On Sunday night I watched “The Big Waste” on Food Network. I was Appalled.

Here’s the description from the page for those that don’t like to click on links:

First class chefs Bobby Flay, Michael Symon, Anne Burrell and Alex Guarnaschelli tackle one of the most massive problems in food today – waste! Divided into two teams, with only 48 hours on the clock, they are challenged to create a multi course gourmet banquet worthy of their great reputations, but with a big twist; they can only use food that is on its way to the trash. The chefs’ hunt takes them from grocery aisles to produce farms, and orchard lines to garbage piles, as they attempt to source enough ingredients to feed a gathering crowd. Bobby and Michael square off against Anne and Alex, as they challenge their views of food waste and how and why it is created.

Don’t get the description wrong. They weren’t pulling rotten looking food out and feeding it to people. They were taking food that wasn’t perfect (usually visual only) to the consumer and saving it from the trash. This included vegetables, fruits, meat, baked goods, ingredients and other things. They used a food safety inspector to make sure that temperatures were good from a safety perspective which was a nice touch.

How is it possible that we have become so needy as people that we can’t handle anything less than perfection in the way that our food looks? I’m just as guilty of this as anyone else.

Apple has a little bit of a bruise on it? Not for my apple pie/cut up apple/in my mouth usage of this.

One of the farms reported 40% of the food they grow goes to waste (compost). WTF?!?!? The images they showed of the compost pile looked like what a “perfectly fine to eat” produce section in the super market would be. I can’t remember correctly if the show also said that America wastes ~40% of the food in this country as well, but it was mentioned a few times.

I did learn a few things though. When a tomato gets too much water it splits and heals giving it a scarred outside texture. However, this makes it better to eat, but harder to look at. Put it in sauce. I learned a lot about tomatoes from Bill’s post on tomatoes and this adds even more to it.

Sadly I had just been grocery shopping before watching this. So I’ll have to wait until next time to pick out the vegetables/fruit that are just as good as the others but just don’t look as nice. I’ll be applying this rule when I go to the farmers’ market as well. Insert “It’s what’s on the inside that counts analogy” here.

Hopefully this spring I can get a good garden going and not waste 40% of my food.

Thank you for reading.

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