On eating from the garbage
I have a confession to make: I dumpster dive for food. Whatever visceral response you have to this statement, be it a simple "Gross" or "oh god, you poor thing, you must be starving to death!" I'd like to strongly protest. First, I am in no way starving, or poor. I make a perfectly livable salary with full benefits and my kitchen is always stocked with enough food to live off of for months, even if all the grocery stores fell off the earth tomorrow. That's not the point. For those of you thinking "gross," it's a little harder to explain why it isn't. Full disclaimer, I don't recommend getting your food from a dumpster. It's true that you can't confirm where it's been or what else it's been in contact with, although I'd like to ask, can you do that with the food you buy in the store? Do you know for certain where it's been or what else it's been in contact with? No. So in this respect I see the risks as quite similar: if there's going to be salmonella or E. coli on your food, it's far more likely that it was picked up in the field or farm or factory where the food was produced. The fact is, our food system is a mess from top to bottom: while you can do your best to buy organic and local and only from "reputable sources," problems arise everywhere. Outbreaks and cross-contamination arise everywhere. Some of the best steps you can take to render your food safe are the ones you take at home: cooking your food to proper temperatures, washing your produce, keeping the raw chicken away from the salad. After multiple college and graduate courses in food safety and microbiology, I've come to realize that these are the most important steps in not getting sick. You can't control most of the variables that determine the safety of your food, until the food is in your hands. So focus on what you can do to make up for the things you can't control.
The other misconception that brings on the "gross" reaction is that most people assume grocery stores throw away food only because it's inedible. This is not true. At all. Going back to the mess that is our food system, grocery stores throw away massive amounts of perfectly edible food every day, for a variety of reasons. Maybe they simply ordered too much of something and know they can't sell it all- why waste the storage space until the product goes bad? Throw it away now. Maybe a product is close to the sell-by date (which has no basis in food safety except on infant formula, by the way) and they have a new shipment to fit on the shelf. Just throw it away. Maybe there's one bruised apple in that 5lb bag- no one's going to buy that bag now. Throw it away. Maybe that pepper, or tomato, or melon has a bruise or a nick in the rind. No one will buy it, and you don't want a reputation as the store with lousy produce, so you throw it away as quick as you can! Maybe a company changed it's packaging, and wants the new package on the shelves on a certain date- guess where the old product goes? Hell, maybe some of the "on the vine" tomatoes came off the vine. Cull them and throw them away. I know all this because I work with a non-profit to rescue those types of product before they reach the dumpster and get them to places they'll be used. I regularly speak with employees of large grocery stores who have to throw away perfectly good food every day, and they're always glad to keep it out of the trash. However, there are stores without rescue programs. And a rare few of them have open dumpsters.
That being said, I do have standards when it comes to food I rescue from the dumpster: I stick with things that are packaged, which is almost everything: even our peppers and cucumbers are vacuum-wrapped in plastic these days. When I do rescue produce, I plan to cook it rather than eat it raw, just in case it came in contact with meat. And, as I do with all produce, it gets washed thoroughly before I use it. Second, I don't mess with meat. Most raw meat products have some type of harmful bacteria already present (albeit in minute quantities), and all it takes is a few hours at the wrong temperature for those to grow into harmful populations. Just not worth it. But this leaves a huge variety of completely edible and safe things to pick from the trash. On my last excursion, I came home with a bag of potato chips (still sealed, but "expires" in 2 days), a box of granola bars (the box was damaged, probably why it was thrown out, but each bar is individually wrapped), 3 packages of sweet peppers (each had one damaged/bruised pepper), a bag of broccoli (the tips are slightly yellow- not worth keeping on the shelf), a plastic-wrapped cucumber, 10lbs of apples (all bagged, with 1 bruised apple), and a loaf of sliced bread (still tightly wrapped, but a little squashed at one end). In the past I've rescued boxes of cereal and cookies and crackers that weren't glued shut (the inner bag still perfectly sealed), slightly dented cans, jars of sauce with damaged labels, and on one occasion dozens of bars of chocolate that had just expired. I can say a good portion of my diet consists of these rescued ingredients, and I've never gotten ill (I'm a healthy, athletic adult with a robust immune system- what's called the "lowest-risk demographic." Never feed questionable food to babies, your grandmother, or any immunodeficient friend).
I wish I could say I do it to make a statement about the waste in our society, or to draw attention to the plight of the hungry. It is an act of social defiance, I suppose, but I don't advertise it. Most stores now have locked dumpsters or internal trash compactors, in part to keep people out and make themselves feel safer from the ever-looming Liability. I dumpster dive at night after the store closes, in hopes they won't ever realize I'm diverting goods from their waste stream. The main reason I do it is the same unsatisfying answer of mountain climbers and daredevils everywhere: because it's there. Because I can. Because if I can feed myself without spending money, and in some tiny way reduce waste and mitigate my negative impact on this earth, why not?
The other misconception that brings on the "gross" reaction is that most people assume grocery stores throw away food only because it's inedible. This is not true. At all. Going back to the mess that is our food system, grocery stores throw away massive amounts of perfectly edible food every day, for a variety of reasons. Maybe they simply ordered too much of something and know they can't sell it all- why waste the storage space until the product goes bad? Throw it away now. Maybe a product is close to the sell-by date (which has no basis in food safety except on infant formula, by the way) and they have a new shipment to fit on the shelf. Just throw it away. Maybe there's one bruised apple in that 5lb bag- no one's going to buy that bag now. Throw it away. Maybe that pepper, or tomato, or melon has a bruise or a nick in the rind. No one will buy it, and you don't want a reputation as the store with lousy produce, so you throw it away as quick as you can! Maybe a company changed it's packaging, and wants the new package on the shelves on a certain date- guess where the old product goes? Hell, maybe some of the "on the vine" tomatoes came off the vine. Cull them and throw them away. I know all this because I work with a non-profit to rescue those types of product before they reach the dumpster and get them to places they'll be used. I regularly speak with employees of large grocery stores who have to throw away perfectly good food every day, and they're always glad to keep it out of the trash. However, there are stores without rescue programs. And a rare few of them have open dumpsters.
That being said, I do have standards when it comes to food I rescue from the dumpster: I stick with things that are packaged, which is almost everything: even our peppers and cucumbers are vacuum-wrapped in plastic these days. When I do rescue produce, I plan to cook it rather than eat it raw, just in case it came in contact with meat. And, as I do with all produce, it gets washed thoroughly before I use it. Second, I don't mess with meat. Most raw meat products have some type of harmful bacteria already present (albeit in minute quantities), and all it takes is a few hours at the wrong temperature for those to grow into harmful populations. Just not worth it. But this leaves a huge variety of completely edible and safe things to pick from the trash. On my last excursion, I came home with a bag of potato chips (still sealed, but "expires" in 2 days), a box of granola bars (the box was damaged, probably why it was thrown out, but each bar is individually wrapped), 3 packages of sweet peppers (each had one damaged/bruised pepper), a bag of broccoli (the tips are slightly yellow- not worth keeping on the shelf), a plastic-wrapped cucumber, 10lbs of apples (all bagged, with 1 bruised apple), and a loaf of sliced bread (still tightly wrapped, but a little squashed at one end). In the past I've rescued boxes of cereal and cookies and crackers that weren't glued shut (the inner bag still perfectly sealed), slightly dented cans, jars of sauce with damaged labels, and on one occasion dozens of bars of chocolate that had just expired. I can say a good portion of my diet consists of these rescued ingredients, and I've never gotten ill (I'm a healthy, athletic adult with a robust immune system- what's called the "lowest-risk demographic." Never feed questionable food to babies, your grandmother, or any immunodeficient friend).
I wish I could say I do it to make a statement about the waste in our society, or to draw attention to the plight of the hungry. It is an act of social defiance, I suppose, but I don't advertise it. Most stores now have locked dumpsters or internal trash compactors, in part to keep people out and make themselves feel safer from the ever-looming Liability. I dumpster dive at night after the store closes, in hopes they won't ever realize I'm diverting goods from their waste stream. The main reason I do it is the same unsatisfying answer of mountain climbers and daredevils everywhere: because it's there. Because I can. Because if I can feed myself without spending money, and in some tiny way reduce waste and mitigate my negative impact on this earth, why not?
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