Do you have shopping habits? I know I do. One of them, for reasons I can’t explain, is that if I go intro a shop to buy a set of ingredients or top up supplies (and it tends to be me who does this), if one or two of the items are on some form of ‘buy two cheaper’ deal, I then have to buy two of everything else too. I caught myself looking at my basket the other day and thinking my two loaves of bread, two pints of milk, two boxes of grapes and two boxes of Belvita biscuits could have people mistaking me for someone with OCD. 😆 (You don’t have to say it. I know).
Of course in a family with 7 people to feed, bulk buying under any circumstances is rarely much of a problem but part of that comes from the fact that Max – control freak extraordinaire in the kitchen department – takes very good care of our shopping and food buying. He plans meals, he cooks according to what is in the cupboards and we rarely throw away anything that isn’t food scraps. In an ideal world I’d be feeding that to my chickens and pigs – but I’m a way off that lifestyle yet. (Rabbits are rubbish vacuum cleaners of food scraps… if excellent at eating carpet and book spines). In our town we have a Hungry Harry worktop box that is collected weekly so food is disposed of separately to rubbish and part of the kitchen design Max and I just worked on involves managing our waste better so that we can buy intelligently (less packaging, more targeted use of offers and reduced food) and dispose of waste in a way that is more thoughtful of our environment.
It’s a staggering fact that a typical family of our size throws away £700 worth of edible food a year (a smaller family £470) and 15 million tonnes of food is thrown away in the UK each year; the better news is that in recent years that has reduced by 21% overall.
AO.com (who won my undying loyalty a few years ago when I won a washing machine in my hour of darkest need and from whom I have bought every appliance since have done a fun interactive animation called The Wasteless Journey, aimed at helping people to plan meals and reduce needless waste in the kitchen. When I get to the ‘buy a new fridge freezer’ (from AO, naturally!) part of the new kitchen experience in 3 weeks time, I shall be bearing them all in mind! (PS. I may go on a lot about the kitchen in the next few weeks!)
The Waste-less Journey has been created by AO.com
Disclosure: in association with AO.com.
I am more aware of our family’s food waste now more than ever as I have had to reduce my working hours so I am trying to cut back . Our rabbits get left over fruit and veg and our dogs make excellent Hoover’s ! It is good to write about this and help remind people of this so hopefully we can all be more consciences in the kitchen and save ourselves some hard earned money .