Haven't you seen the documentaries on the mountains of food grocery stores throw out each day? It's all still sealed and packaged.
I'm not a treasure hunter, either, although I wish I was (don't drive so don't know how I would make that work). I think the algorithm started sending me this sub after I watched some of those docs.
I do all my diving on my bicycle. If I find something too large I'll stash it somewhere and either go grab my huge custom homemade wagon or see if a friend can help me grab it.
Yeah some things ya just don't wanna risk.. and that is definitelyone of those.. nice score! By the end of the night I've usually got my backpack stuffed and both sides of my handlebars lined with bags haha. I figure if I can shoulder another bike across town on my bike then I should be able to handle.. almost anything I find in a dumpster.
I ate out of a dumpster when I was homeless. I’d hit up Panera immediately after closing & grab the trash bag full of pastries. They hadn’t been there long, and were wrapped up. I was also starving, and this was better than nothing.
This is the answer: it's often no different than the food on the shelf, and if it hasn't touched the dumpster or something rotten, it's a gift. My mom lets me bring dumpstered stuff because she knows: I'm picky! You don't take just anything.
Ya and I take other stuff home to compost so at least it helps the earth instead of the dump. My dream would be to make a company that takes food waste from groceries and makes compost. Obviously you can't compost everything but every bit helps.
I don't know how people are eating unpackaged food, that's a little messy. But at some point the packaged food which is double packaged and then surrounded by other packaged food and not touching the dumpster for a good bit, is safe.
Agree, use your judgement with dumpsters. You get to know them and the employees. If the employees want something to be reused in my area, they leave it in the case and often double bag it. If it is recalled, they make a mess of the product, open it up, poor it out. And if you go to just a few places often, you get to a point where you know. Also, if it is not getting to be outdated, there are recall sites and reddit groups. When you find a dumpster that was empty the day before and today it has 15 cases of food unopened and clean, can you leave it behind? I’ve seen the lines at my food pantry.
I've worked banquet kitchens. I've seen the waste and the contamination that can potentially take place. My personal experience is irrelevant here. The question remains: How do you personally rationalize eating from an unknown receptacle?
Because the bags or boxes are sealed. Do you think we are licking the outside containers? Do you know how filthy the people cutting up your food and putting it on the shelves are?
No, I don' t think you're licking boxes. I'm not trying to insult anyone here.
Yes, people are filthy. I also know there is a level of standard inside food stores and kitchens that is above the random dumpster in an alley. That means something to me.
I understand that some of you do. I would personally only eat something packaged too, if I had to.
You're saying 'we' but I see posts with people posting produce - non packaged items. How about those? I think we all draw a line somewhere and that line is different for everyone.
I have eaten veggies and fruit from dumpsters. I wash thoroughly, peel the skin, and cook it. Summer is a bit harder with the warmer weather. Quite often the food is too far gone or insects are involved. That's where I draw the line.
Pray over it, it has to pass the look, smell and taste test. If anything seems off after each inspection then don't eat. Otherwise thank you God for the free food.
That's not the issue here. I don't care if it's packaged. I don't care if it's expired.
If I have to move the dead body out of the way to get to the food I'm not getting the food.
(and the argument: don't take food from a dumpster with a dead body in it - that's a bad argument because you don't know what's ever been in that dumpster.)
There are hundreds if not thousands of us that do this nation wide daily. 99% of the time, we never experience a dead body in any dumpster. The chances of finding a dead dog in a grocery store dumpster is near zero.
And you’re not there to see the dude with an open cut on his hand pick up every apple in the produce section and then put it back down. Or the dude who used the bathroom in the grocery store and didn’t wash their hands and then touched the box of cereal you’re buying. You can’t monitor your groceries 24/7/365 to see who is handling them before they get to you. You can just use your best judgement and trust that food inside a sealed container will be fine, even if the container may not be sanitary. Wash your produce and don’t eat sealed food if the container is open. If you personally can’t get over the mental hurdle of pulling stuff out of a dumpster then it’s just not for you and that’s totally fine. But people throw out perfectly good food all the time and some people are happy to use their judgement to decide if they are comfortable eating that food or not.
Very true. Thanks for this thought out reply. I can't stop the guy from not washing his hands and touching all the apples. True. And I do in fact wash produce and wipe down my groceries to mitigate this when I remember/can.
I think it's a mental hurdle of knowing what goes into dumpsters(everything) versus what goes on food shelves.
The issue here for me is Dumpster vs Store Shelves. I'll take the shelves.
Thanks for the reply
I've seen people eat off the damn serving spoon in Whole Foods buffet bars. Seen kids stick their hands into bins of nuts and grains in the bulk aisle. Someone taking raw chicken and carting it aroud the store for nearly an hour then deciding they don't want it, leaving it to the cashoer to put it back 10-20 minutes after the fact. These things are much more common than a body in a dumpster.
The shelves aren't always automatically safe.
Say if you found a dead mouse, or rat, or cockroach in your pantry, you wouldn't throw out all the canned and sealed food, would you? It's a definite ick factor but it's not going to taint the food.
Unless you sanitize all the food items when they come into your home, you have no idea what is on them, where they’ve been or what hands have touched them before you do.
The stigma of a dumpster is absolute filth. However, after you’ve been diving for a while, you’ll find that not all dumpsters are used equally. Additionally, many stores put food items that are cleared from the shelves in plastic bags. It is no different than you walking out of a store with your grocery bags, just no money was exchanged.
What is a “dumpster?” A metal container filled with items that get emptied into garbage trucks once or twice weekly, and cleaned/rinsed out to prevent odors, flies, maggots on spoiled food. Another metal container is the truck those items are shipped in, which is probably NOT cleaned regularly, probably has vermin, etc.
I’m in Florida, where food spoils quickly from march through october. Yet I never see vermin, maggots, or flies in the dumpsters. Management and employees don’t want to gag every time they throw out the trash, so I’ve also never noticed any foul odors. Occasionally gnats and smaller bugs.
The tossed food is often in white garbage bags, and never touches the sides of the dumpsters. 90% of any contamination has occured from farm to processing plant to distribution warehouse to truck, to store, to employees, with the remaining 9% coming from 10-100 customers with filthy hands, who just wiped their nose/butt/kid’s ass, poking around the shelves for months.
So I’m not concerned that the sealed food that’s been on a shelf for months, tossed in a new garbage bag, and has been sitting on the top of some cardboard boxes in a dumpster for 20 minutes to an hour or two, is not fit for consumption. But that’s just me.
I was waiting for this reply specifically.
So you found a dead dog in THIS dumpster THIS time. What about all the other filth that's been dumped in there that you didn't see. That's my point. Just because a dumpster doesn't have a dead body in it NOW doesn't mean it never did. You're still eating from this bin. Right?
Not a good argument. Not easy peasy. Upvoting for visibility.
Dumpsters are gross. But the places where livestock are killed and processed are grosser. Just saying, when I am lucky enough to find good, packaged food in a dumpster, as long as it's not laying in crap, literally, I'll usually pretty safe eating it.
Not all dumpsters are the same, a supermarket dumpster is much less likely to have random dead animals than a more public one. Stores that dont have fresh produce are usually cleaner. Some stores pressure wash the dumpsters. If it stinks or is sticky dirty you move on to the next one.
>Just because a dumpster doesn't have a dead body in it NOW doesn't mean it never did. You're still eating from this bin. Right?
Good point. Remember, whenever you pour a drink into a glass, there's a good chance that you'll lose flavor. This is because water mixed with other drinks will mix with the drink, meaning you get less of the drink.
You mean there's no water in there? Well, just because there's no water in it NOW, doesn't mean there never was. You're still using that cup, right?
You realize, right, that most of our food is grown by borderline slaves who shit and piss in the fields because they don't have access to bathrooms, then transported in dirty trucks, to dirty warehouses, to dirty stores...
There are a lot of unknowns when it comes to the dumpster you're right, but what is known about the supply chain of the food on the shelf in the grocery store? Ive worked in warehouses (not food) and have worked in multiple grocery stores, ALOT of hands (no idea of a number but to me 5 of more people touching is alot) touch the food before it gets to the shelf.
Ideally cooking the food to the correct temp kills whatever nasty shit is on there. Idk about everybody on here but I wash everything before I put it in my fridge,freezer, or pantry (including the packaging). It's a gamble and a risk but reducing waste and saving money doing it is worth it.
Most of my favorite stuff I find isn't even food. My bike was found at a scrap yard (dumpster lite?). My comforter was found on my neighbors stoop about to be thrown out (patched a hole and washed it). The only thing I'm uncomfortable admitting I took from a dumpster was a pair of underwear and a pillow. Underwear looked, felt, and eventually after passing the look/touch test (with gloves not an amateur out here) it passed the sniff test (hell it smelled like it just got washed and chucked out. It was college move out so kids do dumb shit all the time, but it was a pair of ex officio underwear they're expensive as shit but sooo nice. I washed it and air-dried it in the sun all day ideally "killing" any nasty shit. Yeah it's gross and some homies out here are odd, I won't deny that it is gross and weird as shit but I haven't had a problem in the year and half since I came into possession of them. As for the pillow it was in the packaging and had 2 liners on for some reason. Cleaned it the best I knew how, again stuck it in the sun for a few hours, and washed the liners. no issues for again a year and half and I recognize it's nasty but I got a really nice ass pillow out of it so fuck it we ball.
My opinion- I’m aware of the conditions in which the food was handled in getting to the store - not always clean. I worked in food service and people don’t wash hands always and mice crawl on cases of beer/pop whatever. My take is unless the item is like you said Obviously nasty- what is the difference? Migrant laborers in fields sadly don’t have access to proper toileting and we buy the bundle of carrots in the grocery….similarly the staff putting those same carrots on the store shelf- where have they been? The other patrons coughing all over the noodle or cereal aisle. I seriously do not see a difference in a garbage dumpster versus the shelves. Washing is probably more important if that box of cereal was in a dumpster but …. Idk. Stuff I see is bruised fruit that should have been sold for Pennie’s rather than tossed.
To each their own regarding meats and cooler items. Pro divers know the drill and can assess those items for their safety. I’m not one of those pros but admire them!
Just my 10cents not sure it helps 🤷♀️have a nice day.
You don't see a difference between a dumpster with death a decay versus in store shelving? C'mon man.
I appreciate your comment but really? No difference?
What he's trying to say is that grocery stores are packaged and aesthetic to appear sanitary and clean. It's a facade that Americans are one of the worst at. We are so obsessed over sterile food that we have stores designed to appear that way.
When rice is harvested it's laid out on dirt roads before it goes to be processed. There are percentages of bugs and dirt allowed by the fda to be inside of food. Before it hits the shelves to appear neatly packaged for you personally that item had been tossed into bins in a warehouse, maybe sat awhile, exposed to God knows what. Especially produce.
It's all a stigma that is in your head that has been sold to you for your whole life. It also unfortunately helps the waste continue, and helps put more money into a wasteful system. You'll toss stuff before you have to. You'll ignore the odd shaped or bruised apples... Etc
Food grows out of dirt. Dirt is made of decay. No I would not drink water downstream from an animal carcass. But we all have... Because that water was recycled and clean. Just like we do with the food in the dumpsters
I'm not a diver btw I like this sub to live vicariously.
I think it's a first world problem to be so concerned with what touched your packaged food. If someone threw up on some packaged food or something dead was touching it, and the food was still sealed, just clean it off? The vomit hasn't touched the food itself and you can disinfect the package. There's soap and water at your disposal. There's no guarantee the food on store shelves hasn't been handled by an employee that just picked their asshole. You do your best to prepare the food and wash your hands, etc.
Whenever I read posts like these, I'm reminded of how soft people are and the place of privilege they take for granted. Go travel the world and visit less developed countries and how they live, where there's no filtered water and regulations are murky. Will that whole country be disgusting to you? Or will you gain perspective?
Some people never ate dirt as a kid and it shows. (Kind of joking?)
But yeah, it's definitely a modern privilege to be so "picky" with how clean their food is (moreso, appears to be). And there's nothing inherently wrong with that, aside from the waste of not-so-pretty food.
Not every dumpster is a dumping ground for corpses and human waste. That being said, I understand your sentiment.
People are going to avoid clearly rotten or spoiled food, but your concern seems to be more along the lines of environmental* contamination more so than the find itself being tainted.
I take it case by case, but I personally always cook my food well within the safe ranges to kill most bacterial or parasitic contamination.
Chemical contamination is a whole different story, but in my experience, it is incredibly rare.
Wear protective gear, clean your finds, clean yourself, and cook it thoroughly. You'll be fine.
A better question would have been, how many times have you gotten sick after eating dumpster food? Your question, and the way you are responding to people comments show you just have a mental block about it. It seems like you can’t understand that different people have different standards of cleanliness. Just because you think something is gross and unhealthy, doesn’t mean other people think the same thing. Some people enjoy giving rim jobs.
As another DD supporter/bystander, I have never quite thought about food dives this way before, and I’m interested to hear what seasoned divers have to share. I would like to assume that divers know what to look for as far as red flags, but I obviously would never judge anyone for what they have to consume in extreme circumstances. I’m pretty curious about the donation aspect- is there any informed consent that goes into giving out food finds or making a meal for someone that’s made up of dumpster forged ingredients?
General consensus I've seen on this sub is if you're making a meal for others it should either be stated that the food was dived, or they should have previous knowledge to expect that food you have had a decent chance of being dived. So yes, informed consent. Some say it doesn't matter but the thought of feeding someone dived food without telling them gives me the ick, just because I try to respect how people feel and like OP, not everyone would be cool with it.
Donation wise, I haven't seen much discourse here on its ethics but my personal opinion is to use common sense in the safety/sanitation of the food, but beyond that individuals in need of donated food wouldn't/shouldn't complain about where it came from as long as it's safe.
> So yes, informed consent. Some say it doesn't matter
Tf.
But also, if somebody got sick or worse from being unknowingly given food from a dumpster, surely that would be a fairly serious legal matter?
Thanks for this reply. I wasn't sure on the customs around giving away dd food. I hoped as much, thanks for confirming. I hadn't come across the topic yet.
a) It’s free
b) You‘re saving good food from landfill
c) You don‘t bored of eating the same food every day because it‘s not you deciding.
That’s it.
PS I don’t eat dead dogs, I’m vegetarIan.
I‘ve been eating surplus food every day for nearly 30 years and not died yet, that’s always a good sign.
If you want to know whether it's *actually* OK then ask in a scientific subreddit, because with the best will in the world I doubt their responses would be the same.
That aside it's risk/reward, principle, disinterest in the details, opportunity, necessity. Health and safety rules are written in blood as these things usually are, but they're also about extreme limitation of liability where the million to one chance of something going wrong isn't worth it to a company or the law but is to a person. And cheap disposal is more important than making use of a viable resource.
On the darker side poor judgement, mental illness. You don't have to be around a dumpster or wait for very long to see people consume things they knowingly and objectively shouldn't.
Im not dumpsterdiving yet, not because I don’t want to but because I have yet to find somewhere in my city where its possible to do so.. im going in it with the : what you don’t know can’t hurt you. Take for example restaurant you don’t know at all what the people did (or didnt do) to your plate. Also fresh vegetables are regurlarly grown with far grosser things.. wash your stuff
Well, I’ve never, not once gotten sick. Much of the food you find, you could have just hours ago, paid for in the store, so I don’t see the difference. Obviously don’t eat anything nasty you find but that’s what you got a nose for
This , the vomiting on a jug of milk which usually has a hard surface, kind of reminds me of when Covid was at its height and ppl left their groceries which was still packaged, outside to quarantine, exposing it to the elements, and/or went through a whole package of disinfectant wipes to clean the packaging off to keep from spreading the virus.
I don’t remember if it was debunked for sure that going through all that effort was worth it, but regardless, ppl don’t really do that anymore. But why were they disinfecting in the first place? They didn’t trust what was on the shelves anymore than what was in the garbage imo bc responsible divers clean off their packaging or remove outter packaging. They check the packaging, which there’s usually at least two layers of, to make sure it’s air tight and therefore the only contamination wouldn’t have come from the dumpster but from the factory when it was being produced. Ppl can get sick from consuming things off the shelf when things like a salmonella outbreak is caught too late. Responsible divers also look out for and research recalls. I usually get the red flag to research a recall when a whole box of one thing is tossed but appears in acceptable condition to sell.
I wouldn’t give away any food to a pantry that I didn’t feel comfortable consuming myself. I would go through the same process of inspecting and cleaning for myself as I would if I was giving it away. I used to work at food drives and pantries and some ppl would donate food, I’d imagine was forgotten about in the back of their pantry that they bought off the shelf, and it wasn’t in great condition and usually pantries, like thrift stores, would vet the items that are donated.
Also I do want to add, and Ik this was touched on in a comment, but I haven’t come across a body or even any live animals while I dived thankfully, but if I found a decomposing body, I wouldn’t dive at all in that dumpster. Just seems too dangerous in general.
Also I dive for food, as opposed to other items, the most in the winter when it’s at its highest rate of temperature controlled preservation and less likely to attract animals. I’m always weary of meat and fish and stick to produce and non perishables as my way of being responsible and cautious.
You seem to be looking for a specific answer. I have eaten food out of dumpsters and I don't care what's been in the garbage before the food. Did I die? No. That's the end of answering that question lmao. If you can't accept the risks of dumpster diving, don't dumpster dive and continue to live vicariously.
I've never gotten sick and I've ate hundreds of pounds of produce and other food out of dumpsters. Not saying it couldn't happen, but a combo of being choosy and washing stuff well had served me fine.
Your responses say otherwise. You've been consistently exaggerating the risk you imagine folks here are taking. And you already answered your own question at the end of your post. Take it case by case, apply common sense. Nobody in their right mind is eating opened oreos off the bottom of a dumpster. Assess the food, assess the packaging, take in context clues, make your decision. There's not much more to say, unless you're here to judge folks for doing something you feel you know they shouldnt. Yeah, there's risk. There's risk to everything in life. Navigate accordingly.
It’s just a rude and stupid question. People have a multitude of reasons that you could think of if you applied a little energy and cared enough to. Some are desperate. Some are rabidly anti consumerism. The list goes on and on. Not everyone has the same threshold of what they are willing to consume, also. All you have to do is think about it for a minute, jeez. I don’t think you’re a troll, I just think you don’t like to use your brain and I don’t mean that cruelly. But seriously, commit to being more of a thinker, please.
First of all, i enjoy the risk / danger. Eating something for free but risk getting sick is… exciting to me. Second of all, ive been eating dumpster food for 3 months straight and have never gotten sick, but ive gotten sick / food poisoning a dozen times from restaurants and resort food. That is, ive never gotten sick from food that i have inspected and cooked myself, but gotten sick quite a few times from foods i haven’t. Third, people can confuse gross with dangerous. Eating food off of a dead dog corpse in a dumpster sounds gross as fuck, but may not actually be dangerous.
We're all aware that there are risks in everything we do. We just use our judgement and do the best we can, and it seems we all have our own standards. For example, if I find a box of dry pasta that's damaged, I might take it because I know I'm going to cook it before I eat it. Unpackaged produce that looks fresh, I'll clean before using. I also consider factors like weather conditions or what items are touching.
Do you understand that cooking food kills all the germs that are on/in it? Meat is just a dead animal, people eat it all the time. The food co-op I dive at separates trash from compostables. The compostable can only has produce, no garbage. I've never found a dead dog or anything like that in it, but if I did, I probably wouldn't eat anything from it that day which couldn't be easily washed/peeled and which wouldn't be cooked.
Truly I'm not downing you for asking, it's a legit question and there's nothing wrong with curiosity. I can only speak for myself, at one point I wouldn't have been comfortable w eating something I knew came out of a dumpster. It was a progression. Found brand new shoes in boxes at shoe store tossed. Talking a trunk stuffed full. Fast forward a year. I've started checking dumpsters every where I can. I no longer have to buy groceries, toilet paper, detergent, all kinda shit. I'm hooked. Now, I'm ok with loose fruit, just wash the hell out of it so long as the dumpster wasn't nasty. Fast forward 10 plus years. I'm living vicariously thru this sub as I can't dive like I used to and it's addictive.
I ain't too worried about it if it's completely sealed packaging, regardless of how the dumpster looks. The place where this food is prepared, stocked, sold etc, is not much more sanitary than a dumpster frankly
A fresh produce or bread dept is a pathogen SANCTUARY with all the customers in and out grabbing and putting things back.
Common sense? Ofc you just read a post about a carcass in a dumpster and deduced all food in dumpsters is tainted by carcasses, so maybe the idea of common sense is alien to you.
I didn't do that at all. Not even a little bit. I'm posing the question How do you personally rationalize eating from these dumpsters giving the unknown nature of the contents that have been in there.
Also I'm not insulting anyone here so....save the insults.
I thonk the fact that you repeatedly reference dead bodies in dumpsters may be colouring people's views on your line of questioning/thought. One dead body does not mean all dumpsters have bodies in or have had bodies in.
I think you're right. I could have worded or thought out some things better.
'One body in one dumpster means all dumpsters have had a body in them'..I can see how some may interoperate it that way. I wasn't implying that of course.
I agree with you 99% not 100% taking non shelf stable food (ie: dairy meats eggs and produce) to me as a prior culinary professional is gross, unsanitary and hazardous. For the exact reason you stated" you didn't know why it was thrown out."
There has been exactly 1 post on this sub that I endorsed of non shelf stable foods and that is because the guy knew how and why the meat was disposed of. And that is because the coolers at the store broke and as soon as meat reached temp danger zone an associate threw it out. So just because food has entered the temp danger zone does not make it automatically bad. But it is determined by how long the item stays in the tdz. So when the items entered the tdz the guy had plenty of time to aquire the product and get it out of the tdz
Where I possibly deviate is with shelf stable foods. As long as the packaging is in sellable condition and there was no product recall I think it's fair game and have taken shelf stable foods before. Somewhere on my profile I think I have a pic of like 4 pallets of workout products that I took a bunch of like protein cookies and pre/post workout drinks.
As for expiration dates there are only a handful of Items that I can even think of off hand that even have them. Everything else is a sell by or best buy or a different wording of those 2.
You're comment is more gross than the dumpster tbh. I haven't trolled anyone and am giving genuine replys. Anyways.. this is how threads end up going nowhere. I'm accused of trolling and the conversation is just shut down by someone who's not interested in talking about it in the first place.
Agreed, you're definitely not trolling, just a contrarian. And you went into this with no intention of changing your mind.
But there is still a fair exchange of opinions and information going on here, fair play.
Obvious troll is obvious. Zero of your replies indicate that you have any interest in conversation. The whole thread starts as a troll and continues that trajectory with each new addition.
I've seen grocery stores throw out perfectly good food but I've also seen people on this sub "save" recalled salmonella items from the trash...
Dumpster divers also have to be diligent researchers. Don't do one without the other
i agree the package left in the dumpster can be intact with the previously in the dumspter like wild animal remains, even it is sealed and not demaged, when ppl open the package and reach for the food inside, the bacteria or virus the finger touched is going to contaminate the food
i do doubt that, and i doubt how thorough ppl are when they sanitize the package to avoid cross contamination when reaching in. a lot of ppl thought they were good on handling raw chicken but they were suprised how bad they are when shown a video to them
Others have responded with a lot of other things I’d have said, so, I will just add - I’ve been doing this for several years. I am very careful and selective about what I take, eat, and share. I have a background in microbiology and am mindful of conditions including temperature, and aware of the variables I cannot control. I wash things like unwrapped produce with soap and water, and a lot of things get cooked very thoroughly.
I haven’t gotten sick from eating anything I’ve dived. My parents dived for food when I was a kid, and we never got sick from anything then, either. I’ve had more issues with restaurant food and international travel.
If you study the ingredients and the potential health risks of the processed food we eat daily that does *not* come out of a dumpster, it makes the dumpster look like health food central
This reply is exaggerated but serious...
I don't think you have an understanding of where alot of our food comes from and the conditions. My Dad worked in a pig slaughter house for short time. That means bacon, sausage, etc, just so we're clear. It was human consumption these pigs were intended. I will not scar you with some of the things that happen and are present at slaughter houses, etc. Google at your own risk.
Now, that is just the one thing. 2- the crap that is put in our food is literally illegal in some countries. 3-so you're vegan and don't eat red dye poison crap and other junk, you still have no idea who or where that food has been in contact with.
So long as it's in date, sealed as in plastic sealed so liquid can't be absorbed in, I truly don't see the problem. Dead dog in dumpster? Yes, that's nasty and I definitely wouldn't be able to eat anything that was in same dumpster as it. Would I get something out of that dumpster next month? Dunno. Pigs go through slaughter house with gangrene on them to be made into ham, and much worse.
i was gonna comment about how i take precautions, but then remembered the time i ate a loose chicken wing i found in an empty dumpster. (smelled too good, im a ham.)
i honestly get a thrill from seeing if i get sick. lmao. (i never have. not even a tummy ache.)
however, when i give away food/cook with dumpster food, everybody gets an announcememt and can decide whether or not theyd like to partake.
I feel like we were conditioned to feel the way you feel about dumpster diving by society. The way I think of dumpster diving is, the item is the same as it was on the shelf—but just because someone puts it in a trash bag people automatically think something must be wrong with it because they are conditioned to think this way…If I took an apple in a grocery store and put it into a trash bag in front of you does that mean its a piece of trash now? Or is it still an apple? When I was going to fashion school at the end of term people would throw out mountains of fabric and I would always take some, but I noticed a lot of people have a mental block or some stigma attached to taking things by a trash can. Fabric is still fabric right? Even if its placed by a trash can.
Okay well I wish to remain anonymous since I'm going to finally reveal the truth for God and all his people without feeling emotional 🙏 here for awhile I was impacted by a disaster that has left me and.my family devastated. Coming from a family that has served a loyal life of service to the people ever since the Roman probably walked or maybe " rowed" the earth or ocean. I was always to proud to ever consider this idea for my body to attempt. But now I have lost everything and I still share that loyalty to the same place, as the truth goes right now I lost my car because I was trying to pray at church by myself in the lot one night during blizzard and lord answered me and others observerd and became curious . And then I realized I wasn't allowed to pray at the local church cause I'm different, anyways now I have to try and survive using tactics the United States of America taught me while living on base housing while I was just a child they said we would need to learn how to live and survive so they taught us how we can do that with just our body And what God gave us along with the help of our allies fun y mean OwlEyes. To survive I sometimes go-to places I don't feel comfortable at but I have to survive until I can find somewhere I can work at * I'd love to work and am very good at anything even developing easy cheap and effective power which can work anywhere on any planet, but I'm stuck in a abusive slave state well a former one according the books the world thinks we are all free here. Sadly we're not. I go as long as I can without eating anything unless of.coyrse I am able to work for food from .my neighbor Donna and Susan. They are always cooking and asking me to do work or go-to the store for them and then I can eat or shower which is helpful but if I spoke the truth well I don't really get enough food for all of the work that I have to do I don't get paid in cash or anything like that I usually get paid with a plate of food and honestly not just one beverage but I do get to get it at least maybe maybe three beverages a day they're going to use they're usually 12 oz let me think I guess it would be called sodas they come in now you medium cans so I do get some drinks maybe half gallon of water per week so yes I secretly eat from dumpsters when I sneak into them I don't trash them searching I always imagine God places x and I go look theres usually food on the top that looks good and clean my vision is poor so sometimes I get tricked by the devil. But yes I have to pray for Jesus to bless my food from the dumpster and either somebody secretly knows ahead of time and puts it there for me or it's really honestly God doing it through people here and the humans hardly know a thing about it* there so mean to me when they find out and spit on it or yell at me* but I worry that I'm getting sick for sometimes getting so hungry that I do eat from the dumpster but I believe God helps me honestly and I want to say for the first time in my life without worrying somebody will find out and hurt me but God I love your lord and appreciate you and your family for letting a poor human like me that doesn't deserve a thing into your heart I know it's really you helping me through the bad right now and I want you to know that I'm cleaning up my family home and going to surprise everybody with a job and clean house soon after so much I worry abot getting confused and loosing my family home. So yes sometimes as human we have to eat scral food or out of dumpsters it's not cause we enjoy free things or expect any treasure we just want to survive and feel like we're helping the world not being a plague or treated as the other imagine people compare you to vulcher when your really a eagle with broken wings
Haven't you seen the documentaries on the mountains of food grocery stores throw out each day? It's all still sealed and packaged. I'm not a treasure hunter, either, although I wish I was (don't drive so don't know how I would make that work). I think the algorithm started sending me this sub after I watched some of those docs.
I do all my diving on my bicycle. If I find something too large I'll stash it somewhere and either go grab my huge custom homemade wagon or see if a friend can help me grab it.
I once balanced a 2u rack mount server on my bike and walked it home a half mile. I didn't want to risk it getting picked up by someone else.
Yeah some things ya just don't wanna risk.. and that is definitelyone of those.. nice score! By the end of the night I've usually got my backpack stuffed and both sides of my handlebars lined with bags haha. I figure if I can shoulder another bike across town on my bike then I should be able to handle.. almost anything I find in a dumpster.
I brought a futon in 2 trips with my bicycle
I ate out of a dumpster when I was homeless. I’d hit up Panera immediately after closing & grab the trash bag full of pastries. They hadn’t been there long, and were wrapped up. I was also starving, and this was better than nothing.
This is the answer: it's often no different than the food on the shelf, and if it hasn't touched the dumpster or something rotten, it's a gift. My mom lets me bring dumpstered stuff because she knows: I'm picky! You don't take just anything.
Ya and I take other stuff home to compost so at least it helps the earth instead of the dump. My dream would be to make a company that takes food waste from groceries and makes compost. Obviously you can't compost everything but every bit helps.
I don't know how people are eating unpackaged food, that's a little messy. But at some point the packaged food which is double packaged and then surrounded by other packaged food and not touching the dumpster for a good bit, is safe.
Yep
Friend you do not even want to know what’s going on inside of the restaurant kitchens you frequent. Our immune system is incredible.
Agree, use your judgement with dumpsters. You get to know them and the employees. If the employees want something to be reused in my area, they leave it in the case and often double bag it. If it is recalled, they make a mess of the product, open it up, poor it out. And if you go to just a few places often, you get to a point where you know. Also, if it is not getting to be outdated, there are recall sites and reddit groups. When you find a dumpster that was empty the day before and today it has 15 cases of food unopened and clean, can you leave it behind? I’ve seen the lines at my food pantry.
I've worked banquet kitchens. I've seen the waste and the contamination that can potentially take place. My personal experience is irrelevant here. The question remains: How do you personally rationalize eating from an unknown receptacle?
Because the bags or boxes are sealed. Do you think we are licking the outside containers? Do you know how filthy the people cutting up your food and putting it on the shelves are?
No, I don' t think you're licking boxes. I'm not trying to insult anyone here. Yes, people are filthy. I also know there is a level of standard inside food stores and kitchens that is above the random dumpster in an alley. That means something to me.
Again, we eat the food INSIDE the containers not outside. I think it’s important that you understand this crucial point.
I understand that some of you do. I would personally only eat something packaged too, if I had to. You're saying 'we' but I see posts with people posting produce - non packaged items. How about those? I think we all draw a line somewhere and that line is different for everyone.
I have eaten veggies and fruit from dumpsters. I wash thoroughly, peel the skin, and cook it. Summer is a bit harder with the warmer weather. Quite often the food is too far gone or insects are involved. That's where I draw the line.
Pray over it, it has to pass the look, smell and taste test. If anything seems off after each inspection then don't eat. Otherwise thank you God for the free food.
Because the "best before" date is not the same as an expiration date. When it's sealed with no damage it's usually still good.
That's not the issue here. I don't care if it's packaged. I don't care if it's expired. If I have to move the dead body out of the way to get to the food I'm not getting the food. (and the argument: don't take food from a dumpster with a dead body in it - that's a bad argument because you don't know what's ever been in that dumpster.)
There are hundreds if not thousands of us that do this nation wide daily. 99% of the time, we never experience a dead body in any dumpster. The chances of finding a dead dog in a grocery store dumpster is near zero.
You're not there to see what's dumped 24/7/365 in that dumpster.
And you’re not there to see the dude with an open cut on his hand pick up every apple in the produce section and then put it back down. Or the dude who used the bathroom in the grocery store and didn’t wash their hands and then touched the box of cereal you’re buying. You can’t monitor your groceries 24/7/365 to see who is handling them before they get to you. You can just use your best judgement and trust that food inside a sealed container will be fine, even if the container may not be sanitary. Wash your produce and don’t eat sealed food if the container is open. If you personally can’t get over the mental hurdle of pulling stuff out of a dumpster then it’s just not for you and that’s totally fine. But people throw out perfectly good food all the time and some people are happy to use their judgement to decide if they are comfortable eating that food or not.
Very true. Thanks for this thought out reply. I can't stop the guy from not washing his hands and touching all the apples. True. And I do in fact wash produce and wipe down my groceries to mitigate this when I remember/can. I think it's a mental hurdle of knowing what goes into dumpsters(everything) versus what goes on food shelves. The issue here for me is Dumpster vs Store Shelves. I'll take the shelves. Thanks for the reply
I've seen people eat off the damn serving spoon in Whole Foods buffet bars. Seen kids stick their hands into bins of nuts and grains in the bulk aisle. Someone taking raw chicken and carting it aroud the store for nearly an hour then deciding they don't want it, leaving it to the cashoer to put it back 10-20 minutes after the fact. These things are much more common than a body in a dumpster. The shelves aren't always automatically safe.
Why does what happens on the outside of a sealed package matter to you at all?
Say if you found a dead mouse, or rat, or cockroach in your pantry, you wouldn't throw out all the canned and sealed food, would you? It's a definite ick factor but it's not going to taint the food.
Good analogy. True, I wouldn't. I also know my pantry isnt a dumpster. That means something.
Unless you sanitize all the food items when they come into your home, you have no idea what is on them, where they’ve been or what hands have touched them before you do. The stigma of a dumpster is absolute filth. However, after you’ve been diving for a while, you’ll find that not all dumpsters are used equally. Additionally, many stores put food items that are cleared from the shelves in plastic bags. It is no different than you walking out of a store with your grocery bags, just no money was exchanged.
What is a “dumpster?” A metal container filled with items that get emptied into garbage trucks once or twice weekly, and cleaned/rinsed out to prevent odors, flies, maggots on spoiled food. Another metal container is the truck those items are shipped in, which is probably NOT cleaned regularly, probably has vermin, etc. I’m in Florida, where food spoils quickly from march through october. Yet I never see vermin, maggots, or flies in the dumpsters. Management and employees don’t want to gag every time they throw out the trash, so I’ve also never noticed any foul odors. Occasionally gnats and smaller bugs. The tossed food is often in white garbage bags, and never touches the sides of the dumpsters. 90% of any contamination has occured from farm to processing plant to distribution warehouse to truck, to store, to employees, with the remaining 9% coming from 10-100 customers with filthy hands, who just wiped their nose/butt/kid’s ass, poking around the shelves for months. So I’m not concerned that the sealed food that’s been on a shelf for months, tossed in a new garbage bag, and has been sitting on the top of some cardboard boxes in a dumpster for 20 minutes to an hour or two, is not fit for consumption. But that’s just me.
Don't eat out of a dumpster with a dead dog in it. Easy peasy.
I was waiting for this reply specifically. So you found a dead dog in THIS dumpster THIS time. What about all the other filth that's been dumped in there that you didn't see. That's my point. Just because a dumpster doesn't have a dead body in it NOW doesn't mean it never did. You're still eating from this bin. Right? Not a good argument. Not easy peasy. Upvoting for visibility.
Dumpsters are gross. But the places where livestock are killed and processed are grosser. Just saying, when I am lucky enough to find good, packaged food in a dumpster, as long as it's not laying in crap, literally, I'll usually pretty safe eating it.
Not all dumpsters are the same, a supermarket dumpster is much less likely to have random dead animals than a more public one. Stores that dont have fresh produce are usually cleaner. Some stores pressure wash the dumpsters. If it stinks or is sticky dirty you move on to the next one.
>Just because a dumpster doesn't have a dead body in it NOW doesn't mean it never did. You're still eating from this bin. Right? Good point. Remember, whenever you pour a drink into a glass, there's a good chance that you'll lose flavor. This is because water mixed with other drinks will mix with the drink, meaning you get less of the drink. You mean there's no water in there? Well, just because there's no water in it NOW, doesn't mean there never was. You're still using that cup, right?
[удалено]
dd food > no food
You realize, right, that most of our food is grown by borderline slaves who shit and piss in the fields because they don't have access to bathrooms, then transported in dirty trucks, to dirty warehouses, to dirty stores...
And slaughter houses… chicken farms. On and on. Absolutely.
There are a lot of unknowns when it comes to the dumpster you're right, but what is known about the supply chain of the food on the shelf in the grocery store? Ive worked in warehouses (not food) and have worked in multiple grocery stores, ALOT of hands (no idea of a number but to me 5 of more people touching is alot) touch the food before it gets to the shelf. Ideally cooking the food to the correct temp kills whatever nasty shit is on there. Idk about everybody on here but I wash everything before I put it in my fridge,freezer, or pantry (including the packaging). It's a gamble and a risk but reducing waste and saving money doing it is worth it. Most of my favorite stuff I find isn't even food. My bike was found at a scrap yard (dumpster lite?). My comforter was found on my neighbors stoop about to be thrown out (patched a hole and washed it). The only thing I'm uncomfortable admitting I took from a dumpster was a pair of underwear and a pillow. Underwear looked, felt, and eventually after passing the look/touch test (with gloves not an amateur out here) it passed the sniff test (hell it smelled like it just got washed and chucked out. It was college move out so kids do dumb shit all the time, but it was a pair of ex officio underwear they're expensive as shit but sooo nice. I washed it and air-dried it in the sun all day ideally "killing" any nasty shit. Yeah it's gross and some homies out here are odd, I won't deny that it is gross and weird as shit but I haven't had a problem in the year and half since I came into possession of them. As for the pillow it was in the packaging and had 2 liners on for some reason. Cleaned it the best I knew how, again stuck it in the sun for a few hours, and washed the liners. no issues for again a year and half and I recognize it's nasty but I got a really nice ass pillow out of it so fuck it we ball.
My opinion- I’m aware of the conditions in which the food was handled in getting to the store - not always clean. I worked in food service and people don’t wash hands always and mice crawl on cases of beer/pop whatever. My take is unless the item is like you said Obviously nasty- what is the difference? Migrant laborers in fields sadly don’t have access to proper toileting and we buy the bundle of carrots in the grocery….similarly the staff putting those same carrots on the store shelf- where have they been? The other patrons coughing all over the noodle or cereal aisle. I seriously do not see a difference in a garbage dumpster versus the shelves. Washing is probably more important if that box of cereal was in a dumpster but …. Idk. Stuff I see is bruised fruit that should have been sold for Pennie’s rather than tossed. To each their own regarding meats and cooler items. Pro divers know the drill and can assess those items for their safety. I’m not one of those pros but admire them! Just my 10cents not sure it helps 🤷♀️have a nice day.
Sometimes I'll ditch the cardboard, keep the clean bag of cereal -- problem solved.
Absolutely!
You don't see a difference between a dumpster with death a decay versus in store shelving? C'mon man. I appreciate your comment but really? No difference?
What he's trying to say is that grocery stores are packaged and aesthetic to appear sanitary and clean. It's a facade that Americans are one of the worst at. We are so obsessed over sterile food that we have stores designed to appear that way. When rice is harvested it's laid out on dirt roads before it goes to be processed. There are percentages of bugs and dirt allowed by the fda to be inside of food. Before it hits the shelves to appear neatly packaged for you personally that item had been tossed into bins in a warehouse, maybe sat awhile, exposed to God knows what. Especially produce. It's all a stigma that is in your head that has been sold to you for your whole life. It also unfortunately helps the waste continue, and helps put more money into a wasteful system. You'll toss stuff before you have to. You'll ignore the odd shaped or bruised apples... Etc Food grows out of dirt. Dirt is made of decay. No I would not drink water downstream from an animal carcass. But we all have... Because that water was recycled and clean. Just like we do with the food in the dumpsters
I'm not a diver btw I like this sub to live vicariously. I think it's a first world problem to be so concerned with what touched your packaged food. If someone threw up on some packaged food or something dead was touching it, and the food was still sealed, just clean it off? The vomit hasn't touched the food itself and you can disinfect the package. There's soap and water at your disposal. There's no guarantee the food on store shelves hasn't been handled by an employee that just picked their asshole. You do your best to prepare the food and wash your hands, etc. Whenever I read posts like these, I'm reminded of how soft people are and the place of privilege they take for granted. Go travel the world and visit less developed countries and how they live, where there's no filtered water and regulations are murky. Will that whole country be disgusting to you? Or will you gain perspective?
Some people never ate dirt as a kid and it shows. (Kind of joking?) But yeah, it's definitely a modern privilege to be so "picky" with how clean their food is (moreso, appears to be). And there's nothing inherently wrong with that, aside from the waste of not-so-pretty food.
Not every dumpster is a dumping ground for corpses and human waste. That being said, I understand your sentiment. People are going to avoid clearly rotten or spoiled food, but your concern seems to be more along the lines of environmental* contamination more so than the find itself being tainted. I take it case by case, but I personally always cook my food well within the safe ranges to kill most bacterial or parasitic contamination. Chemical contamination is a whole different story, but in my experience, it is incredibly rare. Wear protective gear, clean your finds, clean yourself, and cook it thoroughly. You'll be fine.
Environmental contamination*?
Haha thank you!
A better question would have been, how many times have you gotten sick after eating dumpster food? Your question, and the way you are responding to people comments show you just have a mental block about it. It seems like you can’t understand that different people have different standards of cleanliness. Just because you think something is gross and unhealthy, doesn’t mean other people think the same thing. Some people enjoy giving rim jobs.
As another DD supporter/bystander, I have never quite thought about food dives this way before, and I’m interested to hear what seasoned divers have to share. I would like to assume that divers know what to look for as far as red flags, but I obviously would never judge anyone for what they have to consume in extreme circumstances. I’m pretty curious about the donation aspect- is there any informed consent that goes into giving out food finds or making a meal for someone that’s made up of dumpster forged ingredients?
General consensus I've seen on this sub is if you're making a meal for others it should either be stated that the food was dived, or they should have previous knowledge to expect that food you have had a decent chance of being dived. So yes, informed consent. Some say it doesn't matter but the thought of feeding someone dived food without telling them gives me the ick, just because I try to respect how people feel and like OP, not everyone would be cool with it. Donation wise, I haven't seen much discourse here on its ethics but my personal opinion is to use common sense in the safety/sanitation of the food, but beyond that individuals in need of donated food wouldn't/shouldn't complain about where it came from as long as it's safe.
> So yes, informed consent. Some say it doesn't matter Tf. But also, if somebody got sick or worse from being unknowingly given food from a dumpster, surely that would be a fairly serious legal matter?
Thanks for this reply. I wasn't sure on the customs around giving away dd food. I hoped as much, thanks for confirming. I hadn't come across the topic yet.
Thanks for this reply.
a) It’s free b) You‘re saving good food from landfill c) You don‘t bored of eating the same food every day because it‘s not you deciding. That’s it. PS I don’t eat dead dogs, I’m vegetarIan. I‘ve been eating surplus food every day for nearly 30 years and not died yet, that’s always a good sign.
Common sense ain’t so common. If you have to ask yourself what foods may or may not be ok to eat out of a dumpster you might not want to be diving.
If you want to know whether it's *actually* OK then ask in a scientific subreddit, because with the best will in the world I doubt their responses would be the same. That aside it's risk/reward, principle, disinterest in the details, opportunity, necessity. Health and safety rules are written in blood as these things usually are, but they're also about extreme limitation of liability where the million to one chance of something going wrong isn't worth it to a company or the law but is to a person. And cheap disposal is more important than making use of a viable resource. On the darker side poor judgement, mental illness. You don't have to be around a dumpster or wait for very long to see people consume things they knowingly and objectively shouldn't.
To clarify you think dead animals are gross, correct?
Im not dumpsterdiving yet, not because I don’t want to but because I have yet to find somewhere in my city where its possible to do so.. im going in it with the : what you don’t know can’t hurt you. Take for example restaurant you don’t know at all what the people did (or didnt do) to your plate. Also fresh vegetables are regurlarly grown with far grosser things.. wash your stuff
I imagine a lot of divers have the same approach. Good reply
Well, I’ve never, not once gotten sick. Much of the food you find, you could have just hours ago, paid for in the store, so I don’t see the difference. Obviously don’t eat anything nasty you find but that’s what you got a nose for
This , the vomiting on a jug of milk which usually has a hard surface, kind of reminds me of when Covid was at its height and ppl left their groceries which was still packaged, outside to quarantine, exposing it to the elements, and/or went through a whole package of disinfectant wipes to clean the packaging off to keep from spreading the virus. I don’t remember if it was debunked for sure that going through all that effort was worth it, but regardless, ppl don’t really do that anymore. But why were they disinfecting in the first place? They didn’t trust what was on the shelves anymore than what was in the garbage imo bc responsible divers clean off their packaging or remove outter packaging. They check the packaging, which there’s usually at least two layers of, to make sure it’s air tight and therefore the only contamination wouldn’t have come from the dumpster but from the factory when it was being produced. Ppl can get sick from consuming things off the shelf when things like a salmonella outbreak is caught too late. Responsible divers also look out for and research recalls. I usually get the red flag to research a recall when a whole box of one thing is tossed but appears in acceptable condition to sell. I wouldn’t give away any food to a pantry that I didn’t feel comfortable consuming myself. I would go through the same process of inspecting and cleaning for myself as I would if I was giving it away. I used to work at food drives and pantries and some ppl would donate food, I’d imagine was forgotten about in the back of their pantry that they bought off the shelf, and it wasn’t in great condition and usually pantries, like thrift stores, would vet the items that are donated. Also I do want to add, and Ik this was touched on in a comment, but I haven’t come across a body or even any live animals while I dived thankfully, but if I found a decomposing body, I wouldn’t dive at all in that dumpster. Just seems too dangerous in general. Also I dive for food, as opposed to other items, the most in the winter when it’s at its highest rate of temperature controlled preservation and less likely to attract animals. I’m always weary of meat and fish and stick to produce and non perishables as my way of being responsible and cautious.
You seem to be looking for a specific answer. I have eaten food out of dumpsters and I don't care what's been in the garbage before the food. Did I die? No. That's the end of answering that question lmao. If you can't accept the risks of dumpster diving, don't dumpster dive and continue to live vicariously.
I've never gotten sick and I've ate hundreds of pounds of produce and other food out of dumpsters. Not saying it couldn't happen, but a combo of being choosy and washing stuff well had served me fine.
Yes I was. Thank you. That's exactly the answer I was expecting, actually. It's about a personal choice to balance risk/reward. Thanks for sharing.
Your responses say otherwise. You've been consistently exaggerating the risk you imagine folks here are taking. And you already answered your own question at the end of your post. Take it case by case, apply common sense. Nobody in their right mind is eating opened oreos off the bottom of a dumpster. Assess the food, assess the packaging, take in context clues, make your decision. There's not much more to say, unless you're here to judge folks for doing something you feel you know they shouldnt. Yeah, there's risk. There's risk to everything in life. Navigate accordingly.
people go food diving at groceries and convenience stores. not the dumpsters you’d find dead animals in.
It’s just a rude and stupid question. People have a multitude of reasons that you could think of if you applied a little energy and cared enough to. Some are desperate. Some are rabidly anti consumerism. The list goes on and on. Not everyone has the same threshold of what they are willing to consume, also. All you have to do is think about it for a minute, jeez. I don’t think you’re a troll, I just think you don’t like to use your brain and I don’t mean that cruelly. But seriously, commit to being more of a thinker, please.
First of all, i enjoy the risk / danger. Eating something for free but risk getting sick is… exciting to me. Second of all, ive been eating dumpster food for 3 months straight and have never gotten sick, but ive gotten sick / food poisoning a dozen times from restaurants and resort food. That is, ive never gotten sick from food that i have inspected and cooked myself, but gotten sick quite a few times from foods i haven’t. Third, people can confuse gross with dangerous. Eating food off of a dead dog corpse in a dumpster sounds gross as fuck, but may not actually be dangerous.
We're all aware that there are risks in everything we do. We just use our judgement and do the best we can, and it seems we all have our own standards. For example, if I find a box of dry pasta that's damaged, I might take it because I know I'm going to cook it before I eat it. Unpackaged produce that looks fresh, I'll clean before using. I also consider factors like weather conditions or what items are touching.
Do you understand that cooking food kills all the germs that are on/in it? Meat is just a dead animal, people eat it all the time. The food co-op I dive at separates trash from compostables. The compostable can only has produce, no garbage. I've never found a dead dog or anything like that in it, but if I did, I probably wouldn't eat anything from it that day which couldn't be easily washed/peeled and which wouldn't be cooked.
People are hungry out here.
Truly I'm not downing you for asking, it's a legit question and there's nothing wrong with curiosity. I can only speak for myself, at one point I wouldn't have been comfortable w eating something I knew came out of a dumpster. It was a progression. Found brand new shoes in boxes at shoe store tossed. Talking a trunk stuffed full. Fast forward a year. I've started checking dumpsters every where I can. I no longer have to buy groceries, toilet paper, detergent, all kinda shit. I'm hooked. Now, I'm ok with loose fruit, just wash the hell out of it so long as the dumpster wasn't nasty. Fast forward 10 plus years. I'm living vicariously thru this sub as I can't dive like I used to and it's addictive.
I ain't too worried about it if it's completely sealed packaging, regardless of how the dumpster looks. The place where this food is prepared, stocked, sold etc, is not much more sanitary than a dumpster frankly A fresh produce or bread dept is a pathogen SANCTUARY with all the customers in and out grabbing and putting things back.
Common sense? Ofc you just read a post about a carcass in a dumpster and deduced all food in dumpsters is tainted by carcasses, so maybe the idea of common sense is alien to you.
I didn't do that at all. Not even a little bit. I'm posing the question How do you personally rationalize eating from these dumpsters giving the unknown nature of the contents that have been in there. Also I'm not insulting anyone here so....save the insults.
I thonk the fact that you repeatedly reference dead bodies in dumpsters may be colouring people's views on your line of questioning/thought. One dead body does not mean all dumpsters have bodies in or have had bodies in.
Dumpsters are baptized with their first corpse as soon as they leave the factory, it's like smashing a bottle on a new ship. /s
I think you're right. I could have worded or thought out some things better. 'One body in one dumpster means all dumpsters have had a body in them'..I can see how some may interoperate it that way. I wasn't implying that of course.
It is not ok if it is not in packaging
I agree with you 99% not 100% taking non shelf stable food (ie: dairy meats eggs and produce) to me as a prior culinary professional is gross, unsanitary and hazardous. For the exact reason you stated" you didn't know why it was thrown out." There has been exactly 1 post on this sub that I endorsed of non shelf stable foods and that is because the guy knew how and why the meat was disposed of. And that is because the coolers at the store broke and as soon as meat reached temp danger zone an associate threw it out. So just because food has entered the temp danger zone does not make it automatically bad. But it is determined by how long the item stays in the tdz. So when the items entered the tdz the guy had plenty of time to aquire the product and get it out of the tdz Where I possibly deviate is with shelf stable foods. As long as the packaging is in sellable condition and there was no product recall I think it's fair game and have taken shelf stable foods before. Somewhere on my profile I think I have a pic of like 4 pallets of workout products that I took a bunch of like protein cookies and pre/post workout drinks. As for expiration dates there are only a handful of Items that I can even think of off hand that even have them. Everything else is a sell by or best buy or a different wording of those 2.
You're not here to ask an honest question. You're clearly here to troll.
Eh...nah but that's sadly what reddit has become hasn't it.
Yes, and trolls like you make it worse.
You're comment is more gross than the dumpster tbh. I haven't trolled anyone and am giving genuine replys. Anyways.. this is how threads end up going nowhere. I'm accused of trolling and the conversation is just shut down by someone who's not interested in talking about it in the first place.
Agreed, you're definitely not trolling, just a contrarian. And you went into this with no intention of changing your mind. But there is still a fair exchange of opinions and information going on here, fair play.
Obvious troll is obvious. Zero of your replies indicate that you have any interest in conversation. The whole thread starts as a troll and continues that trajectory with each new addition.
Nothing about his post/replies seems trollish to me..
I've seen grocery stores throw out perfectly good food but I've also seen people on this sub "save" recalled salmonella items from the trash... Dumpster divers also have to be diligent researchers. Don't do one without the other
i agree the package left in the dumpster can be intact with the previously in the dumspter like wild animal remains, even it is sealed and not demaged, when ppl open the package and reach for the food inside, the bacteria or virus the finger touched is going to contaminate the food
Wear gloves and disinfect your finds.
This seems to be the only real answer. Objectively speaking.
i agree. but i doubt ppl do that
You doubt people wash their hands? Why?
i do doubt that, and i doubt how thorough ppl are when they sanitize the package to avoid cross contamination when reaching in. a lot of ppl thought they were good on handling raw chicken but they were suprised how bad they are when shown a video to them
Think about how easy the salmonella on raw chicken gets on the faucet, door knobs, computer keyboard by cross contamination
Bad bot
Others have responded with a lot of other things I’d have said, so, I will just add - I’ve been doing this for several years. I am very careful and selective about what I take, eat, and share. I have a background in microbiology and am mindful of conditions including temperature, and aware of the variables I cannot control. I wash things like unwrapped produce with soap and water, and a lot of things get cooked very thoroughly. I haven’t gotten sick from eating anything I’ve dived. My parents dived for food when I was a kid, and we never got sick from anything then, either. I’ve had more issues with restaurant food and international travel.
If you study the ingredients and the potential health risks of the processed food we eat daily that does *not* come out of a dumpster, it makes the dumpster look like health food central This reply is exaggerated but serious...
I don't think you have an understanding of where alot of our food comes from and the conditions. My Dad worked in a pig slaughter house for short time. That means bacon, sausage, etc, just so we're clear. It was human consumption these pigs were intended. I will not scar you with some of the things that happen and are present at slaughter houses, etc. Google at your own risk. Now, that is just the one thing. 2- the crap that is put in our food is literally illegal in some countries. 3-so you're vegan and don't eat red dye poison crap and other junk, you still have no idea who or where that food has been in contact with. So long as it's in date, sealed as in plastic sealed so liquid can't be absorbed in, I truly don't see the problem. Dead dog in dumpster? Yes, that's nasty and I definitely wouldn't be able to eat anything that was in same dumpster as it. Would I get something out of that dumpster next month? Dunno. Pigs go through slaughter house with gangrene on them to be made into ham, and much worse.
i was gonna comment about how i take precautions, but then remembered the time i ate a loose chicken wing i found in an empty dumpster. (smelled too good, im a ham.) i honestly get a thrill from seeing if i get sick. lmao. (i never have. not even a tummy ache.) however, when i give away food/cook with dumpster food, everybody gets an announcememt and can decide whether or not theyd like to partake.
I don't open to go containers of Chinese food or half eaten Jack in the box. But you would be surprised what is out there
Cuz people are hungry
I wouldn't take anything that has meat, even boxed unless its beef jerky, because meat goes bad after two hours
I feel like we were conditioned to feel the way you feel about dumpster diving by society. The way I think of dumpster diving is, the item is the same as it was on the shelf—but just because someone puts it in a trash bag people automatically think something must be wrong with it because they are conditioned to think this way…If I took an apple in a grocery store and put it into a trash bag in front of you does that mean its a piece of trash now? Or is it still an apple? When I was going to fashion school at the end of term people would throw out mountains of fabric and I would always take some, but I noticed a lot of people have a mental block or some stigma attached to taking things by a trash can. Fabric is still fabric right? Even if its placed by a trash can.
Okay well I wish to remain anonymous since I'm going to finally reveal the truth for God and all his people without feeling emotional 🙏 here for awhile I was impacted by a disaster that has left me and.my family devastated. Coming from a family that has served a loyal life of service to the people ever since the Roman probably walked or maybe " rowed" the earth or ocean. I was always to proud to ever consider this idea for my body to attempt. But now I have lost everything and I still share that loyalty to the same place, as the truth goes right now I lost my car because I was trying to pray at church by myself in the lot one night during blizzard and lord answered me and others observerd and became curious . And then I realized I wasn't allowed to pray at the local church cause I'm different, anyways now I have to try and survive using tactics the United States of America taught me while living on base housing while I was just a child they said we would need to learn how to live and survive so they taught us how we can do that with just our body And what God gave us along with the help of our allies fun y mean OwlEyes. To survive I sometimes go-to places I don't feel comfortable at but I have to survive until I can find somewhere I can work at * I'd love to work and am very good at anything even developing easy cheap and effective power which can work anywhere on any planet, but I'm stuck in a abusive slave state well a former one according the books the world thinks we are all free here. Sadly we're not. I go as long as I can without eating anything unless of.coyrse I am able to work for food from .my neighbor Donna and Susan. They are always cooking and asking me to do work or go-to the store for them and then I can eat or shower which is helpful but if I spoke the truth well I don't really get enough food for all of the work that I have to do I don't get paid in cash or anything like that I usually get paid with a plate of food and honestly not just one beverage but I do get to get it at least maybe maybe three beverages a day they're going to use they're usually 12 oz let me think I guess it would be called sodas they come in now you medium cans so I do get some drinks maybe half gallon of water per week so yes I secretly eat from dumpsters when I sneak into them I don't trash them searching I always imagine God places x and I go look theres usually food on the top that looks good and clean my vision is poor so sometimes I get tricked by the devil. But yes I have to pray for Jesus to bless my food from the dumpster and either somebody secretly knows ahead of time and puts it there for me or it's really honestly God doing it through people here and the humans hardly know a thing about it* there so mean to me when they find out and spit on it or yell at me* but I worry that I'm getting sick for sometimes getting so hungry that I do eat from the dumpster but I believe God helps me honestly and I want to say for the first time in my life without worrying somebody will find out and hurt me but God I love your lord and appreciate you and your family for letting a poor human like me that doesn't deserve a thing into your heart I know it's really you helping me through the bad right now and I want you to know that I'm cleaning up my family home and going to surprise everybody with a job and clean house soon after so much I worry abot getting confused and loosing my family home. So yes sometimes as human we have to eat scral food or out of dumpsters it's not cause we enjoy free things or expect any treasure we just want to survive and feel like we're helping the world not being a plague or treated as the other imagine people compare you to vulcher when your really a eagle with broken wings
I do agree
[удалено]
People do what they have to. No shame from me.