April 18, 2025 • 8 mins
Food Appreciation Month is coming up, and Kate Hall is thinking about food scraps.
New Zealand households are throwing away over 157,000 tonnes of edible food every year, costing the average household $1,326.
Instead of tossing out your food scraps, Kate has a few tips on how you can reuse them, turning them into ingredients and saving money.
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Team podcast
from News Talks That'd Be and.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Our sustainability commentator Caate Hall is with us this morning.
Calder Kate, what am I? We're just coming up to, Well,
the last couple of weeks of April and next month,
I know is food appreciation month. I feel like every
month is food appreciation in my household. But that I'm
being facetious, I'm putting a twist on it that isn't
(00:33):
supposed to be there. Really, it's an opportunity to kind
of consider the ways in which we don't use food
scraps as well as they could be used. Right, we
waste so much food in New Zealand, and you know,
being fortunate to me in a country with real abundance
on that front, it's such a shame it is.
Speaker 3 (00:53):
I mean, I agree, every every day, every month we
should be every celebrate celebrate food. But we just I
think we're so blind to how much food we waste
because it's kind of just come the norm. But here's
some like figures that always just blow me away every
time I read them. Were in New Zealand homes waste
(01:13):
over one hundred and fifty seven thousand tons of edible
food every year. So that's not even like you know,
your citrus peels or eggs, n it's not we're not
going to say like let's or eat those, but maybe
citrus pels, different recipes with that. But you know, that's
edible food. That's enough to feed everyone in Dunedin for
(01:35):
almost three years. That's crazy and that's like, yeah, yeah,
it's very frustrating, and that's I mean, we can talk
about environmentally how just ridiculous it is that we've made
this food, grown it, produced it amazing, It's been transported
to shelves, we take it home, we forget about it.
The bread goes moldy, the you know, we don't get leftovers,
(01:58):
we go get taken out instead. But it's also a
cost thing as well. I think this is one of
the things that you know, some environmental kind of actions
do take a bit of going out of our way
or maybe spending some more upfront money to do that.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
But this, like.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Currently food waste is costing every key household on average
three hundred and twenty six dollars a year, So we
were focusing.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
More only Yeah, yeah, I mean there's always a good option.
It's just focusing on the money. Even for people who
are like, you know, think that you know, you and
I are a bit woofy when we're having these conversations. No,
but I just focus on the money then, like you
could save one three hundred dollars on average. I mean
there is there is a huge sum.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
So people don't really believe me when I say it.
But if you add it all up, you know, half
a loaf like that letters you forgot about, like you know,
if people go, oh, that's not me, like, you'd be surprised.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah. So in our house, this is one of the
reasons that I do I do like a food delivery
service just because I really hate waste and I don't
want to like sometimes plans change and during the week,
and you know, our house is kind of chaolic at
the times, and so that's one of the reasons I
like having a food delivery services because you just kind
of know, like, we've got we've got food for us
for this number of meals and this number of lunches,
(03:16):
and that's it. We're not going to have excess. But
obviously there are still things like vegps, stems and cores,
old bananas, stuff like that that I think all of
us ended up with from time to time. So what
are your tips on dealing with those sorts of things?
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Totally? So, I think, just like you said, there are
main things like having a meal plan, in a shopping list,
and actually knowing what's in your fridge. So if you
have leftovers, actually labeling it, labeling the date that it
was made, putting that in the fridge, having like a
bin in your fridge that says eat me first. So
if you're in a household where you know there's multiple people,
(03:50):
how do people know what to use? And they're just
going to grab something that they want to eat or
they're going to go, oh, it's not here, I'm going
to go out and buy it. So having a bin
that says eat me first. And with veggipels and stems
and stuff instead of buying stock. Again, this is a
great cost hack. So ends of carrots, I personally generally
eat the whole carrot. But if you have onion peels,
(04:13):
just like any bits of vegetables, just put them into
a bag or a container in your freezer and then
when when you have some time to make stock, I
just put that with some salt and pepper and any
other kind of herbs they have from the garden and
just boil it up and it makes a great stock
that you can use in cooking and things like that.
(04:33):
And same with old banhanas that I laugh because I
once had a freezer it was basically only old bananas.
So yeah, no banana should ever go to waste. We
have freezers, we have muffins to make, Like, yeah, fruit
is one of the main ones that we waste, and
(04:54):
so we really don't need to be wasting it. We
can use things like our freezers to store stuff for
when we do need it or even at the moment.
You know, people have heaps of fijos, I think especially
the wind the windiness, and it's just an abundance. So
if you, you know, wack them in your freezer or
(05:15):
if you want to learn how to preserve them, then
during the months where it's not for you Joe season,
you've actually got all this great stuff to cook with.
But there's a lot of info because it is May's
Food Appreciation Month. Every bite has a program that's like
everyone's getting involved sharing tips and you can kind of
sign up and really make May. Like I know, it's
(05:37):
a good it's good to have these months because even
though it kind of sounds explanatory, we can learn and
do these things. It's good to have a month where
you're like, right, I'm actually really going to get on
top of my food waste and I'm going to implement
some of these things.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
So one thing I find is I go through our
cupboard because I mean this was going to come as
a huge surprise. And I've said this before, but I'm
like quite anal and you know, like I like a
tidy house, tiny mind, and I don't love having food
that's going past it's used by dat and all that
kind of thing. So I kind of go through pantry
once a month or so. How do you manage things
(06:09):
in your pantry that are about to be going off,
you know, past the use by date sometimes soon? Do
you have some sort of a system whereby you know
what's going to be going off so you prioritize eating that.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yep, different shelves, so different. It's where it is in
the fridge. Like it's the whole psychology too of when
you open the fridge, what are you looking at first?
How appealing is it too? You know, like some things
I think, like I reuse a lot of different containers
and all that type of stuff, But I also think,
you know, how am I presenting it to my tired,
(06:44):
hungry self? So when I open the fridge, like, what
what does it look like? How can I you know,
remember to eat that? So also knowing that a best
before and a use by date often like that's not
doesn't mean much. Yeah, yeah, and so going with your nose,
going with your you know, just basic knowledge of food
(07:05):
safety is is really important. Things say are best by
date because they want to say, you know, this will
be the freshest and most delicious before this date, but
it can be perfectly edible afterwards. So yeah, I think
working out a good system, you know, thinking about what
works for your household and how many people are in
the house and talking with everyone too. It's saying, okay,
(07:26):
maybe you know, food leftovers from dinner, we're going to
put in these red tops containers, and so we know
that if we're gonna you know, put leftovers into that
container after dinner, we're going to actually prepare it and
put you all the elements, so it's really easy to
just grab. So yeah, working out what suits you best,
if it's a visual aid or if you're able to, like, yeah,
(07:46):
reculibrate and reorganize your fridge. Just thinking about those systems
and using may as that month is really like, that's
going to be the money saver.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Fantastic. Yeah, I mean that makes a lot of sense.
We'll put all your little tips there up on the
news storks he'd be website. I think just being deliberate,
being purposeful about this, yes, kind of makes all the
difference in the long run. Thank you so much, Kate,
Stay dry and we will catch you again very soon.
That is Kate Haul, our sustainability expert. You can find
her on the social media platforms by searching ethically Kate.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, listen live
to News Talks ed B from nine am Saturday, or
follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Team podcast
from News Talks That'd Be and.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Our sustainability commentator Caate Hall is with us this morning.
Calder Kate, what am I? We're just coming up to, Well,
the last couple of weeks of April and next month,
I know is food appreciation month. I feel like every
month is food appreciation in my household. But that I'm
being facetious, I'm putting a twist on it that isn't
(00:33):
supposed to be there. Really, it's an opportunity to kind
of consider the ways in which we don't use food
scraps as well as they could be used. Right, we
waste so much food in New Zealand, and you know,
being fortunate to me in a country with real abundance
on that front, it's such a shame it is.
Speaker 3 (00:53):
I mean, I agree, every every day, every month we
should be every celebrate celebrate food. But we just I
think we're so blind to how much food we waste
because it's kind of just come the norm. But here's
some like figures that always just blow me away every
time I read them. Were in New Zealand homes waste
(01:13):
over one hundred and fifty seven thousand tons of edible
food every year. So that's not even like you know,
your citrus peels or eggs, n it's not we're not
going to say like let's or eat those, but maybe
citrus pels, different recipes with that. But you know, that's
edible food. That's enough to feed everyone in Dunedin for
(01:35):
almost three years. That's crazy and that's like, yeah, yeah,
it's very frustrating, and that's I mean, we can talk
about environmentally how just ridiculous it is that we've made
this food, grown it, produced it amazing, It's been transported
to shelves, we take it home, we forget about it.
The bread goes moldy, the you know, we don't get leftovers,
(01:58):
we go get taken out instead. But it's also a
cost thing as well. I think this is one of
the things that you know, some environmental kind of actions
do take a bit of going out of our way
or maybe spending some more upfront money to do that.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
But this, like.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Currently food waste is costing every key household on average
three hundred and twenty six dollars a year, So we
were focusing.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
More only Yeah, yeah, I mean there's always a good option.
It's just focusing on the money. Even for people who
are like, you know, think that you know, you and
I are a bit woofy when we're having these conversations. No,
but I just focus on the money then, like you
could save one three hundred dollars on average. I mean
there is there is a huge sum.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
So people don't really believe me when I say it.
But if you add it all up, you know, half
a loaf like that letters you forgot about, like you know,
if people go, oh, that's not me, like, you'd be surprised.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah. So in our house, this is one of the
reasons that I do I do like a food delivery
service just because I really hate waste and I don't
want to like sometimes plans change and during the week,
and you know, our house is kind of chaolic at
the times, and so that's one of the reasons I
like having a food delivery services because you just kind
of know, like, we've got we've got food for us
for this number of meals and this number of lunches,
(03:16):
and that's it. We're not going to have excess. But
obviously there are still things like vegps, stems and cores,
old bananas, stuff like that that I think all of
us ended up with from time to time. So what
are your tips on dealing with those sorts of things?
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Totally? So, I think, just like you said, there are
main things like having a meal plan, in a shopping list,
and actually knowing what's in your fridge. So if you
have leftovers, actually labeling it, labeling the date that it
was made, putting that in the fridge, having like a
bin in your fridge that says eat me first. So
if you're in a household where you know there's multiple people,
(03:50):
how do people know what to use? And they're just
going to grab something that they want to eat or
they're going to go, oh, it's not here, I'm going
to go out and buy it. So having a bin
that says eat me first. And with veggipels and stems
and stuff instead of buying stock. Again, this is a
great cost hack. So ends of carrots, I personally generally
eat the whole carrot. But if you have onion peels,
(04:13):
just like any bits of vegetables, just put them into
a bag or a container in your freezer and then
when when you have some time to make stock, I
just put that with some salt and pepper and any
other kind of herbs they have from the garden and
just boil it up and it makes a great stock
that you can use in cooking and things like that.
(04:33):
And same with old banhanas that I laugh because I
once had a freezer it was basically only old bananas.
So yeah, no banana should ever go to waste. We
have freezers, we have muffins to make, Like, yeah, fruit
is one of the main ones that we waste, and
(04:54):
so we really don't need to be wasting it. We
can use things like our freezers to store stuff for
when we do need it or even at the moment.
You know, people have heaps of fijos, I think especially
the wind the windiness, and it's just an abundance. So
if you, you know, wack them in your freezer or
(05:15):
if you want to learn how to preserve them, then
during the months where it's not for you Joe season,
you've actually got all this great stuff to cook with.
But there's a lot of info because it is May's
Food Appreciation Month. Every bite has a program that's like
everyone's getting involved sharing tips and you can kind of
sign up and really make May. Like I know, it's
(05:37):
a good it's good to have these months because even
though it kind of sounds explanatory, we can learn and
do these things. It's good to have a month where
you're like, right, I'm actually really going to get on
top of my food waste and I'm going to implement
some of these things.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
So one thing I find is I go through our
cupboard because I mean this was going to come as
a huge surprise. And I've said this before, but I'm
like quite anal and you know, like I like a
tidy house, tiny mind, and I don't love having food
that's going past it's used by dat and all that
kind of thing. So I kind of go through pantry
once a month or so. How do you manage things
(06:09):
in your pantry that are about to be going off,
you know, past the use by date sometimes soon? Do
you have some sort of a system whereby you know
what's going to be going off so you prioritize eating that.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yep, different shelves, so different. It's where it is in
the fridge. Like it's the whole psychology too of when
you open the fridge, what are you looking at first?
How appealing is it too? You know, like some things
I think, like I reuse a lot of different containers
and all that type of stuff, But I also think,
you know, how am I presenting it to my tired,
(06:44):
hungry self? So when I open the fridge, like, what
what does it look like? How can I you know,
remember to eat that? So also knowing that a best
before and a use by date often like that's not
doesn't mean much. Yeah, yeah, and so going with your nose,
going with your you know, just basic knowledge of food
(07:05):
safety is is really important. Things say are best by
date because they want to say, you know, this will
be the freshest and most delicious before this date, but
it can be perfectly edible afterwards. So yeah, I think
working out a good system, you know, thinking about what
works for your household and how many people are in
the house and talking with everyone too. It's saying, okay,
(07:26):
maybe you know, food leftovers from dinner, we're going to
put in these red tops containers, and so we know
that if we're gonna you know, put leftovers into that
container after dinner, we're going to actually prepare it and
put you all the elements, so it's really easy to
just grab. So yeah, working out what suits you best,
if it's a visual aid or if you're able to, like, yeah,
(07:46):
reculibrate and reorganize your fridge. Just thinking about those systems
and using may as that month is really like, that's
going to be the money saver.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Fantastic. Yeah, I mean that makes a lot of sense.
We'll put all your little tips there up on the
news storks he'd be website. I think just being deliberate,
being purposeful about this, yes, kind of makes all the
difference in the long run. Thank you so much, Kate,
Stay dry and we will catch you again very soon.
That is Kate Haul, our sustainability expert. You can find
her on the social media platforms by searching ethically Kate.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, listen live
to News Talks ed B from nine am Saturday, or
follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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