Campus Ecochallenge

Sam's points

0 TODAY
0 THIS WEEK
95 TOTAL

participant impact

UP TO

20

plastic containers

not sent to the landfill

Sam's actions

Waste

Reduce Single-Use Disposables

Historically, marginalized and low-income communities live closer to landfills, contributing to a multitude of health problems. I will find out how I can limit single-use items and do my best to limit the waste I generate. I will keep 2 containers out of the landfill each day.

COMPLETED 10
DAILY ACTIONS

Participant Feed

Sam Dare 4/12/2026 12:35 PM

This week, I reduced food packaging waste by preparing 8 20-ounce containers of food, 2 of which I’ve already eaten, instead of buying ready-to-eat meals and snacks. Everything is weighed out, and this system has already proven effective in satiety, meal timing, and improving my eating habits.

While building the recipe for each container, I also tried to think more carefully about using more environmentally friendly whole-food ingredients for my eco challenge post on waste. I reflected on food waste/spoilage, packaging, the environmental impact of ingredient choices, and the tradeoff between convenience, shelf life, and sustainability. Because this came together during a busy time in my life, I couldn't find all my ingredients without packaging this week, but I still built awareness and a design for a recipe around some lower-impact ingredients. Each container includes 100 grams of broccoli, 100 grams of black beans, red onion slices, avocado oil, and 170 grams of 99% lean ground turkey.

To boost protein intake without relying entirely on additional animal protein, I added black beans, which are generally a lower-impact food choice than many meats, especially red meat. The turkey is not necessarily a low-impact ingredient, but it is generally less emissions-intensive than some of the animal proteins I have made a habit of eating in the past. The broccoli I used was frozen and had already been in my freezer for a few weeks. While frozen broccoli is packaged, one sustainability benefit is that freezing can help prevent food waste. Now that I have a system for meal prep, the likelihood of wasted ingredients decreases, so next week, if my recipe calls for it, I can buy produce like broccoli more confidently without worrying as much about it spoiling before I use it. The black beans are similar in that, although they come in a can and create packaging waste, they also offer the advantage of being shelf-stable and less likely to spoil.

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- Cole Christ 4/12/2026 3:53 PM
  
  Doing food prep always saves so much time and energy, the most important thing is being consistent with it. Love that you weighed everything out and made pretty much the same thing. I tend to get bored with food after a couple days, so I end up changing things up. I really like soup, so about once every month I end up making soup bases or chopping up vegetables like onions, carrots, and ginger then just freezing them to use later.
  For broccoli I usually just end up buying the Costco super large bags for the freezer and just using that. I feel like in the grand scheme of things the plastic waste is reduced a little bit since it is such a large bulk item rather than tiny 2 portion bags sold at smaller grocery stores.
  I do not really eat too much meat anymore, but I used to go to butchers or go hunting since I did not like eating beef at all. Butcher shops tend to have a good selection of things that might not be as environmentally impactful as a cow.
  Love what you did and have a good week!
  
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