The Big Waste

   Food Network is airing a special called The Big Waste this Sunday Jan 8th at 10pm EST. From watching the commercials, my interest is piqued because it seems that they are going to touch upon how much food gets wasted in the US. And this isn't the eat everything on your plate leftovers type waste, this is a mass raw product type waste, wasted from places such as the produce farms and the grocery stores. One statement during the commercial is "We've trained the American consumer to demand perfection" while showing images of piles of food just sitting in a field to rot, hinting at there is nothing wrong with this food besides a few imperfections, but these few imperfections deem the food not worthy for grocery stores and so therefore is just dumped. Another statement from a person who appears to be a produce farmer is "We are almost 40%-50% waste".

Surplus tomatoes are dumped on farmland in Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain. Photograph: Sally A. Morgan/Ecoscene/Corbis¹

    The part of this special that worries me a bit is the fact that this special is also a cooking competition. The premise of the special is two teams, Bobby Flay and Michael Symon against Anne Burrell and Alex Guarnaschelli, each having 48 hours to create a gourmet meal for 100 people only with food they find that is on it's way to the trash. I just hope they don't spend too much time on the competition part, removing focus away from what I think the focal point of the special should be of the food waste. (I mean the special is titled The Big Waste and not The Amazing Things Famous Chefs Can Do With Food On Its Way To The Trash). Well it's scheduled on my DVR so we'll see how it goes.

    A bit more info on the special and when the special will replay can be found at the Food Network.
    An interesting article about food waste at the Guardian (same link as the footnote).
    And a good site with tips on how not to waste food at Love Food Hate Waste.


¹Image and caption from an article by Adam Vaughan for the Guardian found at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/sep/08/food-waste