Food wastage in Wedding & Parties

Wedding food worth Rs 339 crore goes waste

BANGALORE: After the big fat wedding is done with and the guests have gone home, what remains is the litter, dirty dishes and piles of excess high-calorie food.Enough to feed lakhs of children, in a country where malnutrition has been termed a "national shame" by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh. Statistics show that every third malnourished child in the world is an Indian.

'Guests should be sensitized'

"Food wastage is a big concern during weddings. We need to create awareness among people and sensitize them against wasting food. Hosts must put placards with messages saying guests must not waste food and take only what they can consume. Nowadays, professionals serve food, which is working positively," says Vasan T, proprietor, Gowrishankar Mahal, west of Chord Road.

Weddings wows

1,000 people attend an average marriage

Menu comprises two meals and breakfast

Each meal contains 1,239 calories

Avg cost of meal Rs 40

943 tonnes of high-calorie quality food wasted

Wasted food worth Rs 339 cr

22% food wasted in buffet system; 20% in served system

The next time you savour a wedding feast, spare a thought for the masses which go without two square meals a day. Especially children. At Indian weddings, where guests are plied with good food, there's always excess. This can be channelized to feed the poor, as some NGOs are already doing. Which goes to show there's enough to go around. India produces enough for its people, but the bulk of the food reaches those with purchasing power. It is the economics which needs to be balanced.

This article from Times of india.

Don’t throw away party leftovers.

Some ways to use leftovers.

Donate to Charity or Food Bank:

Donate the leftovers to a homeless shelter or soup kitchen. If you have a friend or know of someone (a local homeless person, for example) in need, give the leftovers to her. If you frequently have leftovers and know that friends often do too, organize yourselves into a team of leftover donors. Choose one person each week to collect leftovers from each person's house and deliver it to a shelter or kitchen.

Make Them New Again

Many leftovers can be tweaked to form part of a whole new dish. Add leftover cooked vegetables to a broth to make a healthy soup, turn leftover bread into croutons, stuffing or bread crumbs and create miso or wonton soup with leftover noodles. Or slice up leftover fruit and put it into a pie right away. In some cases, once the leftovers have been "converted," you can then freeze them or at least refrigerate them for several days.

Gifts and Parties

Call some friends and ask them to lunch to have a leftover party. Ask them to bring any leftovers they want to get rid of, along with dessert and drinks and turn it into a party. Tell your teenager to invite a few friends over after school to finish the leftovers.

Compost Heap:

Even the decayed food can be used in proper ways.Construct or buy a compost bin at a home improvement store and fill it with all your compostable items. The result is a blackish, crumbly mixture that you can use to fertilize plants or your garden. It's also an earth-friendly option because it prevents the waste from accumulating in a landfill. Examples of compostable items include bread, vegetable and fruit peels and virtually all uncooked food. Avoid putting meat or fish in your compost heap.