What common ingredient do you find yourself wasting the most of?

[Richard Chrz]

Any fresh produce my wife buys. She does not cook, and sees things that she thinks she will eat, and most often, never does and I end up throwing away, especially cucumbers.

[Jfrosty27]

Are we married to sisters? Sounds like my wife all the way.

[Mosca]

Michael_in_TX

Regarding tomato paste, get the stuff in the tube. Use what you need, and keep the rest in the fridge. It keeps a really long time.

[Richard Chrz]

I love a some tomato paste in my pantry, sometimes I just want something now, and it can make a pretty decent sauce on the fly.

[Mosca]

Buns. With just the two of us, we never use all the buns. I made cheesesteaks a couple weeks ago. We used four buns out of an 8 pack. Mrs Mosca just bought an 8 pack of hamburger buns; we’ve used two. And what if we want hot dogs? There’s no way we’re going to eat 8 hot dogs in a month, let alone the two weeks the buns will be good.

[Red Man]

I like to freeze first and then vac seal. That keeps them from squishing at all.

[RonB]

You can also just keep a finger on the seal button, and when the bunz just start to compress, hit seal. That should stop the vac and seal the bag.

Panhead John

[holehogg]

When buns or rolls don't get used they get a workout in the food processor, ziplock bag and into the freezer to be used for crumbing or adding to meatballs.

[Oak Smoke]

Potatoes, followed closely by leftover lettuce and a tomato I bought for a burger 2 weeks ago. With there being only two of us here these days we can get pretty wasteful. Last month we cleaned out the fridge and pantry looking for things with expired use by dates. Good grief that was an eye opener, we threw away a bunch of salsa, hot sauce, horseradish, and bottled dressings. My wife swears that most of that was still good. I’ve had real food poisoning 3 times. I will throw out every thing in the kitchen before I take the chance of getting it again. I’ve been putting off going through my spice cabinet. There are so many rubs in there that friends and relatives have given me because “We know you love to cook on your smoker” . I’ll never use them, most are too heavy on salt, the rest are things I’ve never heard of.

[Sharhamm]

When using only part of a tomato paste I then put the rest in a small freezer bag and then flatten it. Breaks off easily after freezing and it's easy to "guesstimate" 1 tablespoon

[Clark]

Milk. Our store carries it only in 1/2 gallon jugs. I use it on cereal 3-5 times a week, using only about a 1/2 of the jug. Then it is out of date and gets tossed.

[smokin fool]

Try filtered milk.
We switched months ago tastes way better IMHO and lasts 4 to 6 weeks longer than plain unfiltered milk. It does cost more but here at least it does go on sale from week to week.
We will stock up on 3 or 4 bags, don't sell in jugs here anymore, because we know it will last longer.

[Clark]

smokin fool I've never heard of filtered milk. What is filtered from it and how is it filtered? What are the bags you refer to?

[Bkhuna]

We'll buy a gallon of milk and split it into quart bottles. Three go into the freezer.

[WayneT]

Calories.

[Clawbear57]

Lettuce, tomato and potatoes in that order. I have started buying bag salad mix and still end up throwing half of it away.

[Allon]

Charcoal...

[Michael_in_TX]

As a PBC owner.... I kinda have to agree.

[Red Man]

Potatoes seem to be a common answer. I don’t get it. I almost never throw out potatoes. They are sold individually so it’s easy to buy the amount you plan to use in the time period you are shopping for. I know they are also sold in large bags but you probably shouldn’t buy the large bags if you aren’t going to use them. 🤷🏻♂️

[Panhead John]

Agree!

[smokin fool]

Clark years ago they did away with milk in jugs for the environmentalists so milk here is sold in 4L bags. Inside the out is three bags you put in the pictured server container. Snip off the corner and pour.
In a nut shell:
Filtered milk is put thru micro filters to take out bacteria and other organisms that stay in regularly processed milk causing it to spoil faster.

[smokin fool]

It must be at least, boy, 50 years since jugs dis-appeared up here after glass bottles were phased out.
At that time they were sold with a deposit, returned for the deposit and re-filled for resale.
Problem was sanitation, cleaning wasn't the best.
Then during cleaning the plastic was prone to shrinkage so in some cases a 4 L jug went down to 3.9 or 3.6 or 3.5L's.

[Davek8282]

Well I'm living in BC and not Ontario like SMOKIN fool. I can't remember the last time I say the bagged milk. Ours comes in a 4 litre plastic jug or in smaller amounts the waxed cardboard containers.

[smokin fool]

Good point Davek8282, bags are an Ontario thing, I really don't know how other provinces package they're milk so to say its Canadian is mis-leading.
Like BC anything under 4L in Ontario comes in waxed cardboard containers.

[jfmorris]

For some reason my wife loves to buy these chopped salad kits in bags, and we end up throwing half of them away because they go bad before we eat them. To be fair, this is usually in times we are busy and eating on the run and not sitting down to have a meal with a salad.

I'm almost done with buy many spices in bulk at Sam's Club, as most of them go bad and clump up before I am done. The only exception is the stuff I use to mix up batches of MMD. I'll still buy those in bulk, as I seem to mix up a lot of that rub. Everything else, I am getting either small grocery store bottles, or getting flat packs from The Spice House.

This past year, the thing that bugs me the most are those cans of chili peppers in adobo. The recipe will call for 2 of those peppers in adobo, and I won't do another recipe that calls for them for months. I'll stick the open can in the fridge inside a sandwich zip lock bag, then ultimately toss it a few weeks down the road.

[Andrrr]

That's interesting to hear about the chipotles. After I open a can I put foil over it put it in the fridge and it seems to stay for a long time. I couldn't tell you how long but definitely longer than a few weeks.

[SheilaAnn]

jfmorris I take the time to portion put 2 per and about a tablespoon of sauce. Freeze in little packets. Grab and go. I used to do it with tomato paste until I discovered the tubes. Yeah, I was late to that party! 🤣

[jfmorris]

Ok I think SheilaAnn wins! I’ll start freezing them next time I open a can.

[StrikeBBQ]

The long burpless/seedless cucumbers.

[TripleB]

Vegetables. Always seem to be tossing them out of the fridge. But last year bought a small electric composter or food recycler and now I make compost out of the old veggies. The unit makes beautiful compost in like 6 hours.

[Michael_in_TX]

But last year bought a small electric composter or food recycler and now I make compost out of the old veggies. The unit makes beautiful compost in like 6 hours.

I had no idea such a thing existed. Food to dirt basically overnight. A little pricy, but cool technology! Several models on Amazon.