We’ve all done it.
We clean out our pantry, and find boxes, bags and cans of food that are well past their expiration date, so we throw them out immediately.
The wilting produce in the fruit bowl? It’s just easier to toss them in the garbage.
The leftovers that have been found in the recesses of the fridge only to be indistinguishable as to their original intent? Yep, in the trash, and honestly, it’s not even worth cleaning out the nasty Tupperware.
I spend day after day coming up with creative ways to save our hard earned money, sharing those tips with you, and then I encourage you all to take a closer look at your budget. One of the easiest ways we can save money requires virtually no effort,  it’s right in front of our face, and yet we’re throwing it in the garbage – literally.
As I did some research this week on just how much food American’s waste every day, I was flabbergasted, and disgusted. The statistics varied some based on my sources, but bottom line is that a minimum of millions of tons of food is thrown out each year. It comes to an average of over a pound of food waste per person per day!!! How is this possible?
If you had asked me how much food our family throws away, my instinct would be a firm denial of any waste. As a frugal living expert, I know one shouldn’t waste food, right? I would “never” do that. Yet as I started tuning into exactly what we weren’t using, I began to get frustrated at myself, and my sweet familia. It happened so suddenly, I wasn’t even aware. The little bits here and there were adding up, and I knew it needed to stop. We weren’t being good stewards of all that we already were given.
So last week, I declared it NO FOOD WASTE WEEK. I gathered them together and threw the gauntlet down. We are not throwing away ANY FOOD this week  nothing! Now this is much easier said than done. I am two days into the challenge, and I admit giving a little bit of rice to our dog. 😉
Each day on the blog, I’ll share some of the unique ways I am attempting to make this No Food Waste week happen. It means cooperation from my family as well. Just this evening, I offered some left overs, and they said, “No thanks.” Well, somehow this food is going to be eaten, so I will need to get awfully creative tomorrow to figure out how to disguise it as “a new meal.”
I admit, it’s going to be a tricky challenge, but I am already loving the creative aspect it’s bringing to some of my meals. I think we’ll be amazed at how our grocery bill will be slashed in just seven days, as well as the time saved in the kitchen because we have food that’s ready to eat, we just need to think outside the box on how to use it immediately.
If any of you decide to take the challenge, let me know and send me a link to the post you do at the end of the week. I’d love to include it in my round up. This challenge is a good one for me. It’s stretching me to do something that I haven’t done before, and that invigorates me.
Would you care to join me in this week’s No Food Waste challenge? I dare you! (Double dog dare ya!)

Maybe we can all get our creative juices flowing as we look through this week’s Tasty Tuesday recipes.

TastyTuesday200pix Tasty Tuesday   Cookbooks Galore

Simple Rules for Tasty Tuesday Parade of Foods –  As always, please link directly to your recipe post and not your blog URL, so that everyone can find the recipe months from now.
Also, link back here in your post so that everyone can join in the fun, it’s just common courtesy of blog carnivals. Please do not link up a recipe meme that you have started. Thanks for your understanding.