Waste of food, the chef says “enough” ” “

Denmark is among the countries that throw away the largest amounts of food (an average of 105 kilos a year for a family of four.) Over the past years a set of initiatives aimed at curbing this waste, such as the campaign Stop Wasting Food or the restaurant Rub&Stub, which opened in Copenhagen in September. Its philosophy is to use food discarded in shops because nearing their expiry date. The chef prepares dishes with ingredients which companies are willing to give away because expired, although the food is still edible and in good conditions. The earnings will fund solidarity projects in Sierra Leone. Sarah Numico interviewed for SIR Europe Sophie Sales, who founded Rub&Stub with other nine people. How is the restaurant going after the first months? “Very well! We receive attention, encouragement, and positive feedback. But it’s hard to solve everything only with two salaried workers (the chef and the project coordinator, Ed.’s note). We have a large group of volunteers, but we need long-term agreements with those donating food waste to give stability to our initiative. We were about to sign an agreement but at the last minute the food-supplier had internal problems. So now we’ve started everything again from scrap, and we seek to obtain supplies by shops and farmers. Sometimes, during the week, we are brought food supplies, but with last-minute notice. We don’t have reliable agreements that would ensure at least 25% of expired foods, which we set as a target share of all the food used in our kitchen. However, it is our desire to increase this quantity. We decided to be the first ones to launch this initiative, instead of waiting for the food companies to participate in the campaign against food waste. But we’re optimistic”. How did the idea come about? “Nearly all young co-founders worked in kitchens and restaurants to cover university expenses. It was terrible to see the quantity of edible food discarded simply becaue people don’t think, don’t worry, or because the Western market has reached a stage whereby only things that have a given colour, shape or dimension can be sold”. What is your objective?”Utopia: to no longer waste food in Denmark, so that we will have to shut down our restaurant. This will be our success. Now we want to be a place, an idea, a message that prompts people to see, think and act in first person, in their kitchen or when they shop for food. Ours is an “awareness campaign”, a good example, an inspiration to follow, to bring about a change in mentality in society and stop wasting so many resources”. What’s the reaction of those who learn about your initiative or come as clients to your restaurant? “Most of them are positively impressed and also soundly sceptical. Is it really possible? They ask. Then we clash against many misunderstandings. In France for example, the idea of ‘saving’ food before it becomes waste was widely understood as ‘the waste is on the plate’, with pictures circulating of people rummaging in garbage cans. This is a typical sensationalistic misunderstanding. It hits front news. Our major effort is making understood that we serve food products that are still edible, to show how much fresh and delicious food is discarded by supermarkets, food companies and farms. We respect those who rummage in garbage cans. But that’s not what a restaurant does. And that way of facing the problem is not a solution to the social problem. We won’t succeed either, but we can raise the problem of food waste from a broader perspective”. In which way are you a non-profit restaurant? “We want to transform expired ingredients in money, which doesn’t have an expiry date, and use it for solidarity projects in Countries with larger numbers of people in need. This would complete the circle of our project. In reality for the time being we have not yet succeeded in making any profit. We have the rent to pay and buy many ingredients, but once we start earning the profit will be donated to projects launched by Retro, an organization with projects in Sierra Leone for the promotion of female and male entrepreneurial activities”.