For an international perspective on my Imperfect Produce reviews, I would like to take you to my native country, the Netherlands, this time.
Last week, my LinkedIn feed showed scenes of a container filled with over 15,000 pounds of zucchini. While that may already impress you, these vegetables were all “food rejects” waiting for a home. On a sunny day in Amsterdam, this imperfect produce took center stage in Dam Square.
No, these zucchini weren’t dumped and abandoned. They were part of the efforts of social enterprise “Kromkommer” (a wordplay on the Dutch words for “crooked” and “cucumber”) to seek attention for all the rejected produce that goes to waste due to the strict standards of buyers. Lucky passers-by got the chance to save a zucchini from the landfill and enjoy it as part of their meal.
Spoiled For Choice?
Like the United States, the Netherlands cope with a great deal of perfectly edible fruits and vegetables that don’t make it onto consumers’ plates. Biggest culprits are perceived quality and overproduction. In spite of its tininess, the Netherlands is the second biggest exporter of vegetables in the world.
Three years before Imperfect Produce burst onto the scene, Kromkommer started out as a student project in 2012. After a merger with like-minded group “Too Good to Waste,” the crew is on course to change the way the Dutch consumer thinks about produce, while making a further impact on the food-waste landscape.
There Is a Soup For That
Even though Imperfect and Kromkommer share the mission of combating food waste and making people look at produce differently, they reach their goals in alternate ways. San Francisco’s Imperfect offers a subscription service which allows customers to pick a box type, box size and delivery frequency. The company then delivers the box – with or without modifications – straight to the consumer.
Both Imperfect and Kromkommer source produce directly from farmers. However, the Dutch company has a very clear purpose for these foods. They came up with the clever idea to use the dinged, scratched, crooked and distorted vegetables – or “fruitgetables” in case of tomatoes – in soups. Currently they offer soups with pumpkin, tomatoes, beets and carrots, to name but a few. These soups are sold through online retailers and select brick-and-mortar shops throughout the Netherlands. If, for some reason, you are on the fence about consuming wonky produce, this “soupification” will surely make any imperfections undetectable.
Stronger Together
While global efforts to minimize food waste seem to gain momentum, we as consumers still have to play our part. If I order a nice Imperfect Produce box or purchase a bag of Kromkommer soup (something I am eager to try on my next Netherlands trip!), I’m still the one accountable for actually using these products. Like the Pacific Northwest, the Netherlands experienced a hotter than average summer. This caused fruits and vegetables to grow and look differently than usual, which in turn led to growing piles of food waste. According to Kromkommer, Dutch consumers expressed their interest to grocery stores in wanting to buy crooked produce. As a result, several stores temporarily offered fruit and vegetables that would have otherwise been discarded.
Whether it’s in soups, subscription boxes or even regular grocery stores, crooked fruit and imperfect vegetables are here to stay!
Keep an eye on this space to find out about other creative ways the Dutch deal with surplus produce.
Which imperfect produce would you happily purchase and what would you make with it? Let me know in the comments below!
Top photo courtesy of Kromkommer/Judith Tielemans
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