Join Redbridge Council’s FREE cookery demo and learn how to be a zero waste hero, and save money!

It’s Zero Waste Week from September 1-5, and Redbridge Council is supporting the national environmental campaign to get everyone wasting less, especially food waste, and save money doing it!

Did you know up to 40% of household waste in Redbridge is food waste, but we can change that together.

To help you get started Redbridge Council is running a FREE cookery event in the borough for local people to help raise awareness of the harmful impact of food waste on the environment.

Join the Council’s Neighbourhood Environment Team and professional chef Mark Borrell to sharpen up your culinary skills and learn how to cook with leftovers. Discover how to make nutritious, filling meals out of some of the most common foods items found lingering in the fridge.

FREE cookery session:

Thursday 4 September

11am-1pm

Cranbrook Walk The Exchange Mall (Ground Floor, Cranbrook Road entrance), High Rd, Ilford IG1 1RS

During the two-hour live cookery demonstration the team will also be sharing recipes and top tips on food storage, reducing food waste, eating well of less, and how to save money from cutting back on food waste.

The event is suitable for all cooking levels and confidence levels and there’s no need to book a place, just turn up.

Everything we throw away has an impact on our environment and contributes to climate change. Because it’s not just the food we’re wasting – it’s the resources that go into producing it that get wasted too.

There are lots of ways to cut back on food waste, and if you don’t make it to the cookery session here’s a few tips to get you started:

Composting:

Put food waste to good use by turning it into soil enriching nutrients that help flowers and plants to grow. Composting is nature's process of recycling food and other organic waste into nutrient rich sustenance for gardens and green spaces.

On average, a household can reduce their waste by at least 30% through composting.

If you have space in your garden, you can easily set up a compost bin, but if you don’t have outdoor space – you can still get involved through community composting. Redbridge Council now has 5 community composting sites based in local parks.

Visit Clayhall, Goodmayes, Loxford, Seven Kings and South Park all year round. All five sites take a variety of uncooked fruit and vegetables, tea leaves, coffee grounds and dead flowers – all helping create nutrient rich compost which can be used to help keep the borough’s parks and green spaces flourishing. Each site will have posters informing people of the full list of what can and can’t be composted.

The Council is also supporting local people living in flats to set up shared composting bins and community gardens, enabling households who do not have access to a garden to get involved, reduce waste and increase green spaces in the borough.

For more information on this or if you would like to set your own shared composting bin up, please contact the council on ourneighbourhood@redbridge.gov.uk

Local Marta Wojtkowska and her two children regularly use the community composting site at South Park. She said: “It’s such an enjoyable experience for all three of us. Bringing food scraps to the composting site, is such a simple way to teach my kids what compost is and how it helps the environment - and they get so excited to help! Plus, it gives us a great excuse to visit the park, empty the bin and let the kids run around and burn off some energy.’

For more information on composting visit  https://www.redbridge.gov.uk/bins-waste-and-recycling/garden-waste/home-composting/

Food waste hacks:

From portion planning and finding recipes for leftovers, to setting your fridge to the correct temperature so food doesn’t spoil quickly. There are lots of great hacks  and other useful resources on our website to help you cut back on food waste like a pro! Head to https://www.redbridge.gov.uk/our-streets/love-food-hate-waste/