In Defense of Ugly Food

These strawberries don't look at all appealing do they? If you had them, you'd probably toss the whole punnet into the nearest bin[1], right?

What if I told you that First World countries waste enough food to end global hunger?

There's still a lot of use in these strawberries, it's just that you're looking at the ugly bits. Chop away the inedible and you're left with some delicious bits that are still good eating. And once you've done something like turn them into jam nobody would even know that they were 'ugly fruit' to begin with.

The whole problem lies in the fact that First World food has been standardised. Like every other disaster springing from the Industrial Era, food also has to be uniform, regulated, and homogenised for our consumption. The rejects don't even make it as far as a factory to become puree or sauce or whatever. They just go to a dump.

The US especially wastes literal tons of otherwise edible food, just because it doesn't fit the standard.

But there is a solution - market ugly food:

Intermarche - 'Inglorious Fruits and Vegetables' from Goodvertising on Vimeo.

It started in France, and you know how the French love their food. The 'ugly food' is sold at cheaper prices, and there is a line of 'ugly food' products to encourage consumers to recognise that looks are not, at all, everything.

Here in Australia, there was a very brief 'ugly food' section in the supermarket. It lasted a bare couple of weeks before things went back to their standardised monotony. I even purchased a bag of 'ugly' tomatoes... but I couldn't really see what was wrong with them. Plus our local Woolies got it wrong and tried to charge more for their... unique products.

But I can get two kilos of Juicing Carrots at the organic markets for less than I could get a kilo of standardised ones down at Woolies.

And as for my strawberries?

I got two cups' worth out of that punnet you thought was a write-off.

And only two strawberries were a total write off.

If we waste less, there is more for everyone. At least that's the theory. I know that there are food places that make their waste food inedible on purpose, adulterating it with bleach or poisoning it, allegedly so that rats don't breed in their dumpsters... But it's really to stop the starving poor and any Freegans still in existence from getting free food by dumpster-diving. Capitalism hates the concept of sharing. Even when it's stuff that they were going to throw away.

And I find that a horrible thing to do.

[1] That's 'trash can' for the Americans reading this.