What Garbage!

I absolutely HATE throwing away food.  Especially if it’s perfectly good.  I’ll even eat questionable things, because as my dad says, “Waste not, want not.”  I don’t want a food-borne illness situation, but face it, most foods just squig you out–they do not literally make you ill if ingested.  The last time I had any sort of food poisoning was at that sushi restaurant in SanFran in 2007.  And for $6 a plate, I was happy for the rental, actually.  Just cook it longer–gosh high temperatures will kill a lot of bugs.

Some people are not this way.  Most, I would argue.  I’m appalled at how much food people chose not to eat.  Or the way people will NOT clean their plate at a restaurant–where they paid large sums.  School lunches and buffets are more then likely the biggest culprits of food waste.  Kids are picky, and have relatively small appetites, and the food offered is not good.  So a LOT of perfectly good food (some even in original wrappers) gets tossed.  And buffets have a lot of waste just because of the sheer volume of food offered.  I have been a victim of eyes bigger then my stomach more then a few times.

On Marion Nestle’s blog, the consensus of the foodies seemed to be the even giving fast food to the homeless was inappropriate.  All of them favored giving organic, natural, locally-grown options that they themselves would eat.  And I argue, that those do-gooders have no fucking clue, and when it’s a matter of eating at ALL, quality doesn’t matter all that much.  And I say–get real pretentious people *eye roll*

And I wonder if Nevada, state of the best, largest, and most buffets (true statement), donates the leftovers to food banks, homless shelters, or Meals on Wheels.  I would like to think so, but it’s difficult to know.  Every place has it’s own policy.  Also, donating old food can be logistically difficult and turn into a costly endeavor.  You know food have to be kept at certain temperatures to avoid culturing something nasty and harmful, so it’s not just a matter of hauling leftovers across town.  We’re talking refrigeration trucks.

http://www.rgj.com/article/20120508/NEWS20/305080001/Fact-Checker-Must-schools-throw-out-leftovers-

I watched a documentary on the New York homeless who live under subways and they were indicating restaurants there pour bleach over their trash.  I think this is SUPER-unethical and wasteful.  Why do that???  I’m not even certain why businesses would DO that.  I’m glad it wasn’t happening in the NorthWest, as Cool’s roommate would rumage the trash behind some grocery story or organic something or other and would bring whole crates of fresh fruits and vegetables back to the frat house (and store them in the dishwasher???  but that another story for another post).  This is socially and environmentally conscious Seattle that all this fresh produce was just put in the garbage.  What a shame.  Waste of resources, waste of money, wasteful. . .

So moral:  Eat what you take.  If you don’t it’s hard to tell if it will be donated or plucked out of the trash.