At the risk of ‘teaching grandmother to suck eggs’ here’s 50 things we can do, as consumers, to reduce the negative environmental (and health) impacts of our food choices.
Our food choices and shopping for food
- Remember to bring your ‘bags for life’ and re-usable produce containers when you go shopping
- Plan your meals, within the same timeframe that you shop (weekly if you shop weekly; fortnightly if you shop fortnightly, etc)
- Check what you already have at home
- Make a list
- Buy only what you need/know you will use
- Eat more vegetables and fruit, especially those in season and grown locally
- Bear in mind that meat and dairy have a high carbon and water footprint. Beef has a very high environmental footprint (Professor Mike Berners-Lee’s books ‘There is no planet B’ and ‘How bad are bananas? The Carbon Footprint of Everything’ gives facts and figures on the carbon footprint of our food choices)
- Consider bulk buying long-life staple items that you know you use, such as pulses and rice (cheaper and less packaging). Useful websites: www.buywholefoodsonline.co.uk www.hodmedods.co.uk
- Buy items with minimal packaging and/or packaging that can easily be recycled
- Avoid items in black plastic – it can’t be recycled
- Challenge convention and tradition: for example, do you really need mince pies at Christmas? It’s estimated that 70 million mince pies are wasted every year
- Support ‘food waste’ entrepreneurs eg ‘Rubies in the Rubble’ and ‘Toast Ale’ and local artisans (my favourite local artisan is Lucie who set up the Bath Culture House and makes wonderful kombucha)
- Support street markets, farmers’ markets and farm shops, where possible
- Seek out local zero waste shops that offer refill services
- Support your local greengrocer – they sell fruit and veg with minimal packaging, and they tend to discount their produce at the end of each day. Our local greengrocer gives their unsold items to a local farmer to feed his pigs
- Beware microplastics! Look out for plastic-free teabags. Clipper make unbleached, plastic-free teabags. Or consider using loose tea
- Look for Fairtrade when buying items such as coffee, tea, chocolate and bananas
- Organic food is preferable to that grown using chemical fertilisers and pesticides. Also be aware of animal welfare issues and sustainability of fish stocks. Look for the Marine Stewardship Council certification when buying fish and the RSPCA assured scheme if buying meat and eggs
LOAF is a helpful mnemonic:
Locally produced
Organically grown
Animal friendly
Fairly traded
19.Be aware of issues around palm oil. Unsustainable palm oil production is a major cause of global deforestation leading to habitat loss for vulnerable species and global warming.
At home – storing, preparing and cooking food (and dealing with waste food)
20.Store your food properly to avoid spoilage (follow the storage advice on the packet). There’s helpful advice on the Love Food Hate Waste website
21. Your freezer is your friend, though beware “UFOs” – unidentified frozen objects. So, label your items before you freeze them
22. Bread freezes very well. For ease of use, slice before freezing and ‘shake’ the sliced loaf so the slices don’t get stuck together when frozen. You can make toast straight away from frozen bread
23. Milk also freezes well, but will expand slightly, so you may want to open the bottle and pour out a small amount (enough for a cup of tea)
24. Bulk cooking and freezing can save time, money and energy. Dishes such as chilli, curry, lasagne, moussaka, soup and stew can be made in bulk, portioned and frozen. Make sure you label and date the container
25. Left-over wine can be frozen in ice cube trays, for future use, eg to add to sauces
26. Cooked jacket potatoes also freeze well, as does cheese (grate the cheese before freezing
27. If you have too much food, how about offering your surplus to friends and neighbours, a local food surplus scheme or upload via an app such as OLIO and TOO GOOD TO GO?
28. Compost as much food waste as possible (assuming your food waste isn’t collected by your local authority)
29. Keep your fridge and freezer at the optimal temperatures (between 0 degrees and 5 degrees Celsius for the fridge, depending on the model, and minus 18 degrees Celsius for the freezer). The top shelf and top door rack are where your fridge is warmest, so ideal for dairy foods as they are less perishable than meat and fish. The coldest part of your fridge will be the lowest shelf above the fruit and veg drawers. This lowest shelf is best for storing meat and fish
30. Rotate items in the cupboard, fridge and freezer (first in, first out, rather than last in, first out)
31. Defrost the fridge and freezer on a regular basis
32. Consider using food saver gadgets such as ‘food huggers’ and beeswax wraps (the latter are especially good for preserving cheese)
33. ‘Love your leftovers’. There are websites and apps that can help you plan your meals around your leftovers. Love Food Hate Waste has lots of advice
34. There are parts of food items that we traditionally don’t eat but are perfectly edible – eg broccoli stalks, which would be a colourful and tasty addition to a coleslaw or stir-fry
35. Keep bananas out of the fruit bowl – they emit a gas (ethylene) that accelerates the ripening of other fruit
36. Know the difference between ‘best before’ and ‘use by’: ‘use by’ refers to the safety of food and ‘best before’ is an indicator of the quality of the food
Growing your own
37. Grow your own – herbs on windowsills, potatoes on patios, etc
38. Encourage your local school to ‘grow their own’
39. Save some seeds for planting from veg that you’ve enjoyed eating – eg butternut squash (also, to note, butternut squash doesn’t need peeling – cut into cubes, drizzle with oil, and roast in the oven at 190 degrees Celsius for about 30 mins)
Eating out
40. Why not choose a vegetarian restaurant or a vegetarian/vegan dish, for a change?
41. Explain to the server when ordering that you don’t require certain items, eg I don’t like baked beans
42. Ask for a child-size or smaller portion if you think you won’t eat an adult-sized portion
43. Bring a ‘doggy bag’ (a Tupperware-type container)
44. When out and about, take your refillable flask with you (as well as your ‘keep cup’). UK tap water is perfectly drinkable. The Drinking Water Inspectorate ensures that it is safe for us to drink
45. Take part in recycle schemes for ‘hard to recycle’ items such as crisp packets, which are made from metallised plastic. (Terracycle runs recycling schemes for crisp packaging and other hard to recycle items such as empty toothpaste tubes and used beauty products)
More generally
46. Switch to a ‘green energy’ tariff for your home
47. If buying new appliances, look at their energy rating
48. Try to cook several things in the oven at the same time, to save energy
49.Could you eat more ‘raw’? eg salads, rather than cooked veg? There are energy-saving and health benefits from eating raw food
50. Aim to nurture the next generation through the food that you serve and the thought that you give to your food choices. Try to avoid junk food. Experience the joy and satisfaction of real food.
Useful websites:
Food Standards Agency: best before and use by dates