Alexis deBoschnek Wants To Help Fans Reduce Food Waste With Her New Cookbook
Literal tons of food go to waste every year and you won't believe the food waste facts. According to Feeding America, the United States wastes 108 billion pounds of food every year, equating to 40% of all food in the country. That doesn't even compare to the global scale of this problem. World Food Programme estimates that $1 trillion gets lost every year due to food waste, equating to enough meals to feed two billion individuals. The amount of loss also creates massive amounts of carbon dioxide and falls just behind the amounts created by America and China. A variety of organizations have taken aim at this dire issue. The United Nations hopes to curb food loss by 50% by the year 2030 and ranks as one of the organization's top goals.
Individuals have also taken up the mantle and want to do their part. Alexis deBoschnek ranks as one of these activists that hope to combat food waste in a particularly delicious way. According to her website, deBoschnek creates recipes and has worked as the Senior Test Kitchen Manager at Tasty in addition to supplying a variety of other cooking publications with new creations. The chef and food inventor now has a new cookbook that draws on their expertise in the field that aims to help home cooks transform scraps into gourmet creations.
A cookbook with a positive mission
According to a press release sent to Mashed, Alexis deBoschnek's cookbook explores how home cooks can take leftover portions of herbs, carrot tops, and more and transform them into ingenious new meals. The author draws on her experience as a gardener for inspiration in many of the recipes, which include gems like Greens Skillet Pie, Crispy Rice Salad, and Black Garlic Butter Salmon with Scallions. The book, titled "To the Last Bite," was published by Simon & Schuster on April 19 and it currently retails for $32.50. In addition to using forgotten ingredients you might throw away, deBoschnek also aims to help home chefs save a bit of money by using every part of each ingredient.
Alexis deBoschnek's latest book follows a solid tradition of food creators releasing collections of recipes that aim to reduce food waste and use every part of the ingredient. Mads Refslund and Tama Matsuoka Wong authored "Scraps, Wilts, and Weeds," a cookbook that draws on local ingredients and a zero-waste ethos, back in 2018 (via Grand Central Life and Style). The cookbook went on to win major awards and opened up the eyes of many to new ways to use the traditionally neglected parts of ingredients. "To the Last Bite" follows in the same tradition and should offer a variety of recipes to fit every palate, while helping the world ideally waste less food. It even made our list of the best cookbooks of all time.