dumpster love bite

Most food that is found in the trash needs to be dug out from underneath the “real” trash. Things like wax boxes, plastic pallet wrapping, random papers and empty grocery bags; wire, coffee filters, soda cans. The good stuff is sometimes all neatly stashed in a spent broccoli box or packed in an empty onion sack, but this is rarely the case. Usually you have to dig. The biggest turnoff to digging is that you have to physically get inside the container and throw things around like a crazy person.

And yes, these big steel boxes stink. This can deter some people and make them think that it is the food itself that is the problem. The problem is actually that these dumpsters never (or rarely) get washed or steam cleaned, so the crap that sticks to the walls as the containers are dumped rots while “fresh” trash is piled in. Since the dumpsters are emptied a few times a week, encountering something that is really foul is pretty rare.

All that to say that I think that March 1st will be the official start of waste stream month, four full weeks of eating completely free. I’ll be in the trash more often than usual, and, since Lynn and Selena are willing to participate over at Trashy Gourmet, the results of the experiment might be different from last time around. I have been practicing coming up with some recipes, but I think that the staple for the month will be Everything and Anything Soup. Currently bubbling on the stove is a pot of yellow squash, celery, kale, tomato, broccoli, spring onions and bok choy taken from the latest round of scavenging.

Add to that a couple toasted bagels and some “expired” goat butter and were good for a lunch/dinner cycle for a few days. And don’t forget the dessert…

I’m picking March 1st because it will give me some time for my hand to recover from cutting it on the edge of a dumpster as I was about to jump in.

It doesn’t hurt as bad as it did. I just need to remember to wear gloves…