Reducing Food Waste

So many parents tell me that they resort to “slam dunk” foods like chicken nuggets and mac and cheese partly because they feel terrible about how much food is wasted when they serve their kids “adult” food. Even my adult clients complain that eating out is cheaper because many of their groceries go bad before they use them. No one likes wasting food - it’s terrible for the environment, not to mention our wallets. But there’s so many ways to minimize food waste that don’t involve compromising on food quality for you or your kids.

This pic was snapped on a Tuesday, so just 1 day after my “big” weekly grocery run. All of our produce for the week is in that lower right drawer and includes baby carrots, cherry tomatoes, zucchini and asparagus. There’s some pepperoni and prosciutto in the meat drawer (lower left) as well as the thawing chicken in the bowl and the goat shoulder that is rubbed down and awaiting the smoker. There’s some refried beans and quick pickled carrots that are leftover and need to be used up. Everything else you see is more or less a long-lasting staple that we replace only if it runs out. (Minus the Budweiser which is leftover from a party, haha.)

1. My number one strategy for everyone, with or without kids, is to shop based on a very specific meal plan. Stop going to the grocery store and buying a bunch of produce with good intentions but no actual plan. I think most people would be shocked to see how empty my fridge is. I typically do one big grocery trip on Sunday or Monday and a few smaller ones throughout the week to pick up the odd item. My big trip always happens after I have mapped out our meal plan for the whole week, so everything I buy (other than a few non-perishable staples) has a very specific purpose.

2. Don’t be afraid to use leftovers. BUT, don’t feel like using leftovers means eating the exact same meal for dinner three nights in a row. Instead, get creative. I do sometimes eat dinner leftovers verbatim for lunch at work, but mostly we re-purpose them for breakfast in one way or another. By adding eggs or using them on top of toast, it suddenly feels like a very different meal. If you follow me on Instagram, you’ll see this first hand in my daily meal posts. We eat some “crazy” stuff for breakfast!

3. On a similar note, we have a few go-to dinner “recipes” that eat up random bits of cooked and uncooked food languishing in our fridge. My favorites are fried rice, enchiladas and frittatas. They can all use pretty much any meat, fish or vegetable that you need to get rid of. Another good one is “sh*t on toast” (a term coined by Chrissy Teigan, I believe). So far this week for breakfast we’ve used up 1/3 tub of hummus, 1/4 of a red pepper and 4 slices of deli turkey to make open faced sandwiches, and 1/2 can of refried beans to make “Mexican toast” with cheese and scrambled eggs.

4. For those of you with kids, I would definitely recommend serving them smaller portions of everything to start, mainly so that they don’t taint everything on their plate with their grubby hands, making you hesitant to save it for a future meal.

5. And if all else fails…feed it to the dog! I’m actually serious about this, hear me out. We have two dogs, and in the last few years we’ve started taking our breakfast and dinner plates to the counter where my husband and I divvy up any scraps into their food bowls. We’re careful not to give them anything with onions, chocolate, grapes or raisins, but most other stuff is fair game. If there was a substantial amount of protein in the scraps, that might be their whole meal. If not, we’ll top the bowl off with some of their dog food. They have always eaten twice a day, so using breakfast and dinner leftovers keeps them on their normal schedule. Also, by using their normal bowls we avoid bad habits at the table and can better eyeball their portion sizes. I am not a veterinarian, nor do I specialize in canine nutrition, but as a dietitian I struggle to believe that a more varied diet of nutrient dense animal and plant foods could be worse for dogs than eating the same exact dog food every day of their life. And, anecdotally, our 8 year old and 12 year old 40-pound dogs continue to be robustly healthy despite a pretty sedentary city lifestyle.

Maddie knows to ask if the meal had onions, and if not, to bring her plate to the counter instead of the sink. When everyone is done (including lazy Frankie taking his sweet time in the background) we pile everything into the bowls and top off with dog food as needed. It’s saved us a lot of money in dog food!