Are Left-Over Foods Good for Human? Or Otherwise? A survey has been gone to public on the left-over foods discarded by the fast foods and restaurants. Tons of those foods are being thrown by those foods sellers. Those uneaten or excess foods by the customers couldn't be thrown away or be fed to the animals for they could be processed in any way. Couldn't they? At home, sometimes we have some extra cooked rice and we fried them and reeat them. Excess fried fishes are processed in a sweet-sour dish with a little soup. They are still good and taste better as long as they are prepared deliciously with the tasty, seasonings or ingredients. In your case, what do you do with your left-over foods? Do you feed them to the dogs, cats, or hogs? Or do you just throw them away?
We rarely throw away leftover food. It is stored safely in the cupboard if its not perishable or in the refrigerator for heating and consumption the next morning. If its in excess, we give it to the dogs or poultry and they find human food quite relishing. Otherwise, it makes sense to prepare just enough food.
I always try to prepare fresh meals three times a day. Whatever that is left over either goes to birds or animals or if it is still in demand then in fridge for using later. I dislike wasting food and so I try to make adequate for a my needs.
I try not to have too many leftovers because it's healthier to eat fresh. I do eat them, but in the case of fast food, some isn't worth saving if they weren't good in the first place or they have little nutritional value. I don't like to waste food, but over eating is as bad, and food that has lost its nutrition isn't really worth it. You have to consider each item on its merit.
We don't throw the leftovers at our house. Although we try to prepare the meals in such a way that there are no left overs. In rare cases when there are some leftovers, we try to finish it in our next meal and if that is not done then we give it to our maid. It is seldom that our food gets spoiled and we have to trow it away.
Leftover food is a big issue when it comes to the world hunger index. I have a friend who gets leftover food of one fastfood outlet. He feeds the food to his dogs. He said that the food he gets is enough for 3 days food of his 8 dogs. You can imagine the waste from those leftover. In our home, we try our best to limit the leftover by calculating the amount of ingredients that we will buy for our meals. Cooking food gives me the liberty to choose the ingredients so we buy what is currently cheap and the amount is just enough like half a kilo or sometimes even 400 grams of meat. It’s not a good practice to buy meat and fish by the kilo when it will only result in a leftover.
Unless the leftovers are ruined, I think throwing them is very wasteful. The world already has too many people starving and wasting food (even if they are leftovers) is a real crime. Many people don't know what to do with the leftovers, but doing a quick search on the internet it's possible to find some revenue that is feasible.
People are coming up with unique ideas to convert the leftover food into some thing tasty lately. For instance my wife has experimented with the sides of toasts which were considered as unusable until now have been turned into a sweet dish. She fries them and dip in concentrated syrup of sugar that makes a wonderful sweet item.
I cook small meals and any vegetables that aren't cooked is left in the refrigerator. I do not waste anything and I have a simple diet. I do not waste my time going out of the way and buying in large unhealthy food. That's where the waste comes into play. You should make enough for you and your family for that meal, and maybe left overs for tomorrow and that's it. Too large of a quantity will be left in the refrigerator and eventually lose it taste and will go to the trash, eventually. Keep things simple, white you meal plans ahead of time. That way you know what to cook, what to purchase, and the kids will find it fun as they can tell you exactly what they want to eat any given day of the week in advance.
My hubby used to cook huge meals since we are mostly busy all the time so we just reheat them. There are some dishes that tastes better when put in the fridge overnight that's why my hubby cooks them in huge portions and leave it overnight. We never throw food or let anything spoil because we don't wanna waste anything as food is very important for us
Left over foods should be thrown away especially if they are remnant from same plate where the eating was done. Saliva, bacteria and other dirts would have entered the left over food and this is clearly not supposed to be kept for a later date. Instead of having waste it's okay to dish small portion at a time and go back for more if that didn't satisfy.
Leftover foods are great for humans because then you don't have to throw any of it in the trash especially when it's not bad at all. I don't like seeing good food being tossed out so it's better to save. At a restaurant I can see throwing it away if the customer doesn't want to take the food home but good food in the kitchen should be saved until it's no good anymore. After eating a delicious home cooked dinner at home I'll put the rest in the fridge so that I have something for lunch the next day. With leftovers you can do so much with it. I like Thanksgiving because all that leftover turkey can be used for turkey sandwiches, turkey soup, and other turkey meals.
@happyshopper Now the rules are very strict for restaurants as they cannot throw leftover food but they have to give it to charities/orphanages/homeless etc. In my country they have already started working on this plan and new rules are being introduced to avoid wastage as much as possible.
Most left overs can be used as toppings for frittatas and pizzas. You can also use them as toppings for fried rice. Here are some example of frittata recipes for leftovers: Sometimes though I just simply reheat them in the microwave to save time
We try not to waste any food so we get leftovers all the time. When our rice is too dry we feed the birds with it. We like not to waste food. It's good that some places give leftover foods to people to feel their animals with. Food is precious, so I feel it shouldn't be wasted. We too like to cook just enough food for one sitting too.
We've never cooked excess food so there's hardly any leftover food after a meal. We just cook whatever we can eat. The same thing happens when we go to a restaurant, we just order whatever it is we can eat, nothing extras. Most of the times, we even take home the chicken bones because our cats loved to eat those. I'll definitely feel guilty about throwing foods away unless they've actually gone bad or unfit for human consumption.
This is one of my biggest pet peeves, and I cannot stand wasting food. Sometimes there is just not much that can be done with some things, but I really do try my hardest to make use of them.
@Nakitakona In the case of leftover food on the cooking side, yes. In the case, of customer eaten food, no. Note, there is no way to recover uneaten food after it's been thrown in the trash can and it's silly to ask customers to clean their plate as they would do in some military boot camp. @Ray1 I've always wondered how chicken restaurants can keep from wasting food. Places like KFC have to keep a lot of chicken on hand, either behind the counter or in a buffet, to keep the food service fast.
@Nakitakona With a large family, I always miscalculate. I cook for a whole town. So, the unfinished (cooked over a burner once) food goes straight into storage containers into the fridge. Then, the next day, I only reheat very small amount at a time in a small saucepan on a cook stove, depending on how many are eating. Reheating food more the twice isn't good.
leftovers should never be wasted, in our home, our parents taught us that excess food should be stored for another day or given to one who may need it. in most cases we store our left over in the refrigerator for another day and we don't cook until it's done. but when food is little, we mostly use as in between meals. we also rear some chicken, and at times we feed them with left overs. this assures all food we cook well utelised.
