I want to share an interesting article I read this week about advances in science to address food waste.
As we know, there is a lot of food waste in the world and this country. One of the main foods wasted at stores and at home is bread. Part of it is the relative short shelf life of bread and the way bread is made and sold in grocery outlets (What isn’t sold goes back to the manufacturer/bakery at their cost. There is basically no financial risk for grocery stores or incentive to reduce wasted bread).
There are great initiatives to deal with leftover food and specifically stale bread. At home, you can use your old bread to make bread crumbs, croutons, bread pudding, and so much more. Bakeries and stores are working with non-profit organizations to get bread to food pantries. And going even broader, science is taking a stab at using old bread and converting it into oil.
Oil, interestingly, is an important ingredient in baked goods, especially in enriched doughs typically used in sweet pastries and for frying, e.g. donuts. Palm oil is a popular oil because it has many benefits: a lot more oil can be produced per acre of land than any other oil which makes it inexpensive, it is neutral in taste, and creates shelf stable products. But one key drawback is the environmental impact of palm oil grown as monoculture and the continuous deforestation to create more plantations. Despite these cons there isn’t a viable alternative to palm oil, … yet.
Scientists in Munich, Germany are using stale bread and converting it into what is called yeast oil. Using microorganisms such as yeast, bread is fermented. This process is similar to fermentation to beer (which can also be made from bread) but different yeast strains are used that create oil instead of alcohol. The resulting yeast oil is similar in properties to palm oil and even more shelf stable, e.g. it can be used for frying more food before it needs to be replaced with fresh oil, reducing the amount of oil needed. Scientists are still working on the process and optimizing it for cost efficient large scale production, but this may be only a few years away.
When I first read about this process, it sounded work intensive and I wasn’t sure if we needed an industrial process to make oil out of bread. But until we find a better way of managing our food waste and adopt more environmentally sound ways of growing our food, this may just do the trick.
While we stay abreast of innovations in the news and new products in stores that may address environmental concerns with the current food production, we can do our part. Only buy what you are going to eat (meal planning and shopping lists can help), use leftovers and stale bread in other recipes (be creative), and compost (food waste in the landfill is responsible for methane production, a key contributor to global warming).
P.S.
While working on this article I baked a couple of loaves of gluten-free bread testing new recipes and used whole wheat bread crumbs to make little chocolate lava cakes. Carlos and I will prevent food waste in our home: he will take care of the gluten-free bread and I will do my part by eating the cakes.