If you often buy vegetables that go bad before you can use them or aren't sure how to prepare tasty and balanced meals, a meal kit service can be a great solution to expand your diet and reduce food waste.
Just be careful that the meal kit you choose is responsible with its packaging. Otherwise, you might end up with a whole bunch of unnecessary plastic waste, like one Redditor who showcased this problem on r/mildlyinfuriating.
What happened?
The original poster summed it up simply: "Two slices of bread individually packaged." That's one of the ingredients they said they received in their meal kit from EveryPlate.
They snapped a photo in their kitchen for proof. It shows them holding two square slices of white bread, each in an individual, clear plastic wrapper with an expiration date printed on it.
EveryPlate is far from the only culprit. "I'm working for HelloFresh right now and this seems to be a trend," said one commenter.
"What's funny is it's an Every Plate meal kit, but some of the sour cream that came with it said HelloFresh," replied the original poster.
Why does a little plastic matter?
Small, flexible plastic packages like the ones used for these pieces of bread are impossible to process for many recycling facilities. They aren't accepted in residential recycling bins, according to America's Plastic Makers, and would need to be turned in to a dedicated recycling program for plastic bags.
The difficulty and inconvenience of that is one of the reasons that most plastic is never recycled in the U.S. Instead, it stays in the environment, slowly disintegrating into cancer-causing microplastics and adding to eyesores like the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The more unnecessary plastic is added to food, the more it ends up as litter.
What is EveryPlate doing to help the environment?
According to EveryPlate's website, it reduces users' food waste by 23% while offsetting all its carbon air pollution — so on one level, it looks like a great way to benefit both the environment and your bank balance.
However, there's no information listed about plastic on the site, so any environmental benefits appear to be a trade-off.
What can you do to reduce plastic waste?
If you want EveryPlate's meals without the extra packaging, the company lists ingredients for each recipe on its website. You can buy them yourself — or even grow the veggies at home to make sure they use no plastic at all.
To cut down on your own personal waste, you can ditch single-use plastic bottles and plastic food containers.
You can also try other alternatives for reducing food waste, like the app Too Good To Go, which allows you to get surprise bags full of discounted food from local restaurants and stores.
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