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Take Control of Your Health
Mercola Says: How Much Food Do You Waste?
by Joseph Mercola, D.O.
Dr. Joseph Mercola
of Mercola.com
A recent study estimated that 1,400 calories of food per person is wasted every day. These wasted calories represent 39 percent of the available U.S. food supply. Wasted food means wasted resources.
Knowing when food has spoiled and is unsafe to eat often isn’t as easy as just looking at it. A bit of mold or discoloration might not make you sick. It could be safe to cut away the bad spot and eat the remainder. Even foods with a slight odor or slimy sheen are often perfectly safe to eat. Unappetizing, perhaps, but still safe.
The Truth About Expiration and “Use By” Dates
Did you know the dating of food is a completely voluntary practice? Also, the wording that precedes the date stamp can have very different meanings.
- The Sell By date is for retailers and tells them the date the product should be removed from the shelf. The food may have lost its peak freshness, but it is still perfectly safe, if not optimally nutritious.
- A Best If Used By date is another indicator of freshness, but not safety. It’s safe to eat foods past their Use By date.
- The Expiration date is the date after which a food may no longer be safe to consume.
How You Can Minimize Food Waste
- Buy food locally, preferably from a small farm you can visit yourself.
- Eating fresh food is the only way to be optimally healthy. So the solution to food waste isn’t to buy more processed or canned foods loaded with enough chemicals to preserve them for eternity.
- Cook in quantity and store extra food in your fridge. You accomplish two things this way—you use your ingredients before they spoil, and you have nutritious food ready the following day.
- To buy back some of that time you spend cooking, you can eat many foods raw while you’re on the go. Ideally, at least one third of your food should be eaten raw.
- Massive amounts of foods are wasted when people eat away from home and order more than they can consume. Another way to avoid waste is to think in terms of less is more. Buy and serve healthy portions, and give your body the opportunity to be satiated by smaller quantities and fewer calories.
