This year, we aimed to provide an opportunity for anyone to join the fight against climate change with our weekly Unwaste Wednesday posts on Instagram.
To see a safe and sustainable future for our world, we have to change how we think, shop, and even eat. And the best place to start? Our kitchens.
And so, Unwaste Wednesday was born! Check out five of our favorite posts from this year so you can try them at home:
Ugly Apple Pie
We challenged you to embrace the ugly… Ugly apples, that is. Welcome the fall season with an Ugly Apple Pie by seeking out unwanted apples from the grocery store that might otherwise go to waste. Bruised, misshapen, and discolored apples that are being left to waste will work best since the USDA estimates that 19% of apples on grocery store shelves end up going to waste.
Use the Whole Pumpkin
For this edition of Unwaste Wednesday, we partnered with our pals Imperfect Foods, to share some Halloween unwasting tips and tricks!
After the carvings are done and the candles lit, try one of the following ideas to use your whole pumpkin:
- Roast the seeds
- Turn the pulp into a stock or a soup
- Turn the skin into chips (once you’re done with your jack-o’-lantern)
Using as much of the pumpkin as possible helps ensure that the 1.1 kg CO2-eq of greenhouse gasses emitted across the life cycle of a 10-pound pumpkin didn't happen in vain (Clune et al., 2017). Also, don’t forget to see if your local zoo or animal sanctuary will take carved pumpkins after Halloween as a fun treat for hippos, turtles, or other animals! Otherwise, local compost collections may be available near you.
Never Too Good to be Brew
Throw a tea party with homemade tea made from unused parts of spices and fruits! Using these scraps helps mitigate the 52.4 million tons of food sent to US landfills annually (ReFed).
Kiss Me, I Compost
Why should you compost?
Just ask the IPCC: When food rots in a landfill, it emits methane, a potent greenhouse gas 28 times more powerful than carbon dioxide in warming the Earth.
Since you might be curious, you CAN compost Apeel-Protected Avocados (and all Apeel Produce)! And, you can expect leftover skins and peels of Apeel-Protected Avocados to compost at the same rate as other produce.
Clean as Can Be
A single lemon is responsible for an estimated 0.4 kg CO2eq across its lifetime. So make sure to squeeze every last bit out of our tart little friends. Make yourself a glass of lemonade, and then use the peels to create a lemony-fresh natural cleaning product.
We had so much fun this year, sharing a multitude of unwasting tips and tricks for you to try. Do you have any ideas yourself? Be sure to reach out to us on Instagram to share!