Hi, I hope you’re all ok and had a lovely Christmas – as strange as the season has been, I hope you all managed to make the most of a little break! Oh, and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! I don’t think it’s just me who is wishing for a better year than the last.
I digress. This blog post is all about being kinder to the planet in literally the easiest way possible. If there’s anything we can focus on in 2021, let’s make it our planet!
Over the Christmas break, I used an app called: Too Good To Go. Whether you’ve heard of it or not, you NEED to download it (especially if you’re a student living in the heart of Birmingham). The app enables you to rescue food for such a small price that would otherwise be thrown away. The food will either have a best before or use-by date of the day you pick up – but it is still perfectly fine to eat!
The app works in such a simple way: you set your location – I set mine to shops/restaurants within 10km of my home so I’m not travelling too far. Now, the app relies on luck. Some days you can log in and there will be an abundance of ‘magic bags’ and other days you can log in and there be no food available that day! (Which I see as a good thing as it means others are saving food around you too).
I paid the tiny price of £3.09 for my magic bag. I had absolutely no idea what was in this bag, which is all part of the experience. I picked up this bag from a SPAR branch – my local corner shop. All you have to do is ‘swipe to collect your order’ when in the shop and someone will bring it out to you – mine was all bagged up. However, I’d still recommend taking a reusable bag in your pocket just in case they don’t bag your goodies up for you.
I picked the bag up in the evening at the time specified, and luckily that was the perfect time, as one item in this bag was a cherry pie. So when I got back from picking up the bag, the oven went on and the cherry pie went in, so it’d be ready for after dinner.
The other items in my bag included a 4 pack of Warburton’s muffins, a big bag of salad, pre-cut vegetables and microwave mash to name a few. All of this we threw together with a burger mix I already had, to create a makeshift dinner!
The amazing thing about these magic bags is that you can get really creative with it and throw together a meal with what you’re given and see where it takes you! I really had fun putting this food together!
Also in the bag was a tub of guacamole and a 4 pack of cheese rolls, along with the salad, and this made my lunch for the next day! These magic bags are absolutely amazing. For such a little price, it supplied me with lunch, dinner and pudding – enough to feed more than 4 people. Another great benefit of this, if you live on your own, is the majority of this food is more than likely freezeable so will last you even longer.
It’s these simple ideas of paying such a small price and saving food, which in turn is slowly saving our planet. Food waste also creates harmful gases which are released into the environment when thrown away/incinerated, so any food that can be rescued is helping.
I dd set my location for Birmingham before writing this blog post and to my surprise, there were all kinds of amazing businesses on this app, including Yo Sushi, Frankie and Benny’s and even Krispy Kreme doughnuts! If that isn’t enough to convince you to download this app, I don’t know what is!
Take care everyone, keep smiling.
Millie 🙂