July 3, 2014 · Team HG
With a free lunch in the Noorderplantsoen last Saturday, June 28, 2014, Damn Food Waste let visitors sample food that would otherwise have ended up in the trash.
A dinner against food waste. She came all the way from Haren for it. First with her walker in the shared taxi and the last part on foot. Across the grass of the Noorderplantsoen, to the large field near the playground. At one of the many picnic tables, Riet Nauta-van der Burg (87) enjoys a cup of 'disco soup', a richly filled soup made from rainbow carrots, Jerusalem artichokes, green beans and potatoes that were saved from the bin this week.
Nauta-van der Burg is here for her daughter, a volunteer at the stall where the fried mealworms and toasts with sea lettuce hummus willingly slide down the throats of visitors. The day before, daughter Marjo Nauta (53) helped clean and cut 400 kilos of vegetables at the Food Bank in the city.
The food products come from wholesalers, farmers and growers in the area. Because supermarkets can often get their products cheaper from abroad, local producers are left with surpluses. “Such a waste,” says Wilbert van de Kamp (25). He is the organizer of the Groningen edition of Damn Food Waste.
Van de Kamp likes to make people aware of what they eat and – especially – where their meal comes from. After all, together we waste about 50 kilos of food per person per year.
It is busy in the park. Visitors are queuing up at the food stalls. There is a scramble for the rotating soup, made from leftover fish from the auction. There are also queues for the fruit smoothies, which have to be pedaled together using a clever construction of a bicycle and a blender. And yes, there is also a wait for the fried blanched bull testicles on a bed of soy caviar. Eric Grol (29) takes a cautious bite. “A bit tough, but tasty in itself,” he says.
Spring onion cuttings in empty soda cans are being given away from stalls of the Netherlands Nutrition Centre and the Food Bank, a partner of the festival. With this, the initiators want to show that growing your own food does not have to be complicated.
Does it help? Yes, nods Mark Schenkel (29), while spooning his disco soup. He prevents waste by, among other things, freezing his bread so that it does not spoil and get wasted. He also has another trick to ensure he has to throw away as little as possible. He grins. “I just try to eat at home as little as possible.”
With permission of Author: Lieke van den Krommenacker
Source: Newspaper DVHN
