Blog Update!
For those of you not following me on Facebook, as of the Summer of 2019 I've moved to Central WA, to a tiny mountain town of less than 1,000 people.

I will be covering my exploits here in the Cascades, as I try to further reduce my impact on the environment. With the same attitude, just at a higher altitude!

Sunday, February 28, 2010

Food Waste Challenge check-in: week 4

Well, today wraps up the last week of this year's Food Waste Reduction Challenge. We did fairly well and I was responsible for composting only the following:

1 cup cooked Cream of Wheat
1 cup corn cereal
1/2 grapefruit

I must admit I would have not thrown these foods out except for the fact that I had the stomach flu all week long (Monday through Thursday). Since I didn't actually eat anything during those days, it was easy to reduce the food waste generated to some degree. By the same token, I couldn't eat the leftover grapefruit that I left out on Sunday for fear of hurling it back up.

When I was able to eat again, I overestimated the amount of Cream of Wheat I could stomach. Particularly since, after a few hours, it turns into an unpalatable gelatinous mass. Same deal with the cereal. I thought it would settle my stomach, but it just made me queasy. Anyway, I'm definitely feeling better, but still not able to eat what I'd like to. Oh well. At least now I'm down at my goal weight :)

How was your last week of the challenge? How did this year's challenge help you be aware of the food waste you generate? Did it help at all?

10 comments:

Kate said...

I wonder whether you could treat cold cream of wheat the way some fancy restaurants treat polenta. It can be cooled after cooking, then sliced and pan fried for use with some delectable topping. Sort of like a crostini base, but from corn or wheat mush.

Sounds like you could really use some laying hens, Deanna. Most of your waste could have been happily turned into eggs. Between the hens, the worms, and the acidic stuff (tea leaves, citrus rinds) that gets chucked on the blueberry patch, we don't throw any part of any food away anymore. Though we certainly could still be better about consuming *some* of that stuff ourselves rather than passing it down the chain.

Tree Huggin Momma said...

I did pretty good. Nothing but shells, peels, and coffee grounds to compost here. It has kinda helped not having a functioning fridge. I put everything to cool on the porch (which is staying 35-40 during the day) and when its cool, it goes in the cooler or the freezer. I could definately live without a fridge in the winter

Farmer's Daughter said...

Oh yeah! I knew I was supposed to be keeping track of something this week. This challenge has been a total fail for me, in that I completely forget about it just minutes after commenting on it.

Not a lot of food gets wasted around here, cause we like to eat and my brothers come over and they're like garbage cans. But I totally forgot to keep track.

I blame the pregnancy! :)

Jennifer said...

@ Kate

I didn't even think of the blueberries concerning the acidic foods worms and chickens won't eat. What a wonderful idea, THANK YOU!

Crunchy you need a few chickens, they take all sorts of left overs, I've even get some scraps from my family that live near by rather than throw it out. It does reduce your feed costs.

Oldnovice said...

Turned all the carrots ready to go bad into carrot-raisin salad and carrot cake, but now I'm struggling to eat up THOSE dishes.

The problem seems to be that our family is now too small to be able to finish standard sizes without overeating. Spring will help, as I can pull off only enough lettuce leaves for a small salad in my garden but can't buy 1/4 head of romaine at the store.

If you have the challenge next year, I'll probably sign up again, but I'm thanking the Spaghetti Monster right now that this one's over.

Robj98168 said...

I did fairly well. Just some beer and onions from a brat moment. And yse the brats were local. Homemade brats from a friend!
@KATE- Yes you can do that to cold cream of wheat... my mom used to do it all the time

Sandy said...

My major mess up was a dish of thawed strawberries from my freezer that I lost in the back of the fridge (which is doubly wasteful since the goats love them too!). It was helpful to have the challenge as a barometer. I kept track of things before they spoiled and froze them or ate them. Thanks!

Ashley said...

We ended up with 6 burnt shrimp (two others were still edible, as proven by grandpa popping them in his mouth)and the ends of celery from the big pot of stew we made.

With the cold and wet weather, it's been soup season here. Clam chowder, chili and stew were on the menu with nothing left to toss.

ThiftedBliss said...

Pretty good week here, tossed 1/2 cucumber that was mushy into the compost along with some lettuce that I forgot to re-wrap and it got slimy. Have really focused on meal planning with leftovers which we always eat but usually for lunch and some would go bad as they got pushed to the back of the fridge. My biggest lesson from this challenge was to buy less so I will waste less. If you can't see it, the food will spoil. Thanks for a fun month! Karen from CT

Allie said...

Not a great week for me. I lost 2 tortillas and 2 shrimp spring rolls.