It's World Food Day! How to create a "use me first" basket to avoid waste and save money too (includes free printables.)

Hi Honeys, 

Back again for day sixteen of this years Blogtober.  We're halfway through already! How did that even happen?😊 Time is passing far too fast again.  It will be the holidays in no time at all and then we'll blink twice and it will be spring again. Yes, I'm counting down (as I do every year) and, in case anyone else longs for spring too, it's only 156 days😊

Today is world food day.  World food day was created in 1979 and is used to raise awareness of hunger around the world and also of the amount of food that is simply wasted.

When we think about hunger, we naturally think about the developing world and all of the ads we see on tv but in fact hunger is a global problem with so many families, some with both parents working, relying on food banks to help them feed their families.  

Inflation is pushing food prices (as well as utilities, housing costs and everything else) to unsustainable levels and already there are stories in the media of parents skipping meals so that their children can eat.  How much worse will it be in the winter months, fast approaching us, when we're being told many will have to choose whether to heat their homes or to eat each day.  

Wasting food in these situations is simply unthinkable and a combination of home cooking, using inexpensive but nutritious ingredients, as well as ensuring as little as possible goes into the bin, can help not only save money but make our food budgets go further.  In other words honeys, we all need to avoid allowing foods to go past their "use by" dates and use up any leftovers.

No food left behind..

Using up leftovers is another blog post in itself honeys (makes a mental note to write said post) but curating your foods, so that all of them are used in a timely fashion, is like anything else just a matter of organisation.

    

Meal planning is key...

Meal planning and only buying what you need helps make your budget stretch further honeys.  Hubby and I have been doing this for a while now and it is helping us manage to cope on one salary, having lost mine when I lost my job during lockdown. 

Every weekend we plan our dinners, writing out a list on a meal board (this also helps me during the week by reminding me what we're having for dinner that evening and whether I have to take anything out of the freezer.) Our weekly shopping list is then made up, using this meal plan, with additions such as cereal, fruit, milk and other staples. 

Meal prepping and cooking multiple, themed meals (such as lots of different dishes all created using a single, huge batch of minced beef and the resulting meals all frozen) can save money on both the food budget and on utilities too.  

Curating your pantry and fridge contents...

This is something oddly enough I learned from working retail.😊 In a retail environment, when new  stock arrives it's placed at the very back of the shelves, chillers and freezers.  In this way, the stock is sold in a timely fashion, with older stock used up first.

This method transfers perfectly to pantries and fridges too honeys.  To help with this, I created my own fun label.  It was then laminated and attached to a basket in our fridge and into this basket goes anything close to its use by date...   

The label doesn't have to be laminated though, why not print it onto a thicker, card stock? The same label could also be used on a basket in the pantry.  I made two versions.  One has a green border...

Which you can download here. 

The other version doesn't have a border, as you can see honeys...

You can download that version here.

For both labels you can click on the download links above or click "save image as" when placing your cursor over the images. 

There are also two meal planners, which you can find here, to help you plan out dinners for the week ahead.  Again these could be laminated or if you prefer, why not place it inside a photo frame and write on the glass with a white board marker?  This will allow you to wipe away and re-use it each week. 

I hope you like them honeys, enjoy🤗 

How do you avoid wasting food?  Do you use bins or containers in your fridge or pantry?  Do you have any tips to share?  Are you taking part in Blogtober too?  Why not share a link?  I promise I'll come visit and say hello.💖  Till next time dear ones, hugs always x.