Food Waste and recycled furniture - what I did on my weekend

[aldersprig]

Today, I spent several hours or so sanding down my old dresser - and by old, I mean I'm pretty sure my Mom got it at a garage sale when I was 6 or so, so it's been in our family for 30 years, more if I'm right about the garage sale.

This thing is stained - was stained - an orangy red color, and, well, it had been a child's dresser. Possibly two or three children's dresser. It is beat to shit. One of the legs is broken. I have been carrying it in move after move since I moved out of my parents' house at 20. It's well-used.

But it's solid wood, it's a good size for us, and the frame is still intact. So I picked up 4 new (taller) legs at the ReUse center (you should totally see if your area has something similar!) - also stained an ugly orangish red - and got to work with the palm sander.

I've gotten the drawer fronts (5), the top, half the front, and one side sanded down - it's turned out to be a lovely poplar with a very green grain. My plan is to pain the carcass and drawer fronts (the same white as the bedroom walls), stain the top to match what we're doing with the closet doors, stain the legs to match, and buy nifty knobs.

Truth be told, I'm doing all this for the knobs.
"The Frugal Girl" and, specifically, her Food Waste Friday segment, in which she blogs about, yes, food waste. I find it interesting, and I'm glad to see someone else thinks of it.

T. & I have learned to minimize food waste by using the freezer a lot and not buying veggies we don't have a plan for - we buy a lot of canned food. How do you avoid throwing food out?

Comments

[clare_dragonfly]

Sounds cool! Knobs is a good reason. Post pictures when you're done!

I avoid throwing food out by feeding it to my dog, because she loves human food;

Also, I saw this and thought of you (NSFW): http://huzzahactuallygoodporn.tumblr.com/post/22039169056/thoushalllovethymistress-via-ackies

[ranunculus]

Food waste is a looming issue in my family. Donald won't eat "leftovers" unless forced. M is MUCH better about this. I can't eat anything that has been in the refrigerator for more than about 48 hours due to mold issues. I regularly stretch that time, but we still waste food.

[aldersprig]

I don't particularly like leftovers, but T. will eat pretty much anything, so that absolves me of needing to.

Our favorite trick is to turn leftovers into an entirely new meal.

[ranunculus]

I make new meals out of leftovers whenever I can, and use the freezer extensively.

[aldersprig]

We got a chest freezer when we moved into The House, and man do we love it! (We have three turkeys in there right now)

[ranunculus]

I had a chest freezer for a while, then got an upright and man do I love my upright! Grin.

[aldersprig]

Really? We went with the chest because it looked like it would lose less coolth

[ranunculus]

The chest is, in theory, a bit more energy efficient although that wasn't at all true in my case. I think the lid of the chest freezer wasn't quite right. In any case organizing and finding things in the chest was a nightmare. With the upright it is a breeze so I end up using it more, and the door is open for far shorter periods.

[aldersprig]

Ah!

We're thinking of lining ours with blue board, with a half-lid on either side. but right now it's mostly got turkeys in it (saaaaaaaaaaale... couldn't resist)

[inventrix]

A big help is knowing how much of something you'll generally finish before it goes bad. I never get more than 4 or 5 bananas at once, but I can eat a whole box of clementines before they start molding. Bread is no problem. Baby carrots keep fairly well in the fridge and make good snacks. Apple sauce, too. A half a dozen apples works. Milk only in quarts; half gallons usually go bad before I finish them. Cheese, it depends, but I generally can keep up with it well enough. Eggs keep for ages in the fridge, really, but I eat them infrequently enough on my own that I rarely get a whole dozen.

Then there's barely-perishables like canned soup, pastas, peanut butter, honey, crunchy snack things, nuts, chocolate, etc. which I usually have a good stock of.

I almost never buy meat, because I never finish it before it goes bad. Occasionally I will get a small thing of deli sliced turkey if I know I'll want to eat it all week. Same with salad greens.

One of the things I am really looking forward to with having another person around is being able to buy more perishable types of food because it'll get eaten faster. :D

[aldersprig]

That's pretty much how we ended up about veggies. We buy very few, and only the stuff we know we're going to eat.