10 Ways to Get the Most Out of Food Scraps

My kids eat a lot of fruits and veggies and after preparing everything for them, my compost bin is quite full of the food scraps that we take for granted should be discarded.

Have you ever thought about how you could use more of the items that we pay for but regularly toss out?

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10 Ideas for Using up Food Scraps (and Reducing Food Waste!)

We compost our food scraps, and so do get a return on them in the form of a (hopefully) bountiful garden but I was wondering if there was any other uses for these ‘scraps’.

With food prices as they currently are, I felt that it was a good time to re-evaluate food usage in my home to make the budget stretch a bit farther. In the list below I’m sharing some great ideas to use up food scraps that I’ve seen and plan to try out!

1. Various vegetable scraps: Alison shared her process for making amazing homemade vegetable broth from various veggie scraps, read it here!

2. Cauliflower and broccoli stems: I put these aside to make a simple vegetable soup.

Here’s how I make my simple vegetable soup:

Simple Vegetable Soup

Saute 1 onion and a garlic clove or two then add 4 cups of chopped stems vegetables such as carrots, celery, and a potato or two and stir. Add vegetable bullion and enough water so that the liquid is just at the line of vegetables in the pot and boil until all vegetables are mashable. Blend with a hand mixer or blender until smooth. Add salt, pepper and a dash of apple cider vinegar to taste.

3. Carrot tops: Apparently carrot tops make an delicious pesto – who knew! We’re growing carrots in our garden this year so will plan to divert the tops from the compost to our plates! Kale pesto (including the stems) is also a winner.

4. Cheese rinds: Typically thought to be inedible, there are many uses for cheese rinds.

5. Strawberry tops: Apparently strawberry top greens are very nutritious, however I would suggest that they’re not the easiest to eat due to their texture. Instead of simply eating them, consider using in a zero waste smoothie with these recipes!

6. Lemon and orange peels: add the peels to homemade vinegar solution to make a more powerful cleaning solution.

7. Bread crumbs/ends of bread/dried crusts: You can do so many things with bits of bread! This post shares many ideas from making homemade croutons, blending to make your own breadcrumbs for tops of dishes or breading meat, or simply adding to soup!

8. Wilted vegetables: vegetables such as zucchini and carrot can be grated and included in muffins or meatloaf. Try out one of my favourite zucchini muffin recipes here!

Some other options to reduce food waste include:

9. Using Flashfood: The Flashfood App enables frugal grocery purchases while also promoting sustainability by diverting food that was destined for the landfill. This app links consumers looking for grocery deals with stores looking to sell nearly expired food. And it’s also a great way to try out new foods and challenge yourself to experiment with recipes! Find out about the app here: Introduction to Flashfood

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10. Using Too Good to Go: Download the app to purchase surplus food from local stores and restaurants!

How do you reduce food waste in your home?

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