How to Plan Meals Without Wasting Food and Money
Clip | 4m 5sVideo has Closed Captions
A more sustainable food system starts with smarter shopping and less food waste.
Food choices have a powerful impact on the planet. Supporting small-scale farmers and shopping with a meal plan can help reduce household food waste. Just a few simple changes can make it easier to use what we buy and move closer to a zero-waste kitchen.
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Earth Focus is a local public television program presented by PBS SoCal
How to Plan Meals Without Wasting Food and Money
Clip | 4m 5sVideo has Closed Captions
Food choices have a powerful impact on the planet. Supporting small-scale farmers and shopping with a meal plan can help reduce household food waste. Just a few simple changes can make it easier to use what we buy and move closer to a zero-waste kitchen.
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorshipI have a list of the things that I want at the farmers' market based on what I'm planning to cook this week.
If I'm just picking up things without any plan, whether it's at the farmers' market or at the grocery store, then oftentimes it'll go to waste.
In fact, the home kitchen, we're wasting about 43% of our food.
That's huge, but that also gives me hope because that means with just some simple fixes, we can reduce that food waste tremendously.
I need to get a pound of walnuts.
Absolutely.
Here you go.
Absolutely.
This is where we can align ourselves with the folks who are doing what we want in the world, like, what is the vision that we have for our planet?
These are the guys who are doing the work every day.
They are at the forefront of climate action, water sustainability.
These are pesticide-free.
Everything that we grow is pesticide-free.
Even though I don't see an organic symbol.
Yes, we're not certified organic, but we grow-- You grow using no pesticides.
No pesticides or herbicides.
Yes.
About 98% to 99% of all farmland in the world is conventional.
They're using pesticides.
They're using conventional farming methods.
The farmers' market is a way when we align ourselves with these small-scale farmers who are building soil health, who are growing more nutritious foods, then we are partnering with the solution, and we're growing them.
That's what we need to grow, small-scale farms in our communities.
Let me get this.
Oh, okay.
You want to get this one?
Yes.
We just pick up the food, right?
We just pick up the onion, and we just think, "Oh, I just need an onion," but where did this onion come from?
What was the water that was utilized?
Did it pollute water systems, or did it help to regenerate land?
All of those pieces are connected to anything that we buy.
Once I understood the power that my food holds to change the shape of our planet, oh my gosh, it comes alive after that, and everything changes.
Wherever you shop, whether it's at the farmers' market or at the grocery store, we need a plan.
We need to have a meal plan so that there's a structure in place, so that we begin to reduce our food waste.
[music] These are the things that I brought back from the farmers' market.
Now it's about storing it in a way that I know I'm going to utilize it during the week.
It'll make it easy for me.
For the lettuce, I wash it, and I cut it, and I have it ready for salad.
It's the same with cabbage.
I have it already shredded and ready to go, so then I can easily grab some and put it on a garnish for my taco with some lime or lemon, or placing it also as an ingredient in my salad.
That's another great theme, is salad bar.
The goal is zero waste.
Again, this is not perfection, and this isn't a place to beat ourselves up because we don't do that.
It's just getting closer to that.
That's the goal, is zero waste.
Wherever we are in moving closer to that is fantastic.
[chuckles] Our refrigerators were designed to reduce waste, but it's actually the biggest food waster in our home kitchens.
This is a huge place that we can all work together to reduce our food waste with really simple things.
One is not to stuff it full with things.
If you notice, I have a lot of space in here, and it's because I'm meal planning.
I'm buying what I need so that by the end of the week, I'm ready to go out and purchase for the following week and not have a lot left over.
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