"There are no bad food scraps…some are just more versatile than others," writes Lindsay-Jean Hard in "Cooking with Scraps," among the latest of a growing genre aimed at helping us combat food waste in our home kitchens. Hard writes a column by the same name for Food52, where she's earned a following for fresh, flavor-packed creations utilizing ingredients typically relegated to the trash bin — from pesto made with carrot tops to bloody marys spiked with dill pickle brine.
We would all do well – for our pocketbooks and the planet – by following Hard’s example. Every year, some 300 billion pounds of food in the U.S. winds up in the trash, and often a landfill.
For those of us who’d like to be part of the solution, and trim our own excesses in the process, this slim, beautifully organized volume can serve as an inspiring resource. A self-taught cook with a master’s degree in urban planning, the author traces her own zero-waste journey to her time living in Japan. While figuring out what to do with the produce unfamiliar to her in her farm share box, she learned the concepts of “mottainai,” an expression of regret regarding wastefulness; and “hara hachi bu,” meaning “eat until you’re 80 percent full.”
Back home in Ann Arbor, Michigan, she has honed that philosophy in frugal-minded recipes for family dinners such as Cheese Tortellini with Sausage and Broccoli Stems, and for appetizers and desserts worthy of company that include White Beans and Cauliflower Core Puree with Green Olive Gremolata, and Shortbread with Honey-Glazed Grapefruit Peel and Pink Peppercorns.
Throughout the chapters are sections called “Clean Out the Crisper” — templates for transforming what you have on hand into quick pickles, flavored salts and sugars, stratas, stocks, and infused alcohols and vinegars.
Even if you’re not quite ready to blend spent coffee grounds into cashew butter, or puree banana peels to fold into a cake batter, Hard’s inviting prose makes them fun to read about, and imagine the delicious possibilities that might be hiding in your crisper or pantry at this very moment.
Cooking with Scraps: Turn your peels, cores, rinds, and stems into delicious meals by Lindsay-Jean Hard (Workman, $19.95)
Susan Puckett is a cookbook author and former food editor for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Follow her at susanpuckett.com.
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