The Prophetic Diet: Being Careful Not to Be Wasteful

Allahu Akbar! Asalam alaykum loves! We made it through Day 13 of Ramadan! I think as time it becomes exhausting, you are ready for Ramadan to be over and Eid to come. But stay strong, the reward for fasting is beyond what we can imagine and the strength you will obtain is worth the struggle! NO PAIN NO GAIN! Let's get it!

So I have been talking about the Model of the Prophetic Diet (Peace Be Upon him) discussing how the Prophet ate, his manners and what foods were his favorite and had a lot of health benefits.

Today I wanted to talk about food waste, what Islam says about wasting food and how currently food waste effects us in terms of our environment and the facts of how much gets wasted worldwide. The Quran also mentions multiple times, warning us that Allah does not love who are wasteful and to be moderate in both eating and spending our wealth. The verses also talk about do not make haram what Allah has made halal for us to consume and that Allah created different foods for us to eat.

Surah Al-A'raf, 31:

O children of Adam, take your adornment at every masjid, and eat and drink, but be not excessive. Indeed, He likes not those who commit excess.

Surah Al-An'am,141:

"And He it is who causes gardens to grow, [both] trellised and untrellised, and palm trees and crops of different [kinds of] food and olives and pomegranates, similar and dissimilar. Eat of [each of] its fruit when it yields and give its due [zakah] on the day of its harvest. And be not excessive. Indeed, He does not like those who commit excess.

Surah Al-Ma'idah, 87:

O you who believe! Do not make unlawful the wholesome things which God has made lawful for you, but commit no excess for God does not love those given to excess.

Surah TaHa, 81:

Eat of the wholesome things We have provided for your sustenance, but commit no excess therein, lest My condemnation fall upon you; he upon whom My condemnation falls has indeed thrown himself into utter ruin.

Surah Al-Furqan, 67:

And [they are] those who, when they spend, do so not excessively or sparingly but are ever, between that, [justly] moderate

These verses are examples for us to do our best not to waste, there are people all over the world starving and we need to be responsible with the blessings Allah gave us. In the western world there is an abundance of everything so it can be easy to waste because more food is easy to obtain. We have to realize our eyes are bigger than our stomach, it takes 20 minutes for your brain to realize you are full, and less is better, when you make too much food, it becomes harder not to waste! I personally had to throw some food out when I had people over for Iftar and I felt so awful about it, we tend to overcook or think we need to have these elaborate feasts during Ramadan, but we should be careful, when everyone leaves and you got all this food you know you can't finish, it looks bad for you.

May Allah forgive us for having to throw out food and help us to be less wasteful!

With that being said, let me drop on you some food waste facts to make you think!

• We are over 7 billion people on this planet, of which 925 million are starving. Yet we annually lose and waste 1,3 billion tons of food – or enough to feed 3 billion people.

• Food loss and waste accounts for about 4,4 gigatonnes of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) per year. To put this in perspective, if food loss and waste were its own country, it would be the world’s third-largest GHG emitter – surpassed only by China and the United States.

• Food losses and waste amounts to roughly US$ 680 billion in industrialized countries and US$ 310 billion in developing countries.

• The food currently wasted in Europe could feed 200 million people.
  
  
• The food currently lost or wasted in Latin America could feed 300 million people.
• The food currently lost in Africa could feed 300 million people

• By 2050 the world population will reach 9 billion. By then, food production must be increased by 70% to meet the demand. Reducing food losses and waste must be among the main focus areas.

• Even if just one-fourth of the food currently lost or wasted globally could be saved, it would be enough to feed 870 million hungry people in the world.

• More than one-third of all food produced globally is wasted or spoiled. Americans throw away up to 40% of the food they buy, and organic matter in landfills provides 20% of all methane emissions, a potent greenhouse gas that contributes considerably to climate change.

It is sad to see in numbers how much we waste not just as a country but worldwide, and even how compared to how much we produce and then how much gets wasted. Then on top of that us wasting food doesn't sadly go to hungry people AND it affects climate change!

So let's discuss WHAT WE CAN DO, because I don't want to talk about it, let's take action!

1. Plan out your meals, make a detailed shopping list and stick to it at the store! If you get only what you know you like and know will use, you are less likely to waste.

2. Try to purchase foods locally, from local farmers markets, support locally grown food

3. Smaller plates and smaller portions for you and guests

4. Save leftovers, store them in the freezer and label them with dates and eat it throughout the week

5. Out of sight out of mind, when you have too many things stored in the fridge, you forget things that are pushed in the back of the fridge. Store new groceries in the back and things close to expiring at the front of the fridge or wait until you finish everything in the fridge before you buy new things. Expiration dates are also a guideline, we don't always need to follow them depending on the product, they identify food quality not safety.

6. Keep a waste food log, next to food you waste, write down the cost of the dish it was or the food product, this will show you what foods you may need to avoid getting and also show you how much you have wasted in terms of money. Keep the list on your fridge!

7. Before you throw away the food, as long as it hasn't gone bad and it is edible, you could possible donate to a food bank or shelter in need of food to feed their guests. You can find food banks through https://www.feedingamerica.org or https://whyhunger.org/.

Be careful about giving food that isn't good food away, the Quran warns us of this:

Surah Baqarah, 267:

O you who have believed, spend from the good things which you have earned and from that which We have produced for you from the earth. And do not aim toward the defective therefrom, spending [from that] while you would not take it [yourself] except with closed eyes. And know that Allah is Free of need and Praiseworthy.

8. For children, we all know it is hard with younger kids to get them to finish their plates, to help prevent that, try not to get them to eat snacks right before meals like dinner so their small bellies aren't full by the time the meal is ready,

9. Give them smaller portions, cut up the food to make it easier to chew and swallow, and give the food names like X Ray Vision Carrots or Power Punch Broccoli so it makes it more exciting for the kids to eat. When packing lunches, pack what they like, use an icepack and let them help pack so they are more likely to eat it!

10. Do a food waste challenge as a family for six weeks, and try to reduce as a family by 25%, have fun measuring how much you waste all together and come up with a prize or family trip if you achieve that goal. Lastly, involve your kids with meal preparation, talk to them about health benefits of food and talk to them about food costs and bring them to farms to see the animals we eat, plant a garden and grow your food together and start composting if possible!

I hope these tips and information are helpful, May Allah help us all reduce our food waste, be more mindful of the blessing of having food to eat, and help us overall care for the environment and be thankful for what we have!

sources: https://www.ecomena.org/waste-minimization-islam/
                   https://stopwastingfoodmovement.org/food-waste/food-waste-facts/