Food waste is a huge problem in Africa (no joke). Seasonal food such as banana is not harvested fast enough:
> [There’s] $4 billion (USD) equivalent of food losses in a year in the continent and if you can conceptualize what four billion can do to alleviate poverty in our various countries, then you can understand the waste and the economic deprivation that food loss is causing the continent,
Telling people to not "waste" food does the opposite, because now people will eat too much because it's more than they need, thus becoming fatter etc. and then being shitty workers and ending up producing much less food than they don't throw out.
Sometimes there is ideas that are short-sighted but difficult problems so it's understandable to just look at it like an idiot. This isn't one of them, this like an idea from a 2 year old, literally. Like one from the ghetto who hasn't even learned their ABC's yet.
Gotta love the morons who think it is possible to avoid wasting food completely. Reliability is only achieved through redundancy. If we only ever had just enough of everything, we would always be on the brink of a famine if something went wrong.
Reminds me of the local cafeteria at my uni that reduced food waste, so when I went there at 1PM to avoid the crowds (they served until 1:30PM) there was just no food left. Good job, so helpful.
And after all, "Winter is coming." I'm kidding, but really, it would also mean that a country without such a precarious balance could conquer you without military force.
I would prefer not to be at the mercy of some crop dusters with paraquat.
There are two sides to this though. There should be a sane middle ground. At a college, maybe the thing to do is have a fire sale on (or give away) things that are about to expire.
I remember that my college food service had a policy that food that was considered waste had to be thrown in the dumpster, and not doing so was grounds for being fired. A friend had to throw out around 20 pounds of fresh fruit every Friday because the venue that they were at wasn't open over the weekend.
Paying more for scraps than for fresh food? Absolutely ridiculous. Leave it to SF hipsters to be into this kind of thing, especially while talking about how "green" and "eco-friendly" they are.
It doesn't mean anything to me. The word has been abused and stretched so far beyond whatever context it originally came from that it seems completely meaningless.
Let's please try to use language more precisely. Are you really suggesting "hipster" is "completely meaningless"? I mean, it's not completely meaningless when a baby gurgles. Do a Google Images search and let your mind do its magic.
There's one in every thread. Are all categorizations meaningless? Can you define what a "nerd" is, or a "jock", or a "goth"? Just because a categorization is fuzzy doesn't mean it can't be agreed upon by the majority of a population.
A personality affectation characterized by the adoption of outmoded fashions, faux nostalgia for things and eras the hipster never themselves experienced, ostentatious self-awareness and histrionic introspection designed to showcase the hipster's own moral superiority relative to mainstream society, and above all irony as the sole mode of existence, the denial of the possibility of authentic non-referential experience, and the pervasive implicit and explicit ridicule of those who think that authentic, non-ironic, non-referential experience is possible.
There's a CSA I just signed up called Imperfect Produce. They deliver boxes of produce that doesn't meet the aesthetic requirements for grocery stores. Sounds like a more economical version of this.
I have gotten flyers for Imperfect Produce in my mail, but their advertised 40-50% savings off of supermarket prices seem completely false. I like the concept, but I can buy "aesthetically pleasing" fruits and vegetables for cheaper at the store.
I think it still causes people to overeat, though. Most people ask for a takeout box only after they stuff themselves really full and realize they won't be able to finish the serving.
Food is cheap compared to the costs of prepping and cooking and serving it, so restaurants have an incentive to sell you more food to ensure you feel like you got a good deal.
In many countries they have smaller servings - but it's typical to eat 2-3 servings. In the US we often have larger servings (equivalent to 2-3 servings) but only eat the one.
Having traveled quite a bit, the largest discrepancy in serving sizes I've noticed is that the US really likes drinks. Especially sodas and especially 60oz sodas. Everywhere I go gives me a "kids sized" cup of water to down with my meal...
Not to do with serving sizes as listed on boxes, but I believe the amount of food that regularly winds up on a plate in the US is more than what we get elsewhere - especially at home. Or so I've been told.
In the UK, when I go out to eat food, I'll occasionally have a starter before my main, and nearly always end up stuffed. It's a lot more food than what we eat at home.
What? That's simply not true, I've traveled through almost all of Europe and even lived in some of those places and nowhere it was "normal" to get 2-3 servings.
Unless you get tapas in Spain. Or do a festive 15-plate all-day gluttony somewhere in France, where one of those is 2 oysters and the next 50g of steak with a potato and the next a piece of Camembert. That's not normal though, only for festivities. So.. one exception.
Maybe the parent comment is counting the salad, the soup and the dessert?
But these are not "servings" as the OP was talking about, i.e. for the same dish (main course) that you would get 2-3 servings, something we don't do normally in Europe (perhaps only in big celebrations like Christmas).
This is anecdotal but I was just in France recently and the portion sizes were comparable to most urban areas in the US that I have eaten at (obviously it is not comparable to the rural areas engorging Golden Corral).
The big difference is Europe seems to eat a lot less meat. The meat portions were much smaller but replaced with carbs and alcohol.
As an American I felt embarrassed that I could not finish half the Michelin star meals because they were so rich (albeit incredibly good).
IMO when it comes to food waste meat is the real culprit.
My experience of French food is exactly the opposite. Meat is central, with some vegetables on the side. There is a lot of fat in the form of oil and cheese. Carbs, such as bread, are side dishes at best.
In fact, I struggle to think of a French meal that isn't animal product-centred (I'm including fish, eggs, snails etc.)
The biggest difference is they have smaller portions and way fewer carbs. You won't go out for breakfast in France and be faced with a huge stack of pancakes with hash browns and toast.
As a French in the US for a few years now, I second with some nuance. First there would never be meat at breakfast in France for instance, forget the bacon strips and the eggs... Also, diner in my family was often "bread and vegetable soup", or "pasta and tomato sauce". So while the main "traditional" dishes have meat, we don't always eat meat.
Also, while traditional dishes have meat inside, what makes the French Cuisine is not tied to it: you can get most of the taste from some nice sauces, often based of wine.
Other than a salad, I'm not sure I really see "non animal-based" meal in the US either (unless going to an Indian restaurant, or a vegetarian one).
Well I'm not French and I was just vacationing but this is what I saw:
* French eating/dining is extremely bakery heavy.
* Every meal bread is served and lots of it (most Americans think white bread is the worse thing you can eat)
* In the morning I witnessed both in Paris and Nice consumption of pastries and not meat for breakfast
* At lunch I saw most eating sandwiches. Sandwiches with tomato and cheeses. If there was meat it was sparingly and not the subway of america 2 pounds of meat style.
* I ate predominately in French bistros and taverns. Steak Frites in France is more like Frites with an elbow size piece of steak (compare this to any # of the steak houses in) America)
* There are many new renowned chefs that are pushing a more vegetable dining experience (France is still cutting edge for food) over the traditional French Cuisine.
* Going back to bread I saw many of the locals walking home eating baguettes that they just bought. I remember this vividly as my wife commented how you never see people walking home eating white bread in America (this was jovial observation not a jab at the culture).
I feel validated by the fact that somewhere in the world people walk home eating bread. The other night (at 03h30) I went into a 24-hour grocery and bought a ciabatta, ate it on the way home.
It crossed my mind that I had never once seen anyone do this, and by local standards it probably looked ridiculous.
You are both right. French culinary traditions can vary wildly from region to region, town to town, even if they are a few miles apart. If you take a journey through the non-touristy areas you will see a dozen different macro diets (meat vs vegetable vs carb vs sauce heavy styles) and a million variations on the small details like spices.
Claiming that France has one way of proportioning meals is like saying that a Southern American potluck bbq is the same as a posh Michelin star restaurant in Manhattan.
One problem is that restaurants have no incentive to serve modestly sized, affordable meals. No one raves about a restaurant because it served "just enough to fill me up". No restaurant would ever advertise "reasonably sized plates".
Restaurants with small servings are focusing on quality and charging accordingly, or pushing 5+ courses.
Even if a restaurant charged two-thirds the price for appropriately sized meals, they still have the same transactional costs (staffing, equipment, production, etc).
I would love to find a restaurant with "reasonably sized plates." Most places serve ridiculous two-person portions, and out of some Catholic guilt-laden upbringing (kids are starving in Africa etc.) I feel compelled to not leave anything on the plate and have a bad time as a result. I would rave about a place that kept portion sizes down.
Another bonus is it would be more practical to also have dessert after the main course. In practice I usually just end up ordering an appetizer as the main course at the cost of some awkwardness with the server.
Another idea is that you order your meal and one option is to have 3/5ths on the plate and 2/5ths packaged to takeaway. No awkward "can I have a doggy bag?" for a container of the scraps you favoured least.
Even though many desserts are made ahead of time, in Australia they're often very expensive ($15-18) and so something I almost never order.
There's a restaurant in Portland called Little Big Burger. It has $4 burgers that are fairly small, but are made of high quality ingredients you'd find in a fancier restaurant's big $10 burgers. And it's still enough food for a serving if you get fries with it.
It's be cool to see more places like that: small portions but using the extra cost savings for higher quality food.
I always thought it would be great to start a restaurant chain where you had smaller portions for a slightly smaller price, and if you wanted seconds of something, it'd be a reasonable add on fee. $2-3 maybe.
I'd probably call it "Seconds" too, and this is why I'm not in the restaurant business probably. :)
What I do in addition to freezing food that I can't finish is preserving them in mason jars, either by jamming them with sugars, or curing them with salt. You end up with completely different food products with different flavor profiles.
My 4yo son and I enjoy the book Two Little Gardeners* about a brother and sister who prepare ground, grow food, eat some and store the rest. They preserve/pickle a variety of things in jars, store pumpkins and potatoes, hang onions and garlic, and keep their carrots in a tub of slightly dampened sand (a technique I hadn't heard of previously). It's a great little book if you have children, they're interested in gardening as mine are, and you want to introduce them to the stages involved in the whole process.
Boy, we're pretty bent out of shape about our food. Before we can legitimately ask ourselves 'how can we waste less food', we first need to ask 'What is food for?'
The simple answer is that food provides us with the energy and nutrition we need to survive; but of course, if you take a look around it's pretty obvious we dedicate a tremendous amount of time and energy to eating that extends well beyond basic sustenance. We have all sorts of complicated but erroneous aesthetic and cultural reasons for eating, which, in a first world country extends several levels of abstraction beyond merely serving basic needs.
I mean, if optimizing only for sustenance was the goal, we'd all be munching hamster pellets or choking down some Soylent like hydrated paste. We certainly wouldn't be interested paying premiums to have exotic, perishable fruits (which are mostly water) shipped in from other continents only to throw half that in the garbage.
61 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 144 ms ] thread> [There’s] $4 billion (USD) equivalent of food losses in a year in the continent and if you can conceptualize what four billion can do to alleviate poverty in our various countries, then you can understand the waste and the economic deprivation that food loss is causing the continent,
https://fsrn.org/2016/05/african-farmers-seek-creative-solut...
Sometimes there is ideas that are short-sighted but difficult problems so it's understandable to just look at it like an idiot. This isn't one of them, this like an idea from a 2 year old, literally. Like one from the ghetto who hasn't even learned their ABC's yet.
Reminds me of the local cafeteria at my uni that reduced food waste, so when I went there at 1PM to avoid the crowds (they served until 1:30PM) there was just no food left. Good job, so helpful.
I would prefer not to be at the mercy of some crop dusters with paraquat.
I remember that my college food service had a policy that food that was considered waste had to be thrown in the dumpster, and not doing so was grounds for being fired. A friend had to throw out around 20 pounds of fresh fruit every Friday because the venue that they were at wasn't open over the weekend.
It's a fuzzy word with a fuzzy definition, and it doesn't mean quite the same thing to everyone. I think you know that, though.
A personality affectation characterized by the adoption of outmoded fashions, faux nostalgia for things and eras the hipster never themselves experienced, ostentatious self-awareness and histrionic introspection designed to showcase the hipster's own moral superiority relative to mainstream society, and above all irony as the sole mode of existence, the denial of the possibility of authentic non-referential experience, and the pervasive implicit and explicit ridicule of those who think that authentic, non-ironic, non-referential experience is possible.
Really, the size of servings in US is ridiculous, who is supposed to finish that?
In many countries they have smaller servings - but it's typical to eat 2-3 servings. In the US we often have larger servings (equivalent to 2-3 servings) but only eat the one.
Having traveled quite a bit, the largest discrepancy in serving sizes I've noticed is that the US really likes drinks. Especially sodas and especially 60oz sodas. Everywhere I go gives me a "kids sized" cup of water to down with my meal...
In Australia, going out to dinner usually means two or three of an entreee (starter), main and dessert.
Fast food portions are huge though - in the US my girlfriend and I would get a burger each and share a small chips and drink.
Maybe the parent comment is counting the salad, the soup and the dessert?
But these are not "servings" as the OP was talking about, i.e. for the same dish (main course) that you would get 2-3 servings, something we don't do normally in Europe (perhaps only in big celebrations like Christmas).
The big difference is Europe seems to eat a lot less meat. The meat portions were much smaller but replaced with carbs and alcohol.
As an American I felt embarrassed that I could not finish half the Michelin star meals because they were so rich (albeit incredibly good).
IMO when it comes to food waste meat is the real culprit.
In fact, I struggle to think of a French meal that isn't animal product-centred (I'm including fish, eggs, snails etc.)
The biggest difference is they have smaller portions and way fewer carbs. You won't go out for breakfast in France and be faced with a huge stack of pancakes with hash browns and toast.
Also, while traditional dishes have meat inside, what makes the French Cuisine is not tied to it: you can get most of the taste from some nice sauces, often based of wine.
Other than a salad, I'm not sure I really see "non animal-based" meal in the US either (unless going to an Indian restaurant, or a vegetarian one).
* French eating/dining is extremely bakery heavy.
* Every meal bread is served and lots of it (most Americans think white bread is the worse thing you can eat)
* In the morning I witnessed both in Paris and Nice consumption of pastries and not meat for breakfast
* At lunch I saw most eating sandwiches. Sandwiches with tomato and cheeses. If there was meat it was sparingly and not the subway of america 2 pounds of meat style.
* I ate predominately in French bistros and taverns. Steak Frites in France is more like Frites with an elbow size piece of steak (compare this to any # of the steak houses in) America)
* There are many new renowned chefs that are pushing a more vegetable dining experience (France is still cutting edge for food) over the traditional French Cuisine.
* Going back to bread I saw many of the locals walking home eating baguettes that they just bought. I remember this vividly as my wife commented how you never see people walking home eating white bread in America (this was jovial observation not a jab at the culture).
It crossed my mind that I had never once seen anyone do this, and by local standards it probably looked ridiculous.
Claiming that France has one way of proportioning meals is like saying that a Southern American potluck bbq is the same as a posh Michelin star restaurant in Manhattan.
Restaurants with small servings are focusing on quality and charging accordingly, or pushing 5+ courses.
Even if a restaurant charged two-thirds the price for appropriately sized meals, they still have the same transactional costs (staffing, equipment, production, etc).
I know the quality of the food will be meh. When I eat out, I want as good or better than what I can make.
Another bonus is it would be more practical to also have dessert after the main course. In practice I usually just end up ordering an appetizer as the main course at the cost of some awkwardness with the server.
Even though many desserts are made ahead of time, in Australia they're often very expensive ($15-18) and so something I almost never order.
It's be cool to see more places like that: small portions but using the extra cost savings for higher quality food.
I'd probably call it "Seconds" too, and this is why I'm not in the restaurant business probably. :)
Nope. Nope nope nope.
* https://www.amazon.com/Two-Little-Gardeners-Golden-Book/dp/0...
The simple answer is that food provides us with the energy and nutrition we need to survive; but of course, if you take a look around it's pretty obvious we dedicate a tremendous amount of time and energy to eating that extends well beyond basic sustenance. We have all sorts of complicated but erroneous aesthetic and cultural reasons for eating, which, in a first world country extends several levels of abstraction beyond merely serving basic needs.
I mean, if optimizing only for sustenance was the goal, we'd all be munching hamster pellets or choking down some Soylent like hydrated paste. We certainly wouldn't be interested paying premiums to have exotic, perishable fruits (which are mostly water) shipped in from other continents only to throw half that in the garbage.