Watching countryside on TV last night I was struck by the waste of
vegetables grown for supermarkets. If my Purple Sprouting broccoli was
as good as that that was plough back in I would be very happy indeed. As
it is I will get none this year, the netting blew off sometime during
the cold spell and the pigeons have stripped the plants down to their
stalks. Also the birds have wrecked my pots of primulas, all the green
has been pecked off and left on the floor. Not showing much appreciation
for my feeding them well during the cold and snow!
--
Please reply to group,emails to designated
address are never read.

In article ,
Broadback wrote:
Watching countryside on TV last night I was struck by the waste of
vegetables grown for supermarkets. If my Purple Sprouting broccoli was
as good as that that was plough back in I would be very happy indeed.

I didn't see it, but can guess :-( Also, this is a major harmful
consequence of the demise of mixed farming - not so long ago, the
field of broccoli would have had some cows turned into it after it
had been picked.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

wrote in message
...
In article ,
Broadback wrote:
Watching countryside on TV last night I was struck by the waste of
vegetables grown for supermarkets. If my Purple Sprouting broccoli was
as good as that that was plough back in I would be very happy indeed.

I didn't see it, but can guess :-( Also, this is a major harmful
consequence of the demise of mixed farming - not so long ago, the
field of broccoli would have had some cows turned into it after it
had been picked.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.


That happens here in the Isle of Wight. Once the Sprouts or Cauliflowers are
finished, the Sheep are turned onto the fields


--
Mike

The Royal Naval Electrical Branch Association
www.rneba.org.uk
Luxury Self Catering on the Isle of Wight?
www.shanklinmanormews.co.uk

"Martin" wrote in message
...
There was no mention of the producers whose products do meet supermarket
standards.
--

Martin


Haven't you heard the story?

Told by the butcher's brother because he heard it from his sister's
milkman's postman that the supermarket gave the grower the chop and he went
bust?

Simply 'everybody' knows that story, mind you, no body knows 'first hand'
:-(((



--
Mike

The Royal Naval Electrical Branch Association
www.rneba.org.uk
Luxury Self Catering on the Isle of Wight?
www.shanklinmanormews.co.uk

The message
from Martin contains these words:

There was no mention of the producers whose products do meet supermarket
standards.


Surely that was where they started, with the producer that was having to
plough the broccoli back because it did not fit the supermarkets
guidelines

I find it interesting that in most supermarkets, its the fruit and veg
that hits you first, just inside the door. My marketing nouse tells me
that the first port of call is likely to be one of the biggest profit
margin items - "get the punters while they're not really thinking about
it - Oh I'm not sure if I need any spuds, so I'll buy some just in
case!"

Then of course there's the waste from the public! One chap said that
there a

Sell by:
Use by:
Best befo

plus other dates, and that no one really understands them all. Plus many
people throw away stuff they used some of, because they can think about
using it again a few days later. It is interesting that Aldi do not put
dates on the fruit and veg, it becomes obvious when its not as its best!

Roger T

On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:10:50 +0100, Martin wrote:

Sell by:
The last date it should be on a supermarket shelf

For stock control.

Use by:
The last date you should consume it.

Operative word "should", more often than not stuff well past its "use
by" is still perfectly fine.

Best befo
Edible but not at it's prime.

This one ought to scrapped, can't people tell if something has gone
off? See "use by", I guess people have stopped using their brains,
this bit of food has been around a while, it might have gone off.
Does it look OK? Does it smell OK? Is the texture OK? Does it taste
OK?

Plus many people throw away stuff they used some of, because they
can
think about using it again a few days later.

Once you have had bad food poisoning you tend to think twice about using
reheated leftovers.

Properly cooked, kept in the fridge for a few days and thoroughly
reheated once is fine. Of course these days many people don't know
how to cook, store food or reheat it properly.

I read the OPs post to mean people bought the ingredients for a dish,
in the supermarket prepacked quantities, use the amount they need for
the dish and bin the rest. They don't keep it for use in another dish
a few days later.

We generate one small worktop compost bin of food waste/week, that
includes the things that occasionally make a bid for freedom from the
fridge or vegetable store. The average household thows out about
1/3rd of the food coming in, edible and inedible (peelings, skins
etc). I don't know how such households manage to chuck out so much.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Dave Liquorice writes
On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:10:50 +0100, Martin wrote:

Once you have had bad food poisoning you tend to think twice about using
reheated leftovers.

You can go an awful long time without food poisoning - about 48 years in
my case. And that's not by observing sell by/use by/best buy dates.


I read the OPs post to mean people bought the ingredients for a dish,
in the supermarket prepacked quantities, use the amount they need for
the dish and bin the rest.

I'm trying to educate my son at the moment. He cooks well from a recipe,
but doesn't yet have the knowledge and confidence to make up his own
recipes, and you need to be able to do that to use left-overs. So far I
have just got him trained to leave me all the bits, even if he thinks
he's taken everything that is edible.


We generate one small worktop compost bin of food waste/week, that
includes the things that occasionally make a bid for freedom from the
fridge or vegetable store. The average household thows out about
1/3rd of the food coming in, edible and inedible (peelings, skins
etc). I don't know how such households manage to chuck out so much.

The statistic includes such things as banana skins and used tea bags.
That explains some of it!

--
Kay

On 18 Jan, 17:14, Martin wrote:
On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 16:38:25 +0000 (GMT), "Dave Liquorice"





wrote:
On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:10:50 +0100, Martin wrote:

Sell by:
The last date it should be on a supermarket shelf

For stock control.

Use by:
The last date you should consume it.

Operative word "should", more often than not stuff well past its "use
by" is still perfectly fine.

Best befo
Edible but not at it's prime.

This one ought to scrapped, can't people tell if something has gone
off? See "use by", I guess people have stopped using their brains,
this bit of food has been around a while, it might have gone off.
Does it look OK? Does it smell OK? Is the texture OK? Does it taste
OK?

Did it kill you?



Plus many people throw away stuff they used some of, because they
can
think about using it again a few days later.

Once you have had bad food poisoning you tend to think twice about using
reheated leftovers.

Properly cooked, kept in the fridge for a few days and thoroughly
reheated once is fine. Of course these days many people don't know
how to cook, store food or reheat it properly.

Especially restaurants.



I read the OPs post to mean people bought the ingredients for a dish,
in the supermarket prepacked quantities, use the amount they need for
the dish and bin the rest. They don't keep it for use in another dish
a few days later.

We generate one small worktop compost bin of food waste/week, that
includes the things that occasionally make a bid for freedom from the
fridge or vegetable store. The average household thows out about
1/3rd of the food coming in, edible and inedible (peelings, skins
etc). I don't know how such households manage to chuck out so much.

Luckily we aren't all "average"
--

Martin- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

In the days of greengrocers and wholesale markets and fruit and veg
wholsalers the green grocer bought what he new his customers would
buy, The market was governed by supply and demand, to much of a
product in on the day and the price would come down, not enough and it
could fetch a premium, and the small grower could supply just a few
boxes of a fruit or veg. Now the Sopermarkets set the price a long way
ahead and if an item is in short supply they don't pay more they
import it. and if an item is in glut they will reduce the price to the
grower.
Now to get "real" veg you have to find a farm shop or Farmers market.
I'd love to go back to growing veg, but round here many farmers
markets are only once or twice a month so without another steady
outlet I havn't a hope.
David Hill

"Dave Liquorice" wrote in message
ll.co.uk...
On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:10:50 +0100, Martin wrote:
snip
Does it look OK? Does it smell OK? Is the texture OK? Does it taste
OK?
snip
Hmmm...looks like dogshit; smells like dogshit; feels like dogshit; tastes
like dogshit; I think it is dogshit!
Just as well I didn't step in it.

[I'll get me coat]

On 18/01/2010 13:23, Broadback wrote:
Watching countryside on TV last night I was struck by the waste of
vegetables grown for supermarkets. If my Purple Sprouting broccoli was
as good as that that was plough back in I would be very happy indeed.

Much as I like the self-service aspect of supermarket vegetables, I can
see that if they put good and less-good in a box the less-good will get
left behind (and rapidly deteriorate). Not easy to have two boxes at
different prices when the check-out staff have to distinguish them.

My own PSB will be pathetic this year - didn't have space to plant them
out early enough.


--
CTC Right to Ride Rep. for Richmond upon Thames

On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 18:14:17 +0100, Martin wrote:

Properly cooked, kept in the fridge for a few days and thoroughly
reheated once is fine. Of course these days many people don't know
how to cook, store food or reheat it properly.

Especially restaurants.

Yep, the only times I've suffered food poisoning, twice that
immediatly spring to mind from the last 50 years, it has come from
restaurant food.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Paul Luton writes
On 18/01/2010 13:23, Broadback wrote:
Watching countryside on TV last night I was struck by the waste of
vegetables grown for supermarkets. If my Purple Sprouting broccoli was
as good as that that was plough back in I would be very happy indeed.

Much as I like the self-service aspect of supermarket vegetables, I can
see that if they put good and less-good in a box the less-good will get
left behind (and rapidly deteriorate). Not easy to have two boxes at
different prices when the check-out staff have to distinguish them.

My own PSB will be pathetic this year - didn't have space to plant them
out early enough.


They can bag up the bad ones, in the same way that they currently bag up
and discount the old ones. But it'd have to be a big discount.
--
Kay

On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:55:25 +0000, K wrote:

I'm trying to educate my son at the moment. He cooks well from a recipe,
but doesn't yet have the knowledge and confidence to make up his own
recipes, and you need to be able to do that to use left-overs. So far I
have just got him trained to leave me all the bits, even if he thinks
he's taken everything that is edible.

That knowledge and confidence will come. As with most things not
being scared of making a mistake is half the battle. Your son is
lucky he has someone who can cook to teach him, I have feeling that
an awful lot of households now rely on ready meals or takeaways. The
kids won't have seen their parents doing anything more complicated
than poping something in the microwave. We cook from ingredients
almost every day, the frozen pizza does comes out occasionaly but
even then gets bits added to it.

We generate one small worktop compost bin of food waste/week, that
includes the things that occasionally make a bid for freedom from
the
fridge or vegetable store. The average household thows out about
1/3rd of the food coming in, edible and inedible (peelings, skins
etc). I don't know how such households manage to chuck out so
much.

The statistic includes such things as banana skins and used tea bags.
That explains some of it!

I was including the inedible skins and the stuff that hasn't been
consumed before becoming a new life form in our small bin/week
amount. No way is that 1/3rd of all the food coming in for family of
four/week. It's rarely full and has several inches of paper shredings
in the bottom as well.

If the average is 1/3rd there must be a lot of people binning 1/3rd
of their food.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Dave Liquorice writes
On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:55:25 +0000, K wrote:

The statistic includes such things as banana skins and used tea bags.
That explains some of it!

I was including the inedible skins and the stuff that hasn't been
consumed before becoming a new life form in our small bin/week
amount. No way is that 1/3rd of all the food coming in for family of
four/week. It's rarely full and has several inches of paper shredings
in the bottom as well.

If the average is 1/3rd there must be a lot of people binning 1/3rd
of their food.

I remember seeing somewhere the statistic for food produced that ended
up being eaten. I took that together with the '1/3 wasted by the
consumer' statistic and did the sums, and it came out that half of all
food was wasted before it even got to the consumer.


--
Kay

In article , Roger & Barbara
Tonkin writes
he message
from Martin contains these words:

There was no mention of the producers whose products do meet supermarket
standards.


Surely that was where they started, with the producer that was having to
plough the broccoli back because it did not fit the supermarkets
guidelines

So have the suppliers been banned from selling their broccoli from the
door or even pick your own! Surely they could sell the remainder to
organic box companies or even put a note in the local paper!
--
Janet Tweedy
Dalmatian Telegraph
http://www.lancedal.demon.co.uk