Our £600 million-worth of waste Christmas food

We waste a fifth of the food we buy at Christmas, says a new survey.

We’ll spend £3.3 billion on food this Christmas but we’ll throw away a fifth of that, the equivalent of £600 million-worth, a study says.

The average British household is set to spend £133.70 on Christmas food, according to food waste disposer company InSinkErator.

But the waste means that two-thirds of us will use between two and four extra bin bags, meaning around 50 million bin bags going to landfill.

Without sounding like we are preaching, there are several ways you can combat this. The most obvious is not to prepare masses of food that you’re not going to eat. Put some in the freezer and use another time.

The Love Food Hate Waste campaign has a great Christmas dinner portion planner tool on its website.

Another is to make good use of your leftovers. We’ll have some great recipes for leftovers on the site on Boxing Day and you'll find some below.

If you want to put your leftover food to use in your community, the British Dietetic Association (BDA) has launched a Christmas campaign called Mind The Hunger Gap. It’s asking people to not only call in on their elderly neighbours and friends during the festive period, but to take them some food.

The BDA says it conservatively estimates that one million elderly people in the UK are eating less than one square meal a day.

Leftover recipe ideas
RSPCA's pea and ham soup
Lotte Duncan's potted stilton
Rachel Green's kedgeree