An item on the television news tonight confirmed what I had heard about ugly produce being sold in our upscale grocery stores now. By ugly the vendors mean non-conformist. oddly shaped, not jewel-like. I suppose it’s hard to package a bent mini-cucumber with others of dissimilar shape in one neat parcel. And bent peppers don’t stack well on a display counter. They all taste good, though. When I lived up north I used to buy produce at a greengrocers (to use an old expression) in Parry Sound where I went for tai chi class every Monday. I always bought crooked peppers and any others marked down after the weekend because I used to, and still do, grill and marinate peppers. I won’t pause now to describe my favourite use of them. I want to focus on another aspect of food.

I read a report from Australia this morning about a restaurateur, a team from Noma, a Copenhagen restaurant famous for finding indigenous ingredients. They were foraging there for esoteric, edible goodies for a fresh (!) cuisine. Here’s some of the stuff they found: Neptune’s necklace (seaweed), finger lime (citrus flavour), mat-rush (looks like a leek), bunya nut (?), and a delicacy from a rain forest tree called the Atherton oak. Somehow I feel these might be expensive to acquire and with a taste rather difficult to develop.

Isn’t the world funny? We are resolved to save the planet and money by using perfectly good food that is thrown into landfill or dumpsters (same thing) while food explorers are seeking new taste sensations- at great expense. Perhaps, though, when other familiar food disappears, we will be happy to have bunya nuts.

You must have noticed as I have that food waste is a very hot subject now and getting hotter. There are Ugly Fruit movements in most big cities now, making it possible and an honourable thing to buy misshapen but perfectly good produce. We are assured that it’s okay to use a product past its best-by date, unless it’s green or smelly. We are shamed into keeping and using leftovers instead of throwing them out.

I’ve collected lots of lists and tips for reducing food waste. I could have written them myself and, given time, I probably will. My first cookbook was about leftovers (Encore; The Leftovers Cookbook) and I received one of the best reviews for it that I’ve ever had. “A family could save $1000 a year using this cookbook.” My standards have changed (less cream, fewer sauces, less red meat, fewer carbs) but my frugal methods are similar. I wrote my second cookbook for a different publisher and it had cute little line drawn illustrations. The artist made a special page for me depicting various foods all in a state of deterioration with mould or fumes or rot, making his point that I was keeping food too long.

Well, waste not, want not.

I could go on and on but I’m going to bed. Go and look in your fridge and see what you can salvage for tomorrow’s lunch if not dinner. Tell me about it.