are compiling a series of tips, successes and–should they occur–failures. These can be videos, photos or descriptions from inside people’s Thanksgiving dinners.  Feel free to post during the prep, the dinner itself, or the “aftermath.” Together, we’ll create a living blueprint for how celebrations can balance abundance with respect for resources.

A few ideas:

• Videos describing what your friends/family are doing this year to reduce food waste. Or, if a video is too much, a photo or description of the steps taken will work just fine.
• A recipe or two for your favorite dishes made from Thanksgiving leftovers.
• Your preferred way to make the perfect leftover turkey sandwiches.
• An “unboxing” video of leftovers from the dinner you attended.

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Spread the Word!

• I hope you will consider letting your social network know about the Be Thankful, Not Wasteful initiative. Please share this post and ask folks to take action on their own. (And of course to post their results!)

• Do you blog? Please consider a post or video encouraging your readers to participate. Ask readers to join you in adding their voice to the discussion.

• Mention the initiative–and this fabulous new book–at your Thanksgiving celebration. I mean, I don’t want you to start any dinner table arguments or anything, but…

• Solicit tips and tricks from your friends and family who aren’t social media savvy and post them yourself – I know I’ll be asking my Grandma for some ideas.

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Thanksgiving is the one day of the year where we’re all focused on food. Let’s leverage that as a call to action to change our wasteful ways for the rest of the year. I think the day will be more meaningful that way. And remember — even incremental changes can have a massive effect if they’re done by millions of Americans.

Yet, with all of our abundance, though, comes the threat of waste. That’s why I’m hoping you guys will submit some advice here and on the Wasted Food Facebook page about how you plan to avoid waste at Thanksgiving.

I want to leave it wide open to allow for creativity in content and medium. But bonus points for anyone who uploads a photo or video (on Facebook) illustrating strategy or tips.

Whether it’s through words, images or both, let’s get a good dialogue going!

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Also–Finally, some clear insight on the Food Safety Bill! I still can’t believe how hard it is to find news on this piece of legislation.

Pumpkins are the most wasted food in homes (by weight), as detailed in a soon-to-be published study that shall remain nameless. Yet, I can’t get too worked up about pumpkin waste when they’ve served their purpose–a cultural, not a culinary one.

Besides, there are so many more galling kinds of food waste. At the same time…that doesn’t mean we have to let our  pumpkins go for naught. We can cook with their innards.

This tends to work best with the sugar pie variety of pumpkin, but can happen with most any kind. The ideas are endless, from muffins to cookies to soup to burgers fries.

And then there are the glorious seeds. There’s a container of them in my fridge awaiting roasting. (Tomorrow, I’ve promised myself).

If it’s too late to eat your pumpkin (and if you live in a colder climate, even carved ones could still be edible), try to keep it out of the landfill. In other words, compost it!

Seattle and San Francisco residents have it easy. They can slip their pumpkins in their mandatory curbside food waste bin. The rest of us must turn to backyard bins. If that’s not on, maybe we can “return” pumpkins to the woods or bring them to that farm with a pumpkin cannon.