Hugh's War on Waste

suki1964

Well I have just watched both programmes and I'm very impressed with the format

Waste in my own home isn't a major problem as we don't waste food, recycle everything we can and donate to charity shops. We also buy second hand as much as possible. I'm not perfect and I know we could do more as my recycle bin is usually full every fortnight


The clothing waste was an eye opener to me. I was just gob smacked to learn people throw clothes away. When did this start happening ???
To shop for clothes weekly??? Flip I had to buy new jeans and boots this week and just doing two shops was enough to make me feel worn out, and they were only bought because I live in jeans and only have one pair fit to be worn outside the house and my 4 year old boots are no longer reparable lol. Hubby would buy more clothes then me, but he wears them till they die, moving them from good, to work, to garden clothes. It's only when there are more holes then cloth do clothes get thrown away here

I live in a farming community and I'm well aware of the supermarkets hold on the farmers. It's heart breaking seeing fields ploughed back into the fields due to cancelled orders. It's bad enough when we get wet weather so the fields can't be harvested, but to blatantly waste food because it's not perfect is criminal

We grow what we can. My parsnips sometimes have up to six legs but they are still tasty. My carrots are getting huge, one will feed two easily. They aren't straight either but so sweet. My lettuce are full if slugs as are my cabbages. Hell the cabbages have been nibbled even, but they are perfectly fit for human consumption. I'm also lucky that I can buy from the farm gate rather then rely on supermarkets

What did upset me the most was the chicken/ meat waste. I'm no vegetarian, I love my meat. I understand we grow animals to supply that meat, no other reason. To me if you are going to eat meat, you have the responsibility to eat all of the animal, not kill it, chop it up and throw it away

My food waste nearly zero. What we don't eat, either the dog eats or the chickens eat. Or last resort it's composted to feed next years crop Last nights " leftovers" a couple of boiled pots and a spoonful of peas the chooks are scoffing now. In return I will get some really scrummy eggs for a meal later in the week

I liked how Hugh showed families how to use up "waste", esp the children. Once again I think the lack of cooking skill leads to "waste" , so many of us on this board know there is no such thing as waste, just another meal to be made, yet there's so many more who come post who don't realise that a couple of bits of ropey veg is a soup base and that blemished over ripe fruit is a smoothie or crumble or pie waiting to be made

I also like that Hugh admits it's all a conundrum and that there really is no one answer to sort it all out. Yes the supermarkets play a role, but we consumers have to accept our part. Back in the 70's early 80's I was a produce manager for sainsburys Back then we used to sell class 1 and class11 fruit and veg, at completely different prices. We also expected to sell out every night with fresh deliveries Tuesday to Friday. There was no real delivery on Saturday , only what was left in stock and nothing on a Monday. Same with bread and milk. You were expected to shop early to get what you wanted or risk empty shelves. I remember M&S would rarely have full shelves, it came in when it came in and was gone when it was gone. No reducing of food back then to clear overstock. But also back then fruit was ripe and veg was fresh and mostly everything was seasonal. Food waste on a whole was not acceptable in the store, we had a level of 1%- went over and your bonus was hit. Not even dented tins were reduced unless the angle of the dent was acute or close to the rim. Was only those tins that lost their labels that were reduced, you got to learn to identify a label less tin really well lol. Meat, bread, cakes, veg etc was sold to the staff canteen. It really was only food not fit for consumption bagged and binned - with a good spray of bleach over it to stop dumpster divers taking it

Our 24hr society I believe plays a big part of this food waste from supermarkets. People want to shop on Sundays and the middle of the night and they want full shelves so obviously supermarkets have to over stock


I'm not making out I'm a saint, far from it. I've done my fair share of mindless spending just because I had money. Having to learn to live on a smaller income has been challenging yet it also opened both mine and husbands eyes to what we were wasting and even though we aren't scrimping to find the money to pay the bills, we have come to actually enjoy our less commercial lifestyle. The more I enjoy it the less I like to spend in the supermarkets. Tesco only get my custom for strong flour and yeast and the reduced section, lidl gets the rest of my grocery shopping, the butchers gets my custom for meat and the chicken factory for poultry where I can buy top quality chickens rejected by waitrose and marks as well as the other big names because of over stock or over/undersized for as little as 25p each and each time I get a bargain like that I love thumbing my nose to the supermarkets lol

GreyQueen

I buy my fruit and veg, the proportion I don't grow on the allotment, from one of the few independant greegrocers left. It's a family firm, I knew his old dad before him. He tells me that independants like him account for a mere 3% of the grocery trade today.

He also told me of a farmer he knows, under contract to one of the big supermarkets for broccoli. The season ended unexpectedly early and the broccoli were finished with a few weeks of deliveries left on the contract. The supermarket held him to it and the only place he could get the veg was from California, at ruinous expense. The Cali-grown broccoli wiped out all the profit (and then some) from the English-grown broccoli and they worked for nothing and it nearly sunk the farm.

Anyone who grows veg knows that harvests, both in timing and quantity, are unpredictable. I suspect farmers have to commit to gross over-production in order to avoid under-delivering on the contract.

This isn't an insurmountable problem but it does have to be dealt with at the contractural level, with flexibility if the season is shortened because of climatic reasons/ pests/ diseases etc.

Morries had a flyer delivered to my address today, which is a first. They are in my bad books and although I will be passing by their store in the next week or two on other business, I ain't darkening their doors for the foreseeable future.

Justamum

suki1964 wrote: »

We grow what we can. My parsnips sometimes have up to six legs but they are still tasty. My carrots are getting huge, one will feed two easily.

What's your secret? Mine are so small that they wouldn't feed Barbie :rotfl:

suki1964

Justamum wrote: »

What's your secret? Mine are so small that they wouldn't feed Barbie :rotfl:

Horse manure

Even though all those books say not too much for root crops, we put a couple of barrows in each year and we get good root crops

However we can't grow an onion or cauliflower to save our lives lol

We plant in March and they are good sized come September

Justamum

suki1964 wrote: »

Horse manure

Even though all those books say not too much for root crops, we put a couple of barrows in each year and we get good root crops

However we can't grow an onion or cauliflower to save our lives lol

We plant in March and they are good sized come September

I'll have to give that a go. I managed to grow some onions this year with only one loss from 30 onions sets planted.

We have a Bramley apple tree which we do nothing with and it grows so many apples I give up with them - I cook them and freeze them, but if I did them all I'd have no room for anything else!

martinsurrey

GreyQueen wrote: »

He also told me of a farmer he knows, under contract to one of the big supermarkets for broccoli.

Anyone who grows veg knows that harvests, both in timing and quantity, are unpredictable. I suspect farmers have to commit to gross over-production in order to avoid under-delivering on the contract.

This isn't an insurmountable problem but it does have to be dealt with at the contractural level, with flexibility if the season is shortened because of climatic reasons/ pests/ diseases etc.

You are right, what would happen if the supermarkets didn't renew his contract as they were going to be more flexible with their other suppliers and not insist on having so much oversupply and taking all of the other farms produce not just the best of the bunch?

Would we then be angry at the supermarkets for not giving him a contract and forcing him and hundreds of other farms to close?

Living_proof

Justamum wrote: »

I'll have to give that a go. I managed to grow some onions this year with only one loss from 30 onions sets planted.

We have a Bramley apple tree which we do nothing with and it grows so many apples I give up with them - I cook them and freeze them, but if I did them all I'd have no room for anything else!

Do you know anyone with a dehydrator justamum? You could then dry them and they rehydrate very well in crumbles, stewed apple dishes etc. This year I have had an unlimited supply of cooking apples and a large number of eating varieties too. I think it safe to say I don't want to see another apple for a good number of months! I have dried so many I doubt I will be able to use them all before next year's crop will be available, and we have taken to cider making in an attempt not to waste any. We were offered more today but had to admit we are all appled-out. I suppose I could put them on my compost heap and then they would be serving a useful purpose.

moneyistooshorttomention

All of this brings me personally neatly back in a circle to the way I asked my local food bank if they would want any surplus fruit/veggies I produced and the answer was Yes.

I think we even need to be aware down to a pretty micro level if someone somewhere might want our "surplus". Even just little things like I often get packets of free seeds with a gardening magazine I get. If some of them aren't ones I want personally - then I've put them out with a little notice inviting people to help themselves for free and most of them have been taken.

Every little helps...

[Deleted User]

Just watched it on catch-up tv and like Hugh I am fuming .Do Morrisons honestly think the buying public are stupid.It seems they think we are all a lot of sheep who don't know our !!!!! from our elbow.

Come on fellow Frugalers vote with your feet and tell Morrisons not to be so blasted condescending to their customers.

I for one won't bother to go near the place again and most of my friends, who like me watch the pennies and shop with care for things we really need, irrespective of the fact a carrot might be a bit wonky or a parsnip has a blemish God know how we ever survived rationing ,if my late Mum had to worry about something like that we would have been very hungry kids indeed
More power to Hugh's elbow, he has shown the supermarkets for what they are, greedy money-grabbing corporations who don't give a tinkers cuss about their most important asset ..their customers

The two 'suits' sent out to talk to him looked extremely uncomfortable and didn't really want to agree with his common sense attitude He asked perfectly reasonable questions and was given a corporate lecture as though he was talking rubbish.

So as I, said Vote with your feet and don't talk been spoken to as though you are half-witted.Housewives are some of the most astute economists in the country Morrisons may we rue the day they treated us as though we hadn't a clue.

PixieDust

I have been inspired by this thread and the programme, and have had a rummage in the bottom of the fridge. I have chopped and cooked off half an onion (seen better days but still edible), half a courgette, half a yellow pepper and a few teeny tiny whole mushrooms that we had left over from last week. I now have a yummy looking accompaniment for some pasta or a jacket spud tomorrow for lunch. I am by no means one of nature's little cooks but I am feeling jolly chuffed with myself just now for creating something from nothing and saving waste