Book Review: American Wasteland
Those of you who have been here for more than a week know that food waste is a topic near and dear to my heart. In fact, concern over my own personal food waste was the impetus behind my very first (and now defunct) blog, Confessions of a Recovering Food Waster (that's the one that gave birth to this blog!).
Back then, I ran across Jonathan Bloom's blog, Wasted Food, and was thrilled to see that someone else was blogging about food waste too.
He hasn't just been blogging, though...for several years now, he's been working on writing a book about food waste, and that book is American Wasteland
. When I got back from vacation a few weeks ago, an advance reading copy was waiting for me in my mail pile (isn't the post-vacation mail fun? It's kind of like Christmas on a really small scale!).
I think I was the first person other than Bloom himself to get a copy, and I was trying really hard to be the first person to read the whole book, but I've been informed that his parents finished it in a weekend.
Bummer.
Anyways, I read the book from cover to cover and was enlightened, inspired, and also a little bit discouraged to learn about the massive food waste that takes place in my country.
I might be getting somewhere close to being an expert on in-home food waste, but Bloom's expertise goes way beyond that. He does talk about home food waste in his book, but he also delves into the waste that happens on our farms, in our processing plants, in our grocery stores, in our restaurants, and in our cafeterias.
The sheer volume of food that's wasted in these places is staggering...literal tons of food are thrown away every day. And what's especially distressing about that is the fact that people in our country are going hungry at the same time. We have all this excess food and it's not getting to the people that need it.
Well, not all of it is. I was encouraged to learn of the many food recovery efforts going on, both large and small. On the large side are non-profit organizations that send semis to pick up excess produce and on the small side, students on one college campus give their extra cafeteria food to fellow students (this process even has a name...scrounging!).
Of course, the best thing to do with excess food is to give it to people who are hungry, but Bloom says the next best thing is to convert it into something useful by composting it (Amen! You can do this at home for $5.) or turning it into fuel (which, uh, you can't do at home. At least not here...people in China do it all the time!). I was encouraged to hear about how some restaurants and cafeterias are beginning to compost their waste, and also thrilled to read about how they're using computer software to reduce the amount of waste they have in the first place.
At the end of the book, Bloom offers a number of great suggestions on how to reduce large-scale food waste, and I hope those suggestions reach the people with the power to change things.
You and I probably are not going to bring about changes that will reduce the waste that pours out of the institutions, but we can start in our own kitchens. Bloom offers some practical tips that mirror my own (plan a menu, eat leftovers, shop with a list, etc.), and even mentions Food Waste Friday (pg. 86, in case you wanted to know!). I'm usually pretty inspired about using up my food, but reading through American Wasteland gave me fresh motivation and I'm quite sure it'll have the same effect on you.
So, go read it! Buy it from Amazon, reserve it at your library, borrow it from a friend....but read it. If you're not quite sure why food waste is a big deal, this book will convince you, and if you're already on the anti-food-waste wagon, this book will offer fresh inspiration.
(just so you know, I have not been paid to review this book. I love to talk about food waste and certainly don't need monetary compensation to do so! I received an advance reading copy, but that's all.)
Today's 365 post: I have to give my tomato plant props.
It sounds like a good book. Some places are trying to do better. For example, the university I attend just recently started a small compost bin for the coffee shop. They also purchase mostly recycled paper / plastic products for their disposables and only buy fair trade coffee. It's kind of cool to see them slowly adapting their business model to fit in these important factors.
I'm excited to hear that this book is as amazing as I'd anticipated. I'm waiting for my copy right now and it's driving me nuts! I read his blog every day and I can't wait to see what he's like in book form 🙂 thanks for the sneak peek!
I love getting book reviews from blogs - I just ordered this one from my library. Now, I just have to find time to read it... On another note - thanks for mentioning your older blog - I googled it and found it and began reading some of your posts. (I always like to see how a blog started and the progress.) Anyway, food wasting happens too much in our house too - I had to laugh at one of your posts about cauliflower - how you questioned why you buy double produce when it's on sale...I often do this with lofty intentions of cooking, but then the reality of the week hits and I sometimes end up throwing it out. It really is a waste. One way we HAVE reduced some waste items is that we leave Sunday evenings for leftovers. Usually, we have a bigger Sunday lunch and after evening service, we come home tired. That's when I pull out all our bits and pieces of leftovers to feed our family. Having a husband who eats leftovers for lunch helps too!
Speaking of not wasting (and over buying)...I have to make pear sauce today and freeze it from the abundance of pears that I bought last week from Aldi
I'm glad you enjoyed seeing my humble beginnings over on Blogger. 🙂 And yes, good intentions so often lead to food waste!
I just got this book in the mail last week, and I'm SO excited to start reading it! I think my husband's a little amused by my enthusiasm. 🙂
Thank you for the book recommendation! I am looking forward to reading this and making positive changes. Have a great day!
I love reading books about frugality, so I will reserving this one at the library ASAP! Food waste is a subject near and dear to my heart. I grew up with a Great Grandma who raised a family through The Great Depression and WWII. She was very adamant that food (and other things) should never be wasted. I'll never forget the day I pulled into her driveway to find my 87 year old granny shimmying up an old rickety ladder with a five gallon bucket on her arm to pick the neighbors apricot tree, because she had been watching those apricots drop from the tree and it was sending her into moral turmoil. The funny part was that I was very pregnant at the time and I was trying to talk her into letting me pick the apricots before she fell and broke her hip. She was arguing that I was to frail to climbing a ladder, in my "condition"; she didn't want me to fall and break the baby! Finally, my Dear Hubby solved the problem by climbing the ladder and picking the apricots, so that we were both safe. I took the apricots home, and made them into jam. It's not that I love apricot jam; I just wanted my Grandma to be able to sleep at night, knowing she had saved those apricots from wasting! I think of her every year as a can, yet another batch of green beans or salsa, because I know if I let them go to waste, she will up in Heaven shaking her finger at me!
sounds like a great book! i use to work in a restaurant for 10 years, and i was shocked with the amount of food waste that happens there. that is what originally got me thinking of my own personal waste. something needs to be done with our restaurants though, if more owners knew about waste surely they would save money in the end and even though that's not what it's about for me i know that is what it would be about for some of them!
Thanks for the book recommendation; just reserved a copy at the library (I see that my county ordered 5 copies for various towns in the system so I'm excited they're getting it!).
Since reading your blog and also moving to a single income family, I've really been watching my food waste but need inspiration every now and then. For the first time, we joined a CSA this year and have been, at times, a little overwhelmed by the amount of food we are receiving (and growing a little weary of) so you've inspired me to get off my butt and start preserving/freezing/using up some of the excess.
We've been wanting to compost but we live in the mountains and have lots of bears, fox and other wildlife so any food remains outside is a big no-no; we have to get an indoor worm composter. Have been dragging our feet a little on this purchase and your post inspired me to get one already!
As a quick tip to your readers, I save all bits/pieces/stems/peels/skins of veggies and freeze them in leftover bags from tortillas/buns/rolls, etc. Then every couple of weeks, I boil a couple bags worth of these veggie scraps in a huge pot of water and make about 2 gallons worth of veggie broth! Started doing this a year ago and can't believe I didn't do this before!
Thanks for all you do and for the book recommendation!
🙂 Jenn @ GEG
Did you happen to know that food waste has a specific name? It's ort. Just a little piece of unnecessary trivia I have bouncing around in my brain. 🙂
I did not know that until now! lol
I've loved reading your food waste postings and have thought of adding my own concept for awhile - this will not work for everyone but....
If the food is still crunchy it goes to the goats
If it is mushy it goes to the chickens (chickens will eat almost anything but they shouldn't have moldy stuff)
If it is moldy it goes to the compost bin
Kristen,
I'll be honest with you, it is unlikely that I will read a book like this. But the point of my comment is that unlike other book reviews performed by other bloggers, I can tell by your enthusiasm in this review that you have a geniune interest in both the subject for which the book was based and its author. In other words, although probably legally necessary, I don't think that you even had to state that you weren't paid to write the review. I really enjoyed reading this post.
Oh, I'm glad to hear that. I'm not sure I have to legally say I wasn't paid (I just have to disclose it when I HAVE received compensation for something), but I just always worry that people will wonder, you know?
I have two copies of the book. One for giveaway and one for review. I'll go a giveaway contest a week from Monday so that I have a chance to read it through.
It's so pretty!
Katy Wolk-Stanley
"Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without"
Mine is an advance-reading copy, so it has a boring baby blue cover. But the content was still good! 🙂
I'm becoming one of those crazy vermiculturists. I'd like to say to greenearthgoodies that we live near Dan the worm man (http://www.danthewormman.com/) and we have a worm bin. I kept it inside our house (we don't have a garage) all last winter and it was just fine. It doesn't smell at all. Dan makes lovely worm bins out of reclaimed wood, they aren't those ugly plastic things. He gave us two extra containers of worms when we went down there to give to neighborhood kids. And your worms will eat the veggie scraps that are leftover from your broth! A worm bin is especially great for us because I tend to forget to compost, but I'd never forget to feed a pet.