Reduce our Packaged Goods: “Grab n Go” Food

I have been spending a surprising (or sad?) amount of time looking at our garbage.  Talk about a strange hobby for a privileged 50 year old.    Now that we are composting religiously, our garbage is mostly “dry” and actually quite small.  Kudos to the family for their mostly begrudging efforts!  In rummaging through the container the other day, I saw that our garbage now contains mostly packaging from food: coffee, cheese, granola bar wrappers, rice and chips.  As the website name indicates, I want to reduce our waste.  In order to eliminate this excess packaging, I have to make snacks that the family will not reject.  I decide to spend Saturday afternoon making somewhat healthy snacks for our family.   I pick out two recipes on the internet:  5 ingredient, no bake granola bars from the minimalist baker:

Healthy 5-Ingredient Granola Bars

and a quinoa salad from Cookie and Kate:

Favorite Quinoa Salad

I get my 5 ingredients, starting with dates that I chop up in the mini-food processor:

then maple syrup, oats, almond butter and chocolate chips:

I recommend toasting the oats as the bars taste much better this way.

Mix the ingredients together, press into a pan and then put in the fridge:

The granola bars are surprisingly easy to make.  It only took me 20 minutes! I found a beeswax coated wrap from Api-Flex:(Api-flex Food Wrapping) that I use to wrap the individual bars.

This way my daughters have a snack that is healthy, filling and easy to transport.  Grab n go!

We used to buy a seven grain quinoa salad at Costco for our daughters lunches.  The issue is that these salads were prepackaged in plastic containers.  UGH.  I promised my daughters that I would find a replacement and put the salad in these containers.  I am quite pleased that I am reusing these containers that would otherwise be down-cycled.

As one of my daughters is vegetarian, quinoa is a healthy option for her.  The Cookie and Kate recipe also contains chick peas which makes it higher in protein.  This recipe is also very easy to make.  The result of my effort:

I then put the quinoa salad into individual containers so that my girls have ready to eat salads.

Our fridge is now stocked for the week with healthy lunch options for the family that are ready to “grab n go” (patented tradename by my daughter Natalie -LOL!).

Recommendation of the week to reduce your waste: Make something!  Cookies, granola bars, salad,  even prechopped veggies…  Anything homemade is generally healthier and will also lead to less packaging.