What do you do with your waste?

jmbattle · Post by **jmbattle** » Sun 05 Mar 2006 08:45

Good afternoon folks,

May I ask those who are fortunate enough to consume litres of their own freshly-squeezed orange juice each day, what they usually do with the waste from their juicers. I'm sure the pulp would make an excellent addition to any compost heap, however gather that not everyone lives in areas where this is feasible.

Moreover, might I ask a similar question about the egg whites that the majority of us are discarding? Considering the millions starving across the world, it saddens me to think of the vast amounts of nutrient that we are effectively throwing away.

Thank you, take care,
James
x

Post by **Oscar** » Sun 05 Mar 2006 10:40

To be honest, I just chuck it...

YouTube · Post by **RRM** » Sun 05 Mar 2006 16:25

Good point James.
I'm afraid that any effort to save such small amounts of foods, and process them into anything else, would be so expensive that it doesnt make any sense.

Thomas · Post by **Thomas** » Sun 05 Mar 2006 18:38

Unfortunately, there would be no chance for millions to be starving across the world were it not for the agricultural revolution.

Cairidh · Post by **Cairidh** » Mon 06 Mar 2006 08:49

I give the egg whites to my mum to cook, then she eats some and gives the rest to the dogs. It does upset me too wasting food like that, feel very uncomfortable about it, so try to keep the number of yolks I eat to the minimum.

avalon · Post by **avalon** » Wed 29 Mar 2006 00:09

I wish I could say that I give them away but I throw them away also. This hasn't been an easy path because I don't like throwing them down the drain, and I don't just want to spill the whites into the trash...

so what I'm doing now is taking a simple sandwich baggie and pouring the whites in, sealing it zip lock, then I put it in the freezer. I leave it in the freezer till the bag gets full, then throw it out on garbage day. So far this is working very well.

Cairidh · Post by **Cairidh** » Wed 29 Mar 2006 00:31

Can't you cook the egg whites and give them to a dog, or a neighbour, or a homeless man, or a homeless shelter/soup kitchen?

CurlyGirl · Post by **CurlyGirl** » Wed 29 Mar 2006 00:44

Thomas wrote:Unfortunately, there would be no chance for millions to be starving across the world were it not for the agricultural revolution.

4 billion of us would not be alive without the ammonia-synthesis process pioneered by the German chemists Carl Bosch and Fritz Haber during the Second World War, that has made it possible for us to make nitrogenous fertilizers (the nitrogen cycle was most intensively studied by the German soil chemist Justus von Liebig in the late 19th century). The Germans needed to find a method of producing artificial fertilizers locally, without relying on foreign exports of guano (mainly from Peru) that would put Germany in a vulnerable position during wartime.

The human population increased from 2 billion to 6 billion in just one century (20th) because of the agricultural revolution (which paired nitrogen fertilizers with high-yield seed varieties and pesticides)... this is a staggering fact about human history that not many people even realise.

The problem with starvation in the poor world relates to the maldistrubution of the plentiful food we grow on the planet today. Amartya Sen calls it 'lack of entitlement' rather than actual lack of food on a planetary scale. We have enough food to feed everyone, but given the rich world's outrageous consumption (and resulting obesity) the situation is clearly not one of fair distribution. Of course, it is a different matter whether we will continue to be able to increase our output of food when the oil runs out (which it will)... since we need oil to make fertilizer and to manufacture and propel combine-harvesters, etc. Chinese curse: 'May you live in interesting times.'

So, indeed, the agricultural revolution launched us beyond the particular biological 'wall' against which we were bumping our heads at the time. Clever humans... always adapting, always pushing back the line of crisis till we meet up with it again later. So now indeed, there are a lot of us, many of whom are starving. Who can say what the future looks like?

(Meanwhile I will keep composting my orange peels and making plans to construct a family-size permaculture patch... those who grow their own food are not so vulnerable, perhaps?)

avalon · Post by **avalon** » Wed 29 Mar 2006 15:35

I have a beighbor who has a dog, eats cooked eggs, and, he's like 20 feet away from my home...but he has no interest in my egg whites. The NERVE! If I wasn't trying to do the raw thing so well I'd cook the whites and eat them...I live alone and you're in that moment where here are the whites...where can I use them...what to do...

Anyone know how long whites will keep frozen? Months? Maybe that's what I can do while searching, because it just isn't that easy to give them away.