eating out of dumpsters

[JayJay]

Originally Posted by Master-Classter

yep, they're freegans. And before you jump to conclusions and rule them all off as weirdos, read the wiki and do a little research. As a society we do waste a ton of perfectly good stuff. I suppose some of them are just cheap, but many are normal people who believe there's free stuff to be had and it's wasteful to simple consume and move on.
The guy I knew did it because it was what he considered to be free food. He wasn't lacking money. He was really cheap.

 

[acidboy]

when I was a kid I used to pass through a dunkin donuts factory and everyday some people would line up to get the donuts that are to be discarded. this was of course years ago before "social responsibility" was included in business schools and I'd see humongous clear plastic sacks of squished, flattened, multi-colored donuts on the side of the road.

 

[NorCal]

In my early twenties a friend worked at or near (don't remember which) beagle bakery. At the end of each night they would bag up a **** load of day old bagels and throw them in the dumpster. We would grab a bag and share them around.
They were perfectly clean and for a bunch of broke ass college students it seemed like a score.

Just to be clear, this was a dumpster dedicated to the overflow from this one bakery and there was no nasty random **** in there. Also the bakery knew people did this and made a point of packaging up only edible food in clean 50 gal bags and then tying them off. Usually the bag would not even sit in the dumpster.

Personally I have no problem with it. It's a very direct form of reuse.

 

[acidboy]

Originally Posted by NorCal

I
Just to be clear, this was a dumpster dedicated to the overflow from this one bakery and there was no nasty random **** in there.

yeah, and the rats too.

 

[NorCal]

Originally Posted by acidboy

yeah, and the rats too.

Nope, no rats.

 

[itsstillmatt]

This thread should never have existed.

 

[NorCal]

Originally Posted by iammatt

This thread should never have existed.

I figured the usual suspects would get their panties knotted but frankly it makes no sense. People eat day old bread and pasties all the time. They either buy them from the day old bin, buy them from the fresh bin w/o knowing they're paying for day (or more) old food or they eat them at home after having aged them themselves.

So clearly they most people have no problem with food being a few days old.
As for the dumpster part, many who do this, the folks from the article a few posts back and certainly my friend from college, would never eat the random trash filled food from a common refuse heap. The whole point is that often food that is in a "dumpster" is not in any worse shape then that on the shelf.
I used to help with a charity and we got bread that the store would not sell but which was still fine. Nothing gross about it.

In the case of a lot of dumpster diving, the food is packaged up for the express purpose of someone grabbing it before it ever even leaves the store/bakery/whatever, and if it is even left outside it is done so in a manner that insures that it won't be spoilt. A lot of people really hate throwing away so much food and are happy to facilitate someone using it.
I used to take all the rice, falafel, and what-have-you left over from a Middle Eastern place I worked and give it away to the homeless. I don't see how that was gross either.
In many cases, including my bagel case, I promise the food is no less clean than what you get in restaurants.

 

[ysc]

A bunch of (fairly well off) students I know in Edinburgh do this, usually from the stuff chucked out by supermarkets. They even had a dinner party with all the food taken from stuff thrown away. Apparently now too many people are into it there and the good stuff is all gone too fast.

Sounds moderately horrible to me, but none of these people had to do it, so they must have been getting perfectly acceptable food.

 

[SField]

Originally Posted by NorCal

I figured the usual suspects would get their panties knotted but frankly it makes no sense. People eat day old bread and pasties all the time. They either buy them from the day old bin, buy them from the fresh bin w/o knowing they're paying for day (or more) old food or they eat them at home after having aged them themselves.

So clearly they most people have no problem with food being a few days old.
As for the dumpster part, many who do this, the folks from the article a few posts back and certainly my friend from college, would never eat the random trash filled food from a common refuse heap. The whole point is that often food that is in a "dumpster" is not in any worse shape then that on the shelf.
I used to help with a charity and we got bread that the store would not sell but which was still fine. Nothing gross about it.

In the case of a lot of dumpster diving, the food is packaged up for the express purpose of someone grabbing it before it ever even leaves the store/bakery/whatever, and if it is even left outside it is done so in a manner that insures that it won't be spoilt. A lot of people really hate throwing away so much food and are happy to facilitate someone using it.
I used to take all the rice, falafel, and what-have-you left over from a Middle Eastern place I worked and give it away to the homeless. I don't see how that was gross either.
In many cases, including my bagel case, I promise the food is no less clean than what you get in restaurants.
i don't know if he's got his panties in a knot. if anything I think matt feels it's a shame so much perfectly edible, sometimes fairly expensive food is wasted. I agree with him.

 

[Treen]

I used to do it ocassionally, with an ex girlfriend, who was into eco type causes. It is ridiculous what some people throw away, especially large supermarkets: bread that's perfectly fine, potatoes, meat, tinned food and sometimes even booze. The only rule was that it had to be in pretty perfect condition and inside a plastic bag, which wasn't that difficult.

It's something that I didn't continue after seeing that particular girl, because frankly I'd rather save a few quid and not look through a bin, but I can understand why some people do it and it has certainly given me a better perspective as to how much stuff is wasted.

 

[itsstillmatt]

Originally Posted by SField

i don't know if he's got his panties in a knot. if anything I think matt feels it's a shame so much perfectly edible, sometimes fairly expensive food is wasted. I agree with him.
I think a few things. First, I agree that it is shameful that so much food is wasted, but I am not sure that is necessarily the fault of the people at home. A lot of it has to do with the mass quantities we are forced to buy if we want to buy anything at all. As somebody who cooks for two a lot, this is a huge problem to deal with.* As far as restaurants, I imagine that those who toss are often not the places using food which I would consider "edible" in the first place, but the amount of waste in these places is atrocious and my standards aren't built around making sure I can be fed. I do have a problem with the idea of eating from trash cans, but whatever, I am not going to judge somebody for doing it. What I really wish was that there was a better system for getting the stuff that is not allowed to be served, or must be thrown out, to people who would like it, without them having to rummage, but there are a lot of difficulties with this as well, functional, political and emotional. *One thing that if I find really dismaying is that a lot of butchers, especially high end "sustainable" places, will not cut their meats in ways that allow for relatively small portions for two. Old school places are better about this, but come on, it leads to so much waste.

 

[otc]

While I have never gone hunting for food itself, I worked at a bakery in high school that threw away a ton of unsold bread in a dumpster shared with an Einstein Bagels that also threw away a ton of food.

Basically our bread without preservatives was only good for so long...Obviously something like a baguette was pretty much done the next day but something like a heavy multigrain sandwich-loaf is good for something like a week and a half. You can't sell it past the second or third day though as whoever buys it is going to end up with a loaf of bread that goes bad far too fast. Pretty much all the bread my family ate while I worked there came from stuff that was on its way out (we were allowed to take something fresh each shift...but stuff destined for trash was a free for all).
As long as we knew that it wasn't going to last as long as a fresh loaf, there was nothing wrong with it.

I have consumed some pepsi products that were dumpster dived as well. Somebody knew of a spot where a bottler/distributor dumped things that hit their freshness date (and lets face it...pop doesn't really go bad anywhere near that date). He made sure to wash the cans before opening but for the most part they were still on their cardboard pallets just like new cans.

I have also picked up furnishings/building supplies/housewears from dumpsters (move out days on college campuses are crazy...)

 

[otc]

Originally Posted by iammatt

What I really wish was that there was a better system for getting the stuff that is not allowed to be served, or must be thrown out, to people who would like it, without them having to rummage,

*One thing that if I find really dismaying is that a lot of butchers, especially high end "sustainable" places, will not cut their meats in ways that allow for relatively small portions for two. Old school places are better about this, but come on, it leads to so much waste.

As a person who frequently cooks for one (or two by way of making lunch for the next day), I feel you here. I used to live by a produce market that had pretty much everything they sold in bins that you threw into a plastic bag. Now if I want a little bit of spinach or something, the only thing whole foods (the store on my walk home) sells is a box of spinach that is about 18"x6"x6" (but at least they will usually cut meats/fish to order).

As for getting rid of the unused food...it is tough. When I worked at the bakery, the problem was that no sort of food-shelf or shelter was willing to come get the bread. Sometimes if we had a crazy amount left over for some reason, we might have our driver drop it off but most of the time it didn't make sense financially for either side--the food shelves would only pick up large quantities of non-perishables and we certainly couldn't afford to move it (the bakery eventually went under)

 

[otc]

Sorry to triple post but what I found the most odd about this was the beginning of the article that says new haven has no full service grocery store...wtf? I am familiar with poor areas not having functioning grocers but wouldn't Yale step in here? When the grocery store in Hyde Park was getting ready to fail, the University of Chicago became very involved in the process to maintain a store for students/staff to shop at (there are zero full service grocers in the neighboring 'hoods). IIRC what happened in the end was that the UofC ended up forgiving over a million dollars of debt (back rent on a second location that had closed a few years prior) in exchange for the store basically agreeing to close up shop rather than entering into a long bankruptcy proceeding. The University then facilitated negotiations for an established Chicago grocery chain to take over their space and begin operating within months of the deal (using the shelves, counters, etc. of the original store and slowly renovating section by section rather than doing a full-rehab before opening). Seems like Yale really dropped the ball here in supporting their student body and the surrounding community.

 

[Hombre Secreto]

I once asked one of my former Chefs why we couldn't take food home or at least give it away to homeless people. His response was because of a law suit if someone got "sick." Just couldn't risk it.