Digging Trash

Dutch Ethical Vegan, Thrifter, Freegan. 

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Cut this salvaged melon for you guys because we are so gratefull for all the love Diggingtrash trash recieved! Thank you so much for the 1000 followers, reblogs and likes!

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I took my friend Michelle (Hi if your reading this) dumpsterdiving for the first time. She took this action shot of me! We took home a nice little haul.

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Tuesdays haul. There were 4 watermelons but i ate one right away!

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hey, was wondering if you know if it would be possible to just ask a grocery store when they throw out produce, and if they would just let me have it/buy the 'bad' produce in bulk at a low price? im a vegan and leaving for uni soon, so i'd love to find some ways to save money on fruits and veg!

Hi boggin! You can always try. Smaller/local shops might give you the 'bad' produce or sell it to you for cheap. Where i live little Turkish and Moroccan shops sell their very ripe or bruised produce for a fraction of the full price. Bigger supermarkets are not allowed to give or sell it to you, they can get into a lot of legal problems if they do. (for example, if you would get food poisoning, which you won’t from a ripe apple lol! they will be responsible). But if the store employees are understanding they might tell you when they throw things out. I have heard of 1 supermarket in my city that ties the bags with food with a red string, so that the homeless can find it. Some stores will not be so understanding, or you might just get the wrong employee. But we are all people in the end, so if you tell them your story, who knows! Good luck

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Thanks to dumpsterdiving i can afford to juice everyday! It motivates me to juice too, sometimes we have more food then we can eat and juicing helps me ´to get trough it´. Before dumpsterdiving i ate a lot less healthy. Mainly becouse i did not always have the money to spend on healthy food. I was tempted by cheap shit over expensive healthy produce. I am happy to enjoy plenty of fruits and vegetables every day, i am incredibly gratefull!

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Oh fruit mountains i love you!

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How do you find the time to dumpster so much? How long does it usually take you to find a week's worth of food?

I'm all about downshifting. Because i wear strictly secondhand clothes and don’t want a tv, a car, or lot of materialist whatever it is. I can work less, and so have more free time. With that, we rarely buy food. So that saves us a shit load of money. And dumpsterdiving has enables us to live vegan and mostly raw, which improved our health and so eliminated our medical bills.  So all in all, we don’t need a lot of money to live this modest lifestyle. And with that we don’t need to work a lot. So i have a good amount of free time. This personally goes well with me, it might be different for others.

And because dumpsterdiving is something i am passionate about, i make time to do it as well. On average it takes about 3 to 5 hours to fins a weeks worth of food for 2 people. We leave a lot of the more 'junk food' type of food. So if you are not looking after your health to much, you might be done quicker. Sometimes i am lucky and find everything i need in 1 bin. And then i am done in 30 minutes. But most of the times it needs a few runs on different nights. We do live within a 5 to 30 minutes radius of the bins we dive. so that saves time to.

Over these 2 years we have found thousands of euro's worth of food. And with that saved ourselves a lot of money. If i had to work to be able to pay for all that food, i would have spent nearly as much time working. (now I don’t make a fortune, but I cant complain)

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thank you so much for your help. I live in the states, but your insight is very helpful. I have not tried diving yet - far too cold for me. I hope to begin figuring out how to do this well. Don't want to start off wrong and get hurt or have poor etiquette.

On not getting hurt: I think dumpsterdiving sounds a lot scarier then it is. If your sensible you will be fine. The only time i got dumpsterdiving was then i got cut by glass, because i never dumpsterdive with gloves. An accident waiting to happen. But it was a minor cut that was so small it did not even leave a scar.

Wear sturdy gloves, like docker gloves. This will keep you safe from broken bits of glass. Wear old clothes, because you might get dirty. Take a torch so you know where you are digging at night. And some people like to bring their phone, so that in the worst case scenario you can always call out for help. (put it in a pocked with a zipper, so it doesn’t fall out whilst your diving) Some people like to climb into the bin itself when digging. But when your starting out i recommend to take a little stool (if your short), so you can lean in rather then climb in.

On etiquette, the most important bit is to clean up after yourself and leave the area around the bins trash free. If there are not a lot of dumpsterding possibility's in your area. You might want to leave something for other dumpsterdivers or homeless people. But this is not necessary in big city's. We have said before, if we empty 1 bin, the bin around the block will still be full. Cold countries are not bad for dumpsterdiving at all! Because of the low temperatures food will keep preserved longer whilst out of the cool environment of the store or refrigerators.

Good luck!

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I watched a diving documentary a couple months ago called dive! and since then i have been wanting to do it but none of my friends are willing and im not going alone! any ideas to convince them?

Think about what inspired you! Did your friends watch Dive yet? Maybe you can show them or inspire them in a different way. The best way might be to go on your own and bring home a feast for your friends, to show them what a cornucopia dumpsterding is. (or maybe show pictures from other dumpsterdivers) You might also be able to find people willing to join you online, there are a lot of people who want to try it but don’t want to go alone. I'd say go for it! Go alone. But of course that is only for you to decide. What is the reason you don’t want to go alone? And are there solutions to those reasons other than people joining you? Good luck! I hope you will have a great experience.

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Wonderfull healthy all vegan haul! :) Its does look like a lot, but its not all that much if you consider we are 2 people that eat mostly raw vegan. We do feel very lucky to be able to do this. And also, thanks everyone for the nice comments, shares and likes!

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hey this is an awesome blog il give ya that ! I have heard that in some places especially big chains they put harmful chemicals on the food when they throw it out. How do you know what good to eat in that respect? Thanks

Thank you so much :) We have heard of that too! Its very sad that some chains rather see their food go to waste then see people to enjoy it. I am lucky enough to not have encountered that yet. They don’t go out of their way to poison us, they are not trying to kill us, but they want to discourage the dumpsterdivers. So most of the time you can tell right away because of the look and smell of the chemicals.  Most of the time they use bleach. They are most likely to use things that can be found in the store like bleach and toilet cleaners (unless I grossly misjudge them, and they actually have special chemicals for this use).  I heard from others that they have found bins like these. They either stay away from those bins, or only take the packaged foods. (And they use gloves) These bins are no good for fresh produce, you don’t want an apple or lettuce head covered in bleach (even if you wash it) But things like cans, jars and plastic packaged goods are safer to take, the chemicals won’t spoil the inside of the jars. Just make sure to wear some waterproof gloves and beware of possibly harmful fumes. Also nonfoods can still be saved. I'd say stay away from these bins, and try the other bins in the area. Only go to these bins if you were out of luck at your other spots or when you have no other solution. And be carefull.

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why do stores throw out clothing? other than the season is over but like socks? why would they throw a package out if the same one is going to still be on the shelf.

I know it is ridiculous! There is so much waste because it is a flawed system we work with. Focused on profits. i can only speculate on why things get thrown out. There is a supermarket chain over here that have weekly specials, a lot of that is non food like clothes. Everything that doesn’t sell that week, gets thrown. For bigger supermarkets, if costumers change their mind and leave a product at the cash register, it is cheaper for them to thrown it then for them to have an employee return all the products at the end of the day. Also stores overstock, it is cheaper for them to throw away things when they have overstocked then to under stock and potentially loose costumers. A lot of it i don’t understand myself, if you are not going to sell a product that will never go out of date (like clothes) at least donate it to the local homeless shelter...

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This is what our fruitstash looks like at the moment :)

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The fruits (and veg) of last nights diving! I'm so exited to eat all this.

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Have you ever gotten sick from eating food from a dumpster? I would assume if you cook the food or wash it you'd be fine.

When i started dumpsterdiving i suspected that i might get sick. I was willing to take the risk. But i have NEVER been sick from dumpsterdived food. (My boyfriend, who is my dumpsterdiving buddy, also has never gotten sick from salvaged food) I haven’t been sick at all in the 2 years I’ve been actively freegan i suspect its becouse my immune system got a boost from dumpsterdiving!

And that says a lot, because i try to eat a 100% freegan, and succeed in that most of the time. So that is a lot of food consumed, without getting sick. Most food is still packaged, so only the packages get dirty and unpackaged foods i rinse with water before eating. If you are unsure about you item still, you can wash it with some (organic) soap, make sure to rinse the soap off well! Also wash your hand after dumpsterdiving .

But just use your common sense and you will be fine. Don’t eat things that smell, look or taste like they have gone bad. If you have doubts, either don’t eat it. Or eat a tiny amount, and see what it does to your body.

Think about why most of this food is being thrown? Not because it has gone bad, but because the ‘best before’ date. Best before does not mean that it is no good after. When i started this, i cooked almost al my vegetables, because i didn’t trust the bins. But after a few weeks i realized that if you use some common sense, you will be fine. I try to eat as much raw as possible.

I personally do not eat meat. But i know people that eat meat from bins, and they have been fine. Meat is something you have to be really careful with thought, with meat; if you have any doubts, don’t eat it.

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I'm so so happy I stumbled on your blog. So happy you've dedicated time to spreading awareness about saving food that's being thrown out. Suggestions to where the best places to dive are? Grocery stores? Markets? Restaurants?

Thank you lovely! For anyone going dumpsterdiving; supermarkets/grocery stores, warehouses and big drugstores seem to waste the most where i live. Local shops and organic shops seem to waste less, but are still worth checking if you’ve got time on your hands. A lot of bakeries throw away breads etc. at the end of the day. I have heard of pet owners dumpsterdiving at pet stores. Whilst traveling i have found gas stations throw away quite some food as well, but there weren’t a lot of healthy options. This food is mostly thrown away because the ‘best before date’ You will find most packaged.

You can check your local market when it closes down, weirdly shaped produce, very ripe produce or produce with a bad spot (you can cut around) may be thrown away. I have dumpsterdived restaurant bins whilst traveling as well. To me this is a backup plan only. (Not trying to sound ungrateful I am very grateful for all the food i find!) Because the food is not packaged, it will get spoiled quicker. For example; a loaf of supermarket bread in a bag stays sealed and the actual bread won’t touch the bin (only the bag). Most restaurant food is leftover from meals and unpackaged so the actual bread might touch some things that do belong in the bin. That’s a bit harder to clean then something packaged! I will eat from restaurant bins and residential bins, but i tent to find the freshest and ‘cleanest’ food in supermarket bins. If you check every bin you come by, you will get to know the best sports in your area. Good luck! :)

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Believe it or not, we were almost out of fruit! Because our diet is plant based it goes so quick. (if dumpsterdiving goes well, i can afford to be 80/10/10) So i went out and hauled this in. There was a lot more bread, but i handed it out to people passing by.