Order of the Bath

As my family will testify, I am rather obsessive about waste. I think this is learned behaviour from my father and grandmother who taught me from a very young age what it meant. I can probably count the occasions when I have left food on my plate and then it was either because I was ill or the victim of over generous restaurants (which I will never visit again). I have also been known to cadge unwanted morsels from other people which probably makes me an embarrassment in company. It is hard sometimes not to berate others who leave perfectly good meals, don’t be surprised if I no longer talk to you if you are guilty. I will turn off television programs where waste or destruction is a feature of the entertainment. I have been known to cry in extreme cases, such as the Jersey tomato wars (yes, they are seared in my memory) or when our almost new car was written off. It may also account for why I am a little larger than I ought to be (if it is served then I will eat it) and why our house is full of things that “may come in useful one day.”

So I could probably answer today’s reported survey honestly and say that “No, I don’t waste food” unless you count over-eating as waste, which we probably should. By the way, you need to read the referenced article carefully. Half of the waste they are talking about is genuine rubbish; peelings, bones and used tea bags for instance. I am not interested in the environmental bandwagon that this report is hanging on but the fundamental principle that we should only consume (in whatever way) what we need. Anything else is theft.

There are sources of waste which never even reach the customer and the report doesn’t mention them. Food is trimmed so only the presentable bits are left in the packet, even though the other parts are good, and, even if not consumable, serve to protect the remainder. Use-by and Sell-by days often err on the ridiculously cautious side. We know, in most cases, what is good and what is bad and when we can’t, crying wolf too often only makes things worse. In what way will salt or sugar go bad (if kept dry).

“There’s nothing wrong with mouldy cheese, just cut the mould off”

said Antony Worrall Thompson

“I remember in the old days, when you got a big joint on Sunday.
You’d have cold meat on Monday, cottage pie or shepherds pie on Tuesday, curry on Wednesday and so it would go on until you got a bit of fish on Friday.”

Don’t people still do that? We do.

This entry was posted on 16 Mar 2007 at 12:46 by Rick and is filed under Miscellaneous. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.