What is the Food Waste Challenge?
The Food Waste Challenge provides the tools and resources to help you reduce waste. From learning easy ways to reduce waste at home, such as composting and simple non-toxic alternatives, to paying attention to your purchasing habits and understanding why it matters to buy local, we can all take steps towards the same goals:
reduce, reuse, recycle, and rethink.
Here's an overview of the program
Week 1
Tool of the week: Shop Smarter
- Organize your fridge
- Use a meal plan when shopping
- Shop with a list, and stick to it
- Buy only what you need, eat what you buy
Tips to Shop Smarter
Week 2
Tool of the week: Prep Smarter
- Prep your veggies now so you can easily eat them later
- Make an upside-down jar salad
- Learn to pickle and preserve fresh food.
Tips to Prep Smarter
Week 3
Tool of the week: Store Smarter
- Know what kinds of produce to keep in the fridge vs. pantry
- Learn how to navigate use-by, sell-by, and expiration dates
- Other smart food storage tips
Tips to Store Smarter
Week 4
Tool of the week: Strategies for Success
- Engage your kids
- Learn to quick-pickle
- Buy and eat ugly produce
- Discover your strengths
Tips for Success
The tools we use throughout the program
The Eat First Basket
People say the number one most helpful and easiest way to combat food waste in their home was to use an Eat First Basket. This basket serves as a visual and physical reminder to eat stuff in your fridge before it goes bad.
Find a basket OR just use a section of one of your refrigerator shelves. Print out an Eat First card and attach it to the basket or shelf. This is a place for you to put food in your fridge that you need to “Eat First”.
Not sure what to put in your basket? Some ideas include: half a sandwich, a partially used can of tomato paste, some bean dip, a jar of chipotle peppers, and half a zucchini.
Food Waste Tracking Cards
We encourage participants to measure, using either weight or volume, how much food they waste throughout the challenge.
(This does NOT include food that goes into the compost.)
Watch your numbers change throughout the 4 weeks!
By getting a better picture of exactly how much food is going to waste in your household, you'll be able to better create a strategy to minimize that waste, save money, and prevent unnecessary greenhouse gas emissions.