Supermarket food waste to power renewable energy instead of tackling food poverty

For little more than the price of a big cup of coffee at Starbuck's you can get a warm and hearty three-course lunch made from scratch at the Station House Community Café in Haringey, London. The café is a ‘big society' outfit: run by volunteers, with a social mission and a linchpin in a community that, like many others, has suffered the closing of local shops. All the food that goes into making £4 veggie lunch at the café are donated by the nearby Sainsbury's supermarket. This is perfectly good fruit and vegetables that the supermarket can no longer sell and would otherwise go to waste.

Danny Turi, Station House's newly hired manager, explains how it works: ‘On Thursdays I go by the Sainsbury's in Haringey and pick up the food they have donated. At 3:30 pm, 4 volunteers show up, we lay it out on a table and in 15 minutes we devise a menu of two starters, one main and three desserts. What I love most about cooking is that it's local, vegetarian and seasonal. Everything is perfectly edible - just nearing or on its sell-by date'.

Both the Station House Café and the Pie in the Sky Cafe in Bromley-by-Bow, which...

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