I have seen recipes that call for the green part of the green onion, and I have seen recipes that call for the white part of the green onion, but I have never seen recipes that call for the stringy little roots of the green onion. (Until now, because I’m about to write one.) The little white allium threads are edible, however, and they make a great little crispy garnish.
My love for corn has been well documented. I will eat it steamed. I will eat it creamed. I will strip the cobs of their golden, juicy kernels and eat them raw.
And, once I am left with nothing but naked cobs, I will use those corn sticks to make a corny broth.
The green parts of the leek doesn't get enough love. Almost every leek-containing recipe tells you that you don't need them, that they're too tough, and unworthy of you. This is all false. Though they are a bit tougher than their white counterparts, they have a lot of flavour within those hard-to-break-down cellular walls, and they make an eggscellent breakfast accessory.
Tender, sweet asparagus stalks are about as springy as it gets, but their tough, fibrous ends have to be removed before they can take their place at the table. These are usually tossed (or composted), but they can actually be used to make little green soufflés.
Peeling capsicums before cooking makes them so silky they practically melt, but it does leave one with a lot of peels. You could use them to flavour homemade stock, or you could be extremely clever and make a vibrant red salt that tastes like paprika.
Video: Welcome back to Eating Trash With Claire, the Lifehacker series where I convince you to transform your kitchen scraps into something edible and delicious. In this episode, I show you how to transform strawberries that are just a bit past their prime into a sweet sauce, cocktail-friendly ice cubes and a delicious compound butter.
Video: Welcome back to Eating Trash With Claire, the Lifehacker series where I convince you to transform your kitchen scraps into something edible and delicious. In this episode, I show you how to make a delicious, hearty pesto out of carrot tops.
Video: Welcome back to Eating Trash With Claire, the Lifehacker series where I convince you to transform your kitchen scraps into something edible and delicious. In this episode, I show you how to use spiky, seemingly useless pineapple peels to make a tasty, tropical gin.
Video: If you're a reader of Eating Trash With Claire the Lifehacker series where I convince you to transform your kitchen scraps into something edible and delicious - you should get excited, because it's now a video series. First up, I show you how to make a delicious, flavour-packed stock out of scraps, shells, and other "trash" that is actually treasure. Enjoy!
One can never have too much thyme, but I often find myself with a lot of leftover thyme stems. These woody, inedible, but still fragrant little plant parts may seem unusable, but you can reclaim every bit of your thyme by using them to flavour cocktail syrup.
Cherry pits may seem like one piece of kitchen refuse that has no second life, but as Stella Parks of Serious Eats points out, the little bit of fruit that clings to the stone has the ability to infuse flavour and colour into all sorts of tasty treats.
Whether you're frugal, environmentally conscious, or just love an efficiency challenge, there are a lot of reasons to save your food scraps. Well, mostly to make stock out of. And to compost the rest. But some of your scraps are good for more than just boiling for soup -- they can also be the starting place for a clever air freshener.
It seems as though I am forever buying butter. I'm not complaining at all -- having a lot of butter around makes me feel warm and safe -- but I often find myself unwrapping a lot, depending on the type of projects I have going on.
Pineapple is a flawless fruit. Not only is it a tasty snack all on its own, but it's delicious when dipped in chocolate, and plays super well with alcoholic spirits of all kinds. I like to buy them whole and break 'em down myself, but I'm always a little sad to toss out the the bumpy, slightly spiky peels.
I'm a big fan of repurposing seemingly useless scraps into something surprisingly delicious, which is why I was extremely pleased to stumble upon these recipes for tomato skin salt and peach skin sugar on Food52.
