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Chef shares tips to limit food waste this Christmas

Handout Elly Curshen smiles as she looks to the left of the frame. She is wearing a black t-shirt with her hair in a bun and sunglasses on her head. She is standing in front of a wide door painted forest green.Handout
Elly Curshen, known online as Elly Pear, ran The Pear Café in Bristol for 12 years

A chef who is passionate about limiting food waste is urging people to plan for "random meals" this Christmas.

Elly Curshen, known online as Elly Pear, is a cook, columnist and producer who became aware of this issue when running The Pear Café in Bristol between 2006 to 2018.

She said the key to Christmas cooking was organisation and encouraged people to audit their kitchen - just like a business owner would.

"Do a stock take," she said. "Try and work out some kind of fridge and freezer raid meals and clear out space for leftovers."

She added: "Get yourself organised and make a list of things you can make with the things you've already got."

The author, who has written three cook books, told BBC Radio Bristol the second tip was always having good quality eggs and bread in the house.

"Plan for those days between Christmas and New Year," she said. "Plan for some random meals but if you've got eggs and you've got nice bread the world is your oyster."

Poppy Button Elly looks off to the left of the frame as she drinks from a bright orange re-usable coffee cup. She has her brunette hair up in a bun and is wearing orange sunglasses. She has a white denim jacket on, an orange t-shirt and a small bag across her. Behind her canal boats are tied up in a marina. Poppy Button
Ms Curshen now writes for publications such as BBC Food, Waitrose Weekend and The Guardian

Ms Curshen's RolloverLeftovers series on Instagram led to her nomination as a finalist for this year's Digital Creator Award at The BBC Food & Farming Awards.

She said: "I didn't win but it was absolutely amazing to be nominated.

"My passion for leftovers and using stuff up in a creative way - I get so much inspiration from what needs to be used up – I guess it stems from the café.

"When you have a small business, everything you bring in you have to maximise the profit that's going out so every bit of waste is money, and that's how it started."

Ms Curshen started the series on Instagram to share what she was making at home.

"I would literally share online, make a reel every single day, edit and share it every day on my own," she said.

"I showed how the cooking I made at home flowed from one day to the next."

The cookbook author, who now writes for BBC Food and Waitrose Weekend, said ultimately everything can me made into a frittata.

"Everything can be used again," she said. "Even things I think are really basic ideas are worth sharing."

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