Scrap cooking: how to turn your leftovers into a delectable delight

While preserving scraps may seem like an additional chore, Tamar Adler says it can actually save you time – and money – later on. Illustration: Olivia Heller/The Guardian

If holiday meal prep leaves you with plates full of potato peels and cutting boards full of carrot tops, you’re not alone. The US sees a 25% increase in waste during the holiday season – 21% of which comes from our kitchen tables. Just on Thanksgiving, Americans toss a whopping 305m pounds of food. And all these cheese rinds, apple cores, vegetable skins and crusty week-old leftovers that make their way to landfills are harming the planet by emitting methane, a potent greenhouse gas. According to one estimate by the UN Environment Program, if food waste was its own country, it would be the third-largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. Much of this so-called food waste is perfectly edible.