Eating Food Made With Trash

Would you eat ketchup made from tossed-out tomatoes? Drink beer made with stale scraps of bread?

If so, join the club. A growing number of companies are making food and drink products out of ingredients traditionally considered waste. And, according to new research, consumers increasingly accept—and even prefer—such products.

“Consumers are actually willing to pay more for food made from surplus products,” says Jonathan Deutsch, a professor of culinary arts at Drexel University, who led the study.

Deutsch and his colleagues presented study participants with different food products labeled either “conventional,” “organic,” or “value-added surplus”—their term for foods normally destined for the dumpster. Participants were not, as food manufacturers have long assumed, disgusted by the idea of using “trash” in their food, but felt positively about the opportunity to help the environment.

Would You Eat Food Made With “Trash?" | Smithsonian.com