Useful Portions

We are currently a family of 3. It would seem reasonable to expect that I could make the same amount of food for dinner each night, expecting that an equal amount would be eaten, it just isn’t so. While we do save leftoevers for lunches the next day I am very diligent about throwing out anything that is more than 4 days old, so a meal that creates a LOT of leftovers ends up being too much. This is something I’ve been working on controlling lately – creating useful portions.

I hate to throw out food. If I had a compost bin I might not feel quite as bad, but I don’t. Whatever doesn’t get eaten gets tossed and it’s just like throwing money in the trash (which is contained by a “pay-per-bag” trash bag). Part of my frugal life is creating less waste. It’s better for the environment and I believe it’s also part of being a responsible citizen. So what’s a person to do?

The biggest culprits here are my daughter and nieces. Chloe is 2-1/2 so she’s learning that she has some control over things, to put it mildly. She’ll ask for something like a banana or an apple so I’ll break it open or cut it up, she takes two bites and tells me she’s done. Grrrrr. Frustrating. I can’t very well force it down her throat so I’m left tossing it in the trash. The other girls follow suit.

As I write this, I’m listening for my oven timer to tell me that my mini muffins are finished baking. In one area of success, I have found that the 3 girls will take two bites of a full-sized muffin and then be finished with it, leaving about 3/4 of a muffin to be tossed in the trash. Instead of baking 6 full-size muffins, now I bake 23 mini muffins, and believe me, it works. The girls just polished off all but 6 of the 23 I made. No waste. The remaining muffins go into a bag for a snack tomorrow.

Let’s run with this idea. How can I apply this to other foods that I serve; portioning it in such a way that is not only encouraging for the kids to eat, but also not wasteful if they don’t eat much of it? Also, how can I change my food-prep habits so that the waste isn’t created because I’m not mindful in my preparation? Here are some ideas I have:

1. Cook for 3, not 5. I grew up in a family of 5 and though I haven’t lived with my parents for some time now, I still find myself preparing meals the same way and the same size that she did. I don’t need to make an 9.5×13 pan of lasagna when a 9×9 pan would be more than enough, but I find myself automatically preparing the larger dish because that’s what I’m used to. I don’t take the time to intentionally prepare the right amount.
2. Keep portions very small. This is a good thing to do anyway. It is far better to take a small amount of food and then get more if you finish rather than taking a large amount and being forced to throw out what you don’t eat. Not only does this save from wasting food it also helps your body decide if it is actually still hungry before you take more. We almost always eat our dinner on salad plates instead of our dinner plates because we tend to put too much food on the larger ones.
3. Limit options. This one may be tough for you, but I’ve maintained this rule from the beginning and I assure you it’s worth it. I don’t make separate meals for my daughter. She eats whatever we’re having unless it is something spicy, and even then I usually just save a portion aside for her without the spicy element. I don’t force her to eat her meal and I don’t make her something else if she refuses. There are very few exceptions to this rule in our home and it actually isn’t really a problem because it doesn’t occur to her to ask for something different (yet). Either way, if she always knew there was the option of having something else it would create a lot more waste because I would be encouraging her ‘picky-ness.’ At snack times I usually allow her to pick between two different snack so she feels like she has some control over things. Sometimes this helps.
4. Serve kid-sized food. I don’t know about you, but I really don’t like taking a bite of a collosal burger or a 4-layer club sandwich. My male readers might be saying, “no, I love that!” However, I do not. I don’t like not being able to fit the food into my mouth or having the juices run down my chin because I had to cram it in. That’s disgusting. Knowing that, I have to assume the little girls might feel the same way. Maybe the reason they don’t like to eat a big muffin is because they have a hard time taking bites out of it. They might also feel that way about a full-size sandwich or really thick bread. It’s just cumbersome for them to eat. I’ve been re-thinking how I serve food. Here are a few tricks that I have for making food more kid-friendly. 

•  
  • Cut sandwiches, pancakes and toast into strips, shapes or use cookie cutters.
  • Cut cheese into little, tiny rectangles, we call them cheese sticks.
  • Call something a funny name: peas=green balls. Snap peas are hiding something (look inside!)
  • Serve it in a strange container: toy plate or cup, ice cream cone, coffee mug, gravy boat or measuring cup.
  • Arrange food in a silly way. I build a quick, little ‘fort’ with their cheese sticks or arrange the green beans into a square.
  • Avoid super-messy foods. When I serve soup I give them very little broth and mostly solid ingredients. Otherwise they just want to play in it.
  • Have Chloe ‘help’ with the meal. If I give her something to stir, or a measuring cup of something to dump then she takes ownership of the meal and is more likely to eat it.

This is a work-in-progress for me. Sometimes, what works one day is a complete failure the next but it doesn’t hurt to try does it?

What have you done to create less food waste in your home? Do you have any tricks for feeding toddlers and preschoolers? I’d love to hear them.

Why I do what I do ~ My niece had an accident today. I told her to wait on the potty while I got a change of clothes for her. When I returned to the bathroom she was standing on the potty stool and said, “It’s ok Auntie. Chloe wiped me!”

If you enjoyed this post you may want to subscribe to free updates by RSS feed or Email.