Recycle Now and Love Food Hate Waste, have come up with some egg-cellent tips this Easter to help ensure you waste as little as possible.
If you’re planning on indulging in your favourite treats, try to waste as little as possible by recycling as much as you can and avoiding food waste.
Top tips include:
Easter egg foil: The foil wrapped around most easter eggs CAN be recycled – Simply scrunch the foil into a loose ball along with any other bits of used foil (including from smaller eggs) and pop it into your normal recycling bin for collection. If it springs back open when you try to scrunch it, this means it’s laminated and should go in your general rubbish bin.
Easter egg packaging: Easter eggs with less packaging are much better for the planet and luckily there is much more around these days. Most of the packaging can be popped in your kerbside collections – cardboard boxes and possibly some plastic trays, which need to be flattened to save space.
Flowers: Once your flowers have past their best you can pop them in with your garden waste or place them in your home compost. If you are feeling creative, you can dry them and use them around your home.
Plastic Wrapping / Wrapping Paper: If your Easter treats have come in cellophane wrapping this is not widely recycled at kerbside – you can check the Recycling Locator to see if your council accepts it. Over 6,000 supermarkets across the UK now accept plastics bags and wrapping. For any wrapping paper, as long as it’s not foil or covered in glitter, and passes the ‘scrunch test’, it can be recycled at your kerbside.
Food waste: Each year in the UK, approximately 6.6 million tonnes of food go to waste from our homes over the twelve months. So, if you are planning a sumptuous feast do not forget about your freezer! Utilising your freezer acts like a pause button, giving you more time to eat it and saving it from the bin. Not only does it lock in freshness and preserve quality and flavour, but it’s also perfectly safe providing it’s defrosted correctly. Your food won’t deteriorate in the freezer, and most bacteria can’t grow in it, so it’s a great way to buy yourself extra time and save delicious food for later!
Useful links to recycle and prevent food waste:
- What do all the SYMBOLS on your packaging actually mean – and which ones should you take heed of? https://www.recyclenow.com/how-to-recycle/understanding-recycling-symbols
- Freezer guidance: Seven foods you never knew you could freeze | Love Food Hate Waste
