Uk Is The Worst In Europe For Wasting Food

 A Dig For Victory poster - encouraging Britons to cultivate gardens and allotments during WW2.

There is such a disparity between our current relationship with food here in the UK and that of my mother's generation. I often wonder how many of us even begin to take on board that the UK is the worst in Europe for wasting food?

I have no idea if the younger generation have any concept of food rationing, and if not, why not? Such is our abundance of food, particularly that of the ready made variety, we no longer teach our children the basics of cooking or home economics, food is seen as easy come - easy go.

 After world war two began in 1939, rationing began taking place and by 1940, bacon, butter and sugar were rationed, closely followed by meat, tea, cheese, eggs and milk.

Although fresh fruit and vegetables were not rationed, supplies were low, lemons and bananas became unattainable, apples limited to one per person, per week and oranges generally reserved for children or pregnant women. My own mother never saw a real egg when she was young, eggs were limited to 1 per week, therefore many families used powdered egg, rationed at 1 packet per month.

Here was a generation who scraped by on 540g of meat and 57g of cheese a week compared with todays society who waste approximately £480 of food per year, per household.

We are now a throwaway consumer culture, we under value food because we are a rich western nation deluged with food choices. We no longer cook from scratch and the combination of cheap ready meals and fast food takeaways means many Britons have forgotten the basics of cooking, how to organise their fridges or freeze food and don't know how to use up leftovers.

Worst still, people are confused (yes, confused!) by best before dates, no longer dictated by austerity, hunger or common sense, the average Brit throws away almost a quarter of meat, half of vegetables and 41 per cent of fruit they buy per year.

To put things in perspective, rationing didn't formally end until 1954 - sixty one years ago, we're not talking about the dark ages! Children like my parents were overjoyed upon receiving an orange in their Christmas stocking, nowadays children are plied with sweets and snacks on a daily basis and in spite of foodstuffs being crammed full of preservatives, we are now, as never before, guilty of colossal food waste which is totally avoidable.

                              A shopkeeper measuring out a families weekly rations

We think nothing of loading our shopping trolleys with two for one offers without even a basic understanding of how to preserve the food we buy, and unlike our European counterparts, our bulk of waste is generated within our own homes.

I have never known what it is like to go hungry, my parents however, grew up in post war Britain where rationing continued and in some aspects became stricter for some years after the war. Both knew what it was like to go without, therefore they always showed great reverence towards the food they were lucky enough to have in later years.

Unlike todays children, my generation grew up with an understanding that not everyone was lucky enough to have three square meals a day. If we left food on our plate we were reminded of the starving children in Africa, we were taught to value food and that has stayed with me throughout my life.

Hotchpotch dinners are my speciality, these can be any variation of leftovers to make dishes such as bubble and squeak or my version of Shepherds pie. Of course given the surplus of cheap food found in most supermarkets, I could quite easily throw more than twice my own body weight of food away a year, as the average Brit does, and just buy more food, but my conscience won't let me.

This next dish is simply vegetables leftover from Sunday lunch and is really very tasty.

Vegetable hash

Recipe
Leftover roast or boiled potatoes
Leftover Brussel sprouts
Salt and pepper

Pulse potatoes in a blender

Mash Brussels with a fork and add to potatoes

Line a dish with greaseproof paper and mash ingredients into the dish, seasoning to taste

Cook in a preheated oven for 30 minutes

Slice and serve with fried eggs and tomatoes

'I was born during the war and grew up in a time of rationing. We didn't have anything. It's influenced the way I look at the world.'
- Vivienne Westwood

Love Donna xxxxxxxxxxxxx