Everyone loves methods.

Having a method gives the impression you might know what you’re doing but whether it yields success Is not a given. So-called gurus pontificate about the necessity of methods but that’s only part of it…you need to have desire, drive and above all, some modicum of skill or talent to go along with it. Yet despite all that you just might suck and fail no matter how or how hard you try.

Then there’s the relationship of method and process. There’s no clarity as to whether they are synonymous or one is part of or result of the other, and attempts to delineate leads to word salad. The simplest, sourced out on the web, is “Method is a particular way of doing something. Process is the step-wise actions involved in implementing the method. So process will be different when we carry out a particular job with a different method”, which makes some sense but leaves me with an also simple “Who really gives a fuck?”

I deploy methods and processes when an outcome requires a specific sequence of steps to be done properly though most outcomes leave room for variation to get to the same place. I’ve never been a precision/rules type of guy, especially when the repercussions of not following rules or being precise are nil or nominal as long as the desired result is reached. So ruminating on the “why” I do certain things a certain way is not one of my “things”.   

But food waste is one of my things. It irritates the fuck out of me and I do whatever I can to minimize it. This goes back to my youth and the Jewish guilt hammered into me by my mother and grandmother, “Finish your food…people are starving in Europe”, which I accepted without a lame comeback such as “So send this stuff there” or “What about the rest of the world?”. I’m not making light of starvation, but it did lay the groundwork for my “Waste not, want not” mentality.

Which my wife thinks is commendable but sometimes extreme. Back in the day, before all food had “Sell by” or “Best if used by” dates, the only way to know whether something was still edible was to look at or smell it, though not feasible when frozen or in a box or can. Leftovers never lasted long unless it was stuff I wasn’t a huge fan of, thus eaten only if nothing else more desirable was lurking and beckoning. Complicating matters was my father being my leftovers competition which inadvertently led to me to occasionally pre-emptively snack on what was to be a future dinner my mother left unattended and defenseless in the fridge.

I still had my limits though they didn’t necessarily jibe with might be deemed appropriate. Or healthy.

But now, everything is dated, which still doesn’t necessarily dictate the edibility of anything, as there are plenty of debates and muddying of their validity by lobbyists, regulators and omnipresent conspiracy theorists always looking at the dark side.

Despite that I could care less about dates…they’re like “Suggested Retail Price” to me, there to only provide guidance and not serve as the law. Not that I ever descend into chowing down on anything approaching carbon dating but sometimes I’m out on the borderline with stuff in packages, bags and cans, theorizing if something is sealed how can it go bad. Does it lose “efficacy” like prescriptions or OTC drugs supposedly do? And how do the manufacturers really know how long something is good for anyway? I would imagine there’s a lot of guesswork involved especially if something comes with a “date” well into the future. Worst case scenario if I crack a can or package open and it doesn’t taste right I toss it. Same for frozen stuff, either in original packaging or wrapped in foil and/or freezer bags if not exhibiting apparent freezer burn. No harm no foul.

It gets trickier dealing with fridge inhabitants and this is where I need to deploy a method, not quite like Method Acting, but still immersive as it requires quick thinking and interaction, especially when planning, part of my process, begins to falter.

There are various categories of those inhabitants, many of which don’t insinuate themselves into my method…condiments, dressing, jam, butter and wrapped dairy products can hang out for quite a while. Fast-movers like creamer and juice don’t require much thought either. But milk, cold cuts, some fruits, vegetables and leftovers can become problematic, with the latter especially troublesome if we’ve been on a cooking spree with the remnants residing in containers jammed on the shelves awaiting their fate.

I’m long past the days of competition from my father or kids and my wife is leftover-selective so the Beat the Clock pressure is confined to eventual inedibility. First, I leave certain things for her as her dietetic choices are typically less caloric. The next step is assessing the remaining useful life in those containers, considering the content and when it hit the shelf. If I’m lucky the remaining life will align well with my interest in eating it, since despite my anti-waste mentality, I still have a Sliding Scale of Preferences, with various ethnic foods and fruits at the top. And then I get to work.

I will often consume things I’m not in the mood for because they are nearing their end. Like having cereal only because the milk is going bad. Or semi-congealed salad my wife left untouched for a few days. Or eating a sandwich with cold cuts out on the border on hardening bread because some sliced tomatoes and onions are beginning to change colors in the plastic wrap they’ve been residing in.

But sometimes my sequencing and efforts fail despite my vast experience…maybe because of misleading dating, my improper tracking of containers, a temporary decrease in appetite or just too much stuff to deal with in too short a timeframe with not enough assistance.

So stuff will have to be unceremoniously discarded, with my wife taking the lead, refusing to leave things past their time loitering and tempting me, as though I have no discretion and would want to sicken myself. I would think I’ve proven myself capable of exercising caution without needing any assistance, but then again part of the fun to this whole thing is seeing just how much fucking better at it I can become.

With or without changes to my process.

Or method.