Friday, September 28, 2001 - 01:06 pm
Every time I buy a nori "hand roll" from a Sushi Train or similar shop, I'm given a little plastic fish with a few mls of soy sauce in it. I get one with each roll, as does every customer.
I don't know how many hand-rolls are sold throughout the world every day, but with an apparent 1-to-1 correspondence with little plastic fish, I shudder to think of the mountains of piscine plastic being deposited in landfills.
The fish are cute, sure, and they're much easier to use than the foil soy squeeze-packs (which can 'explode' if opened carelessly), but it hardly seems worth the waste just for the relative convenience.
Tuesday, May 14, 2002 - 12:35 am
Which brings to mind the general predominance of takeaway food and its concomitant rubbish.
It's strange: the feeding habits (opportunities) of my parents during their working hours - the sit-down meal at a diner or restaurant - have been largely supplanted by fast food outlets. The rubbish these produce (edible and otherwise) has been the cause of much argument.
Yet there is an increasing trend (at least in my home city) to the so-called "Food Hall" where an astonishing array of foodstuffs from many different lands is available to large numbers of people. In such an enclosed environment one would be excused for thinking that wastage like that of the takeaway could be much reduced.
Not often, however, do you find these places using reusable crockery and cutlery. Almost always you find your meal served on a plastic plate or in a plastic bowl with plastic cutlery, destined for the garbage after you've finished.
Why does one food hall use disposable and the other not? Is it all a question of cost? Health regulations? Style?
Bring back the "greasy spoon", I say. Encourage people to go out and sit down for lunch, using real knives and forks on something approaching china plates, and avoid the paper bag, plastic container and the styrofoam coffee cup.
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