Category Archives: Supermarket

Tuesday Buffet

There’s some evidence that the issue of food waste is catching on in China, albeit in a fairly political way. According to the official newspaper of the Communist Youth League, the abundant food waste can be blamed on the wealthy. — — Waitrose, the British grocery chain, just announced that it now sends no food […]

October 30, 2012 | Also posted in Anaerobic Digestion, Friday Buffet, International | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

In case you haven’t heard of it, the Save Food initiative is doing important work to reduce and raise awareness about food waste. — — One of the less discussed byproducts of reduced food waste–reduced trash hauling costs. A Pennsylvania ShopRite franchisee with 10 stores saved $20,000 in three months by donating edible but unsellable […]

June 8, 2012 | Also posted in Energy, Friday Buffet, Household | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

A Washington supermarket has an on-site contraption that converts food waste into liquid fertilizer. Organics alchemy, in action! — — The 42 million pounds of food that Forgotten Harvest will recover this year is…a lot. The most, actually. — — Piles of Indian wheat rotting by the side of the road? What a shame; what […]

May 11, 2012 | Also posted in Composting, Food Recovery, Friday Buffet, General, Personal | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

This Just In: Massachusetts is planning to ban commercial food waste from landfills. That means large restaurants, hospitals, universities and other large generators would have to compost or create energy with their waste. The ban, likely to go into effect in 2014, would be the first of its kind in the U.S. — — Chuck Schumer […]

May 4, 2012 | Also posted in Composting, Restaurant, Waste Stream | Comments closed

Sensing a Problem II

There’s something in the air at Boston-area universities. The smell of rotten fruit, perhaps? Last week I wrote about a Tufts project to embed scannable, edible patches on food items to communicate bacteria levels. Now comes word of an M.I.T. project to help retailers know when food is ripening: The new sensors, described in the journal Angewandte Chemie, […]

May 3, 2012 | Also posted in Technology | Comments closed

Bi Into This Challenge

With Earth Day fast approaching, the good people at Bi-Rite Market have issued a challenge. A Food Waste Challenge. Here’s how it works: Leave a comment on the Bi-Rite blog post on the food that you or your community often wastes. Then, the San Fran retailer will identify foods that are often wasted. Bi-Rite will […]

March 26, 2012 | Also posted in Household | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

While the UK leads the way in waste reduction, they lag in food recovery. A certain Member of Parliament is out to change that. Kerry McCarthy hopes to introduce legislation requiring supermarkets to donate surplus food, rewarding other businesses for donating food and establishing a US-style Good Samaritan Act. And it being 2012, here’s the text of […]

March 16, 2012 | Also posted in Friday Buffet, International, Personal | Comments closed

Flash Freezing

Let me get this straight–before last week, all perishable food bought in the UK carried the advice to ‘freeze food on day of purchase?!’ Seriously? Happily, that is no longer the case at the major British chain Sainsbury’s, as they’ve backed off that uber-cautious advice. With the backing of the waste-reduction crew at WRAP, Sainsbury’s labels […]

February 15, 2012 | Also posted in International | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

Anyone looking to rescue some food should check out this awesome produce recovery guide. Thanks to Rotary First Harvest for putting out the uber-useful guide. — — UCSB has begun a student-led composting project. The best part is that students are the ones doing the sorting. While that means a lower food waste capture rate […]

February 3, 2012 | Also posted in College, Composting, Food Recovery, International | Comments closed

Friday Buffet

Looks like in.gredients, the Austin-based zero-waste store is set to open by the end of the year. The bulk food vender will mostly sell to customers wielding their own containers, but compostable packaging will be for sale, too. I’m excited to see this operation in action! — — Statistics New Zealand just released some interesting…statistics […]

November 18, 2011 | Also posted in Composting, Environment, Friday Buffet, International, Waste Stream | Comments closed