World Food Day: Five Ways to Turn Your Kitchen Sustainable

Chef Balendra Singh Director Institute of Bakery and Pastry Arts talks about the important role of sustainability

World Food Day is celebrated every year on 16th October to mark the beginning of a global move towards hunger eradication. It came into existence to celebrate the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations in the year 1945. Over 150 countries across the world, including UN Member countries, organize events to celebrate World Food Day every year. It is one of the “most celebrated days of the UN calendar”.

World Food Day aims to educate people across the world about the accessible menace of world hunger and that right to safe, hygienic and nutritious food is one of the basic necessities for all humans all across the world. Food security and sustainability are other problems that revolve around the commemoration of World Food Day. This year’s theme calls for a wave of investment in food security and rural development.

Discussion of food security and sustainability, a lot rests on checking these concepts on the microcosmic level. Only if we keep a check on what happens in our kitchens or the local grocery store, a substantial change may begin to take shape. This World Food Day, let us come together in the fight against world hunger by ensuring less food wastage and sustainable kitchen practices that may facilitate reduce food wastage and enable best possible utilization of resources. Let us pledge to follow easy practices that will go a long way in making the planet a more sustainable place – free from hunger, wastage and toxic items.

This World Food Day, you shall

 

Try and grow your own veggies

It is easy, inexpensive and so much easier. Start by owning an herb balcony and as you grow the interest further, go on by widening the area of your practice. Once you begin to grow your own veggies, invariably you’d be careful toward wasting the same being mindful of the amount of hard work, time, patience and resources gone into growing the same.

 

Minimize kitchen waste

Discuss with peoples and you will end up learning a great deal on how to minimize kitchen waste. If you do a lot of cooking with meats, the best way to make use of the discarded bones is by adding them in preparing hearty bone broths. Learn all about cooking bone broths here. Peels from fruits and vegetables can amount for most of your everyday kitchen waste; you can simply use these in generating compost that will help enrich the soil for gardening purpose, et cetera. Fruits and vegetable peels can be put to different other uses. Items like lemon or orange rind can be sun-dried, powdered and used in your skin care routine.

Get in the routine of segregating your everyday kitchen waste into dry and wet. Our water purifiers are one of the biggest tools of waster wastage, they waste more water than what is purified. Use the surplus water to water your plants, wash cloths or utensils.

 

Twist the way you cook and store ingredients

In case you are going to be left with some fruits or veggies that will not be used in cooking anytime soon, utilize them for making condiments like jams, marmalade, pickles, sauces, chutney, et cetera. Make use of leftover food too. A sustainable kitchen is also the one that is energy able, therefore it will not hurt if you switch your normal mode of cooking to steaming or pressure cooking. The latter is the fastest and easiest way to prepare meals, it saves up cook-time, therefore conserve energy.

Switch off your gas stove whenever not in use and try more of induction cooking to save energy. The way you stock up food items and ingredients may also help in minimizing waste. Herbs like coriander and mint quickly get dry, buy them in small quantities and store them correctly to avoid getting them wasted. Some ingredients ripen faster when stored with other food items. For example, bananas must always be brought slightly unripe and wrapped in a paper bag, stored separately to slow down their ripening process.

 

Have your way around plastic

Plastic waste is well-known just because of the fact that a single piece of plastic is non-degradable and the bio-degradable ones may even take years and years to breakdown. Restaurants and different entities in the food space are trying out ways to curb the use of plastic and connected waste stemming from the industry. While one of the initial moves was a vehement no to the use of plastic cutlery including glasses and even straws, the Indian government has now begun a serious crackdown on the use of plastic bags in the market.

 

Go organic

Nutritious food free of pesticides, processing or additives is essential to one and all. Going organic not only promises fine health but also a brighter future for the journey toward a sustainable planet. This World Food Day let us be the change at the grassroots to make possible a bigger wave of transformation.