Ring in the New Year with Love Food, Fight Waste!

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Happy New Year! Make food waste reduction a part of your New Year’s resolutions! 

Follow one or more of these five tips to have a meaningful impact this year. Reducing food waste saves you money, preserves landfill space, reduces greenhouse gas emissions, and more! 

1. Make a shopping list

Before heading to the grocery store, shop your kitchen. Inventory which food items you already have in the refrigerator and pantry to avoid buying duplicates.

What meals or dishes do you plan to make this week? Identify which ingredients you will need and add them to the list.

2. Freeze food you won’t use right away

Package food in portion sizes before freezing. This makes it super easy to take out of the freezer and heat up for a quick meal later!

3. Save the bread!

Storing your store-bought bread in the fridge extends its life up to 2 weeks and preserves quality. (Source: USDA)

Freeze bread that you won’t use right away. Frozen bread will keep for up to 3 months. (Source: USDA)

Get creative with stale bread! Make croutons, breadcrumbs, French toast, bread pudding, stuffing, and more with stale bread. Here are a few sources for recipes: 

Insanely Good Recipes

The Kitchen Community

4. Look at it, smell it, taste it

Did you know that the dates stamped on food are not safety dates? The only food item where the date should be strictly followed is baby formula. Except for baby formula, most dates are indicators of best flavor and peak quality. 

Before tossing a food item that is past the “best by” date…

  1. Look at it – do you notice any of these characteristics indicating it may be past use or spoiled? (Source: Taste of Home)
    • Moldy
    • Slimy film
    • Pale, greenish tint, or discoloration
    • Texture – produce wrinkled or caving in, or pasta congealed
  2. Smell it – does it smell funky?
    • Rancid foods can have a similar appearance as when they were bought but smell sour. (Source: Ricardo Cuisine)
  3. If you can’t tell by smell and sight, a last resort can be giving it a small taste.
    • Foods that have gone rancid will usually have a sour or acidic flavor. (Source: Healthline)

Pick up our magnet all about how long food lasts past stamped dates at these locations during open hours: 

  • Table to Table office: 1049 US-6 E. Iowa City, IA 
  • City Hall front desk: 410 E Washington St, Iowa City, IA

5. Date your leftovers

Mark opened food containers and leftovers with a date of when they were opened or prepared to help keep track of how soon items need to be used up.