Freeganism - Not For Everyone, But It Might Be For Me!
A Unique Dinner Invitation
A few days ago, I recieved a dinner invitation. The invitation wasn't unique, the dinner was. I had been invited to a freegan dinner.
So what is freegnaism, exactally? It's a way of living for those who choose to participate in consumerism in the most minimal way possible. People who practice freeganism take advantage of the rediculous amounts of wasted and discarded goods, particularly, but not limited to, food.
I have to say that it's taken a while to get me on board with this idea. But last night's dinner may have sold me! I meant to take lots of pictures, but once dinner was served I was so distracted by the delicious dishes and intriguing conversation, I forgot all about the pictures! SORRY!! I did get a few.
These veggie kabobs were outta sight! Also on the menu was delish pasta and veggie salad and some of the most fantastic herb-roasted potatoes.
That's not so unusual. I know. It's not what was on the menu. It's where the ingredients came from. Every single item used to make this amazing dinner was thrown out by stores. Yep. Thrown out. As in thrown into a dumpster.
Yikes! How many of you did I loose with that statement? If you're turned off, that's okay. But before you totally make up your mind, check this out.
The night before our dinner, my hosts had gone "shopping" at a couple local grocery stores. The above is what they rescued. Piles of beautiful, bright, fresh veggies.
What a Waste!
It's estimated that up to 1/3 of all the fresh food grown in the world is wasted. One third!! That's a lot of food! Freegans are cashing in on this waste, and frankly, they're probably eating better than I am.
The freegans I had the pleasure of dining with told me of full flats of mushrooms, blueberries and citrus they've recovered. Crates of bananas and apples and lettuce. Some seemed to be thrown out because a few of the apples had bruises or one or two avacados in a crate were bad. But the food is often thrown out as a result of overstocking.
This whole thing blows my mind! Do you know how often I'm able to afford a bag of bell peppers? And here, on this table are so many beautiful peppers that they had to give many of them away!
The Stigma
Freeganism is synonymous with dumpster diving. What do you think of when I say, "dumpster diver." A homeless person? A dirty street rat?
Well, let me tell you about these divers. One is a teacher at a local college, the other works for the U.S. Postal Service. They live in a nice, middle-class home furnished beautifully with road-side finds and unique pieces pulled from dumpsters. Shelves of rescued books and cabinets loaded with found dishes. After dinner we had coffee made in a French press snatched from the Bed Bath and Beyond trash, new still in the original box.
I'm suprised by how many people are doing this. I suppose no one really advertises that they're into this sort of thing is the stigma that comes with it. One of my hosts told me that when she told her mom what she had for dinner and where it came from, her mom offered her money, thinking that she was resorting to rotten, dangerous dumpster food out of desperation.
But, as you can see, the food is beautiful. After being washed, each piece is looked over. Bruises are cut out and the occasional bad piece is thrown out under a giant tree where opposums and deer and come often to see what goodies have been left. Turtles show up every morning and evening in their car port to nibble on fruit to bruised to save. This guy showed up while I was there and enjoyed a peach.
Want To See It In Action?
I've put in a request to join in on one of their food rescue missions, and my request has been approved. Please know that I will be sharing that experience in a future post!
I found a great food-from-the-dumpster playlist by a Youtuber called Shelbizleee. I actually found lots of freeganism when I started digging into it. I found a site that threw out some stats that I've heard before, and some that I haven't heard.
"- We throw away 165 billion dollars worth of food per year in the United States. That's more than the budgets for the United States national parks, public libraries, federal prisons, veteran's heath care, the FBI and the FDA combined.
- About 50 million of our 317 million Americans are food insecure yet we produce enough food to feed over 500 million Americans.
- To create just the amount of food that ends up in the landfills we waste enough water to meet the domestic water needs of every American citizen."
Whaaaaat? Get to his site and check out the pictures of the recued food on there. Mind blown. I've always known that food waste is a huge problem, but I had no idea!
I'm really excited to go out and see this for myself. I doubt I'll ever be a full-on freegan, but the idea of rescuing some of this food has peaked my interest.
To Be Continued...
Be sure to check out this post on medicinal Passion flower and enter for the medicinal seed giveaway!
I think dumpster diving is awesome. Our society definitely throws out wayyy too much food, and combine that with the same cause (capitalism) keeping so many people below poverty, this is just a great thing. Not that I'd prefer people to have to dig through garbage. :P But since the system is unlikely to change soon...
My only motivation to participate in this thing, my reason for interest, is it blows my mind to see how much is thrown out! I was brought up by waste-not-want-not kind of people, so I'm just not okay with waste on this level! I also don't like wasting money, so if I can save wasted food and other goods, and my money, yeah, I'm in!
Um, wow.
Idk if you understand how relevant this could be to me right now. I literally texted my friend the other day that I wanted to start learning about minimalism. And my wife and I are currently reading 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess on loan from @burntoblog.
Keep posting about this. I want to know more :)
So yeah, I'm going to be posting on this. Maybe a lot. I don't know how much interest the topic will attract, but I think it's something that's not being covered enough - if at all. And I'd love to have lots of conversation about it.
Good plan!