LIFE

Minimizing waste is a frugal win

Abbey Roy

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how much I waste.

Leftovers that sit in the fridge for much longer than anything consumable — with the possible exceptions of dry beans and Crisco (I know, I said consumable) — should sit untouched; clothing from which I can’t remove pesky oil and tomato sauce stains; scraps of yarn from knitting projects that are probably long enough to do something with but I have no idea what.

Then there are the more “acceptably” wasted things that this week tipped off my frugal radar: bread heels and banana peels.

I’m going to address the latter two today, because for now I’ve thrown out the half-serving of moldy mandarin oranges, turned the unusable shirts into rags and given the yarn to Little and Littlest Roy for their latest inventions that most likely involve harassing the cat.

Heels of bread were never an issue in the house where I grew up, because my dad ate them along with the crumbs at the bottom of the chip bags and the three bites of (insert entree or side dish here) left at the end of every meal.

Folks are a little pickier at the Roy residence, and Yours Truly is (usually) the only one who will touch a heel of bread — and then only because all the other pieces are taken.

As I was preparing to throw away another heel this past week, I sighed and began thinking about how nice it would be if there were something useful I could do with a perfectly good and edible piece of food that I had, after all, paid money for.

Obvious answer: Compost pile. I’ve been slacking at our compost this year, but a simple 15-second walk through the backyard would turn my wasted bread into nutrients for next year’s garden. (The same could be said about the banana and orange peels and other fruit and veggie scraps.) I’m sure the birds would also have appreciated it.

Other uses I intend to try: Drying the bread and putting it through a food processor for instant bread crumbs or cubing it for croutons; using it for bread pudding or French toast casserole.

It can also be put to good use in your brown sugar container to keep it from getting hard.

I have to admit, none of the bread uses were entirely surprising to me.

But the banana peel kind of blew me away.

I mean, those are really only good for that one old-timey comedy gag, right?

As it turns out, no. Case in point, our first use: Shoe polish. Seriously.

Now, I’m not recommending you wolf down your daily dose of potassium and use it to coat your favorite pair of suede shoes, but I was surprised to see the inside of the banana peel successfully removed the scuffs from a pair of Littlest Roy’s white tennis shoes (after I wiped the sliminess off with a white rag-formerly-t-shirt.)

Next up: Teeth whitener. The claim is that the minerals in the inside of the banana peel will whiten your teeth if you’re faithful about rubbing them for a couple minutes a day. I didn’t notice a huge difference, but that’s probably because my experiment didn’t last long enough.

Or because my teeth are already perfect.

The third and most surprising experiment: Fixing skips in a CD or DVD. (“CD? What’s that?” said every Bargain Advocate reader younger than 25 — which I’m sure is quite a few.)

I know, I was skeptical, too. And still sort of am. But I really didn’t have anything to lose, and I take great pleasure in jamming to my 1990s tunes — on real, actual compact discs — as I drive the family van to PTO meetings and such.

Allegedly, I read, if you rub the inside of the banana peel in circular motions over the back of the CD where the scratches are, gently wipe it off with a soft cloth, lightly spray it with glass cleaner and wipe it dry, the scratches will miraculously be fixed.

I tried it on one of my favorite skippy discs (it should be noted that I already had a digital copy as “backup”) with surprising success, though I’ve read mixed reviews about this particular treatment. (Note to self: Apparently you can also attempt to remove scratches with toothpaste. Must try sometime.) I’m sure it largely depends on the severity of your scratches, but like I said — not much to lose by trying, and for now the treatment seems to be holding. I intend to try it on more beat-up ’90s discs in the future.

Another theory is that banana peels can be placed over or under meat — chicken on the grill, for example, or a roast in the oven — to keep it from drying out while it cooks.

I asked Mr. Roy if he thought that would work.

“No,” he frowned. “I think it would make it taste like bananas.”

I didn’t even broach the subject of attempting this experiment because I know his thoughts about wasting a good piece of meat.

The final claim that interested me but that I couldn’t test — because I didn’t feel like giving myself or my children a splinter — is that affixing a piece of banana peel to a splinter will cause the banana’s enzymes to help ease the splinter out.

Because of past experiences extracting splinters from small fingers, I can say with certainty that I will try anything — anything — to reduce the time I spend listening to bloodcurdling screams the moment I wield the tweezers.

... Bananas included. So stay tuned.

Next week we’ll touch on a few more ways to give a second life to commonly discarded items. In the meantime, think twice before you toss out that heel and peel.

If you have insight about a frugal living topic or an idea for a future column, please email me at amroy@nncogannett.com. I’d love to hear from you!

Happy saving,

Abbey