-Whether we like it or not, everybody's talking about food waste these days.

I love that you're using the word forage.

-Yeah, foraging my own fridge.

-We're going to make a simple syrup with some leftovers.

-I think this would go perfect in a matcha.

-You would, you hipster you.

-Ooh!

That's really good.

-Ooh, look at that.

[ Both laugh ] -We're not gonna waste grapes in this house anymore.

And I actually think this may have been even easier than throwing the grapes in the trash.

This is gonna make your bread taste good.

She's all about no food waste.

I don't feel like I'm saving money when I transform something.

I feel like I'm making money.

-Yes.

-Yes.

♪♪ -I'm Vivian -- part chef... This is a match made in heaven.

...part student... What is gluten, anyway?

...full of questions.

What's this?

How cold is it in here?

How do you heat it up?

Welcome to "Kitchen Curious."

-Major funding for "Kitchen Curious with Vivian Howard" is provided by... the ETV Endowment of South Carolina, the proud partner of South Carolina ETV and South Carolina Public Radio.

With the generosity of individuals, corporations, and foundations, the ETV Endowment of South Carolina is committed to sharing entertaining and uplifting stories and series like "Kitchen Curious."

And by... Additional funding provided by... Building community in Florence, South Carolina.

And... ♪♪ -So, you know, bananas are basically like the cheapest thing at the grocery store.

And for that reason, every time I buy bananas, I buy way too many and they often end up like this.

But never fear, because Vivian's got a smoothie bag in her freezer.

And that's where I put all of my smushy strawberries, my less than perfect blueberries, and of course, these "bananers."

So I just peel that because you can't peel a banana after it's frozen.

Trust me, I've tried.

And I break them up into smoothie-size portions and then put it in the freezer.

You've got breakfast almost ready.

This is the real kicker, though.

I'm not wasting anything today because I'm going to feed my banana peels to my worms, And I feed my worms to my turtle.

I've been busy the last five years.

[ Chuckles ] ♪♪ Whether we like it or not, everybody's talking about food waste these days.

And I'm going to come out and say that I probably waste as much, if not more food than the average person.

And that bothers me for a lot of reasons.

But probably the number-one reason is that I paid for that food that I'm wasting.

But I get fatigued by the idea of making creative use of every piece of brown lettuce or slimy broccoli in my refrigerator.

So we're going to start small today on "Kitchen Curious" with fruit.

Fruit has long been something people have been trying to make use of.

Cobbler and banana pudding both utilize fruit past its prime.

So that's what we're going to do today.

And we're starting with apples because I've packed many a lunch in my day and also unpacked many a brown apple.

So we're going to make a little PB and A oatmeal.

I'm going to start by browning a little bit of butter.

Now, I said PB and A oatmeal.

I did not say PB and healthy oatmeal.

Alright?

So we're going to brown some butter.

And we're going to add our diced less than stellar apples to that.

I'm using roughly the same volume of apples as oatmeal.

So that's a little guide you can think of.

We're going to let these brown just a little bit in this butter and soften up.

I don't want them to be mush when the oatmeal is done, so keep that in mind.

Part of what they're going to do to this dish is provide a little bit of texture and freshness.

So while they carry on, I'm going to add my spices.

I'm going to add a little bit of cinnamon and some nutmeg.

If you're using ground nutmeg, please change that and buy a whole nutmeg and grate it on a microplane.

It makes such a difference.

And the reason that I am putting in my spices now, straight into this apple butter situation, is because I want them to bloom in the oil.

You know, the cinnamon and the nutmeg is going to be much more aromatic and have a lot more impact on the oatmeal if you put it in at this stage versus after you add the liquid.

Alright.

So now I'm going to add my oats and my milk.

You could use water.

You could use any type of nut milk you want.

You could even use a little bit of apple juice in here.

And now I'm going to stir in some peanut butter.

Peanut butter is going to complement the apple.

It's also going to add creaminess and richness.

And it's going to make this really satisfying and something that can honestly carry you to lunch.

We're gonna let that come up to a boil.

I'm gonna add a little bit of brown sugar.

You could use brown sugar.

You could use regular white granulated sugar, maple syrup, honey, agave, whatever you want.

You're going to want a little bit additional sweetness though.

Oatmeal is one of those things that it cooks really fast, but I think it's something that you need to eat immediately.

Alright.

So I am going to make myself a little bowl of this oatmeal.

See, the apples not only give it more flavor, a little bit of acidity, a lot of texture.

They also add a nice color and make it all more appealing.

And so one of the things that I do all throughout my cooking, even when I'm not focused on food waste, is if I have an ingredient inside of the dish that's cooked, often I will garnish it with the same ingredient.

So we've got cooked kind of soft apples in here already.

And peanut butter.

So to make our breakfast a little more interesting, we're going to add some fresh diced apple and then a few chopped peanuts.

And both of these things are going to add additional texture, complexity.

And the apples are going to add a freshness and acidity that's missing I think in a lot of oatmeals.

And I happen to think this looks beautiful and does not look like anything you are going to make out of something that you are going to throw away.

Breakfast of resourceful champions right here.

Oh, it's so hot!

Mm.

-Are you okay?

I'm okay.

It was like a boiling apple I put in my mouth.

[ Laughs ] ♪♪ My nephew Sam is a barista at one of my restaurants in Charleston.

He's a lot like me -- creative, good with people.

He likes to start projects, but maybe not finish them.

[ Chuckles ] So today we're starting one together.

You've been here... -Three years now.

-Three years, and he's been kind of living his... -Charleston best life.

Living.

Being young, having fun.

-Yeah.

[ Both laugh ] Did you grow that mustache just for today?

-Of course.

-Well, I appreciate.

-Got to look best for the camera.

-I appreciate the prep time.

So, Handy & Hot's right here.

And my other restaurant is Lenoir, and it's right there.

And we share a kitchen, so we're able to kind of cross-utilize a lot of things.

And at Lenoir we make an apple preserve out of the flesh of apples.

but you can't use the peeling in the preserve because the sugar makes it really tough.

So we always end up with a ton of apple peelings and cores.

So I'm going to make a little simple syrup.

And with that you're going to make a drink.

-I think this would go perfect in a matcha.

-You would, you hipster you.

So we're going to use this to make a simple syrup with some leftovers.

We're also going to use ginger peelings and a sprig of rosemary because apple, ginger, and rosemary -- -Rosemary.

Even Sam knows.

It's the classic combo.

And then, Sam, if you want to put that water in there, we'll just cover the ingredients.

And usually when I make a simple syrup like this, what's your ratio of sugar to water?

-One to one.

-One to one.

You've got about a quart of granulated sugar.

And we're just going to bring that up to a boil.

♪♪ Alright.

So this has been boiling for about I'd say 10 minutes now.

And because we used red apples, it's taken on this pink color.

-It does look delicious.

-I'm gonna get you to try it and tell me.

Don't burn your mouth.

I don't want to jeopardize that mustache.

-Oh, that's good.

That's really good.

Whoa!

-You taste the apple.

The ginger is up front.

Okay, so maybe some matcha.

-Matcha time.

So we'll start.

We'll grab a little water in our bowl.

-Hot water?

-Hot water.

About 160 degrees ish.

Then we'll grab our matcha.

-And what is matcha?

-Matcha is like really finely ground green tea.

-So it's almost like a powder.

-It's truly like a powder, yeah.

♪♪ We'll do about an ounce of syrup.

Guesstimating.

What kind of milk drinker are you, Vivian?

-Let's do what you -- -I personally think that with matcha, we should do something a little fun.

I always do oat milk.

-Yeah, because matcha is for the hip kids.

-So we've got our syrup, our milk, and then... put your matcha on top.

-Ooh-whee!

-There we go.

-That looks amazing.

-Give it a good mix.

-So I think this apple, rosemary, ginger flavor profile, for me that screams like fall.

-Right.

This is definitely a fall drink.

-You're gonna let me try first?

-Chef first, of course.

Age before beauty.

[ Laughing ] -I bet a lot of people would beg to differ, Sam.

-[ Laughing ] I know you're not wrong.

-It's very good.

♪♪ -Ooh!

That's really good.

-Ooh, look at that.

Look at that foam on there.

[ Both laugh ] ♪♪ -So today, Irene and Mei Li are meeting me at Chef & the Farmer.

They wrote a cookbook about cooking with everything in your kitchen, even the things that you're about to throw away.

And, you know, if you've ever worked in a restaurant, you know that one of the things that the cooks and the chef are always doing is cleaning out the walk-in, going through all the ingredients that are past their prime and getting rid of them.

So today, the Li sisters are going to come in and do that number in my walk-in.

They're going to go through and find some things that it looks like we might throw away and make a tasty dish with it.

♪♪ Hello.

How are y'all?

-Great to see you.

Thanks for having us.

-Thank you.

Thank you for coming.

Thank you for coming to Kinston.

Y'all ready to cook some leftover food?

-Yes.

Always.

-Let's do it.

-Come on in.

-Thank you.

-Alright, so we're going to go in here.

But don't judge me.

-Of course.

Never.

-Or just judge me silently because it feels like I'm naked, letting you in here, seeing all my mess.

-It's so fun.

The skeletons in the walk-in.

Oh, this looks great.

-Oh, yeah.

Just great.

-Very organized.

Beautiful labels.

-Oh, so much stuff here.

-Oh, I found some lettuce.

-Some slimy lettuce?

-You know, just a little brown.

But we can still make use of this.

-And we have a little ginger up here.

Awesome.

We can try that.

Yeah.

Starting to dry out a little bit on the ends, so that's great.

Alright, let's do it.

-This is where the magic happens.

Where we make rotten food tasty food.

[ Laughter ] So you got a lot of things that I always find in my refrigerator that are past their prime.

-Us too.

-Scallions.

I don't know why.

-They're always dry and slimy at the same time.

-How is that possible?

-What is that?

Yeah.

-And then always -- I buy romaine every time I go to the grocery store.

I like the crunch.

It's very versatile.

-Yes.

-But I always end up with one of these always.

-Yeah.

-Always.

-And evidently we do here too.

People don't get excited to eat something that looks like that.

-Of course.

-But I think people are afraid they're going to get sick.

-It's certainly a fear people have.

-Yeah.

-Founded in... -I think in a lot of cases you can cut around bits that don't look so good, and often it's just an issue of the texture feeling icky.

It's not actually going to make you sick.

But of course we say, you know, if you're immunocompromised, if you have elderly folks or babies, you want to be more careful.

And for a lot of the recipes where we're cooking things, that can also help.

-So what are you going to make with these scraps?

-Well, I'm seeing we have a lot of fun greens, and I thought maybe we would try doing one of our favorite dishes that we started making more when we were writing our book, which is actually a stir-fried lettuce dish.

-Oh!

-Yeah.

-Yes.

-Great.

-I loved having y'all at Lenoir for our book club.

-That was so fun.

-And you told this story about growing up and the packets of condiments.

-Yes.

-Please tell it.

-Well, we dedicated our book to the OG zero-waste queen, Our mom, who actually is not an avid cook, but her classic recipe to not waste anything was, you know, in the little door in the fridge, you put all your little takeout sauces like the hot mustard, some duck sauce, maybe just ketchup or hot sauce or salsa.

-Anything she could find really.

-Yeah, really, anything that comes in a small packet.

She puts it all in a bowl, and then she marinates chicken wings in it, and it comes out different every time.

But somehow it's always delicious.

Some kind of sorcery.

-I love that.

-Takeout sauce magic -- You can now have that recipe in your repertoire.

-Yes.

-So I think I'm going to cut this cabbage just into some chunks to go with the lettuce.

-Great.

-That'll give us a couple different textures in our stir fry.

-While you do that, I will go through the scallions.

-The slimy, dry scallions.

-Exactly.

All the time.

What we always do is just kind of take out this outer layer.

You just peel off anything that feels a little slimy and/or dry, and then the rest is good to go back.

Back when we were at Lenoir in the book club, you were talking about how good it makes you feel when you actually do manage to transform something.

You're like, "Oh, my God, I'm so smart."

-That's exactly what you said.

-I don't feel like I'm saving money when I transform something.

I feel like I'm making money.

-Yes.

-Yes.

-At a restaurant, you definitely are.

-Yeah, but at home, I'm like, "Oh, I just saved myself a trip to the grocery store," which is something I hate doing.

-And I tricked my kids.

-Yes.

And I just made money.

-Yeah.

-You're like, "Oh, my God, I'm doing amazing."

-"I'm doing great."

-Yeah.

-I feel like when we stir fry, people don't often put enough oil in there.

-Yes.

Oil is an ingredient in a stir fry.

Yeah.

-So I like to go in with the scallions first.

They have a little more water, and we're gonna try to get a little bit of toastiness on these aromatics.

I'm gonna go in with some salt as well.

That's gonna help pull more moisture out of the scallions.

Just give these a little stir.

-And talking about aromatics, ginger, garlic, and scallions are like the Chinese trinity of aromatics.

They just make everything taste good.

If you want to get more creative, you can start adding in soy sauce or sesame oil or black vinegar.

A little sugar helps too.

But with the lettuce, it's such a simple flavor, it's nice to just keep it with aromatics here.

Great.

-Smells amazing.

-It does smell amazing.

-Alright.

Mei, you want to drop some cabbage in there?

-Let's do it.

-It's a little heartier.

To get it nice and tender, we'll want a little more time in the pan.

And that's kind of a good rule of cooking with the things that you've foraged in your fridge, I think is, you know, if it's sturdier, you just give it more time in the pan.

You have the ability to make that calculation based on what you've foraged.

-I love that you're using the word forage.

-Yeah, foraging my own fridge.

-Like a hunter-gatherer.

-Exactly.

[ Laughter ] -Alright.

And then we're gonna go in with some lettuce.

-Okay.

-You can see we're starting to get some nice browning.

-And you really don't want to cook it for that long.

And that's what's great about this as a side dish is it's so fast.

♪♪ -Alright.

So I'm just going to plate up a little bit of stir fry.

And I love how it still has some volume to it.

-It's really beautiful.

I mean it looks like something you would get in a restaurant.

-Should we dig in?

-Yes.

I always love eating other people's food.

-Yes.

-More than mine.

-I feel the same way.

-Mm.

This smells great.

-Mm-hmm.

-Wow.

That is delicious.

[ Lettuce crunching ] And you can hear me crunching.

-Mm-hmm.

-It's still crunchy.

-Yum.

-And that took like four minutes from start to finish.

-Mm-hmm.

-And we just made money.

-[ Laughing ] -I feel rich.

-I usually try to ignore food trends but there's a new wave of products that speak to my waste-not sensibilities.

And I've enlisted two of the most discerning palates I know to give their critiques.

Do y'all know what we're doing?

-Trying snacks.

-Yeah, but not just any snacks.

All of these snacks and dog treats were made with some food that would otherwise have been thrown away.

So, like these fiber bars are made from blueberries that would be past their prime or not pretty enough to go in the grocery store.

And then this rind remix... So these... -Include the rind.

-...include the rind.

Okay.

Let's start with this one.

♪♪ I think it's good.

I think it tastes like a -- a very healthy trail mix.

-The strawberry's good.

-Yeah, I think it's good.

Alright.

Let's do one of these Floura bars.

You know Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream?

-Mm-hmm.

-This is Jeni's company.

-I'm gonna try the vanilla one.

That's pretty good.

-It is pretty good.

What is that?

-Veggie chips.

-Ooh, that's called Trashy.

-Can I imitate you real quick?

-You can try.

-Well, that's called Trashy.

-[ Chuckles ] Well, that looked scary.

[ Laughter ] Spicy sea salt unbelievable veggie chips.

Eat Trashy.

-Let me get some more of these.

-Sorry.

Let's see what it's made with.

-It doesn't even taste like vegetables.

It just tastes like a tortilla chip.

-Yeah.

-Romaine, spinach, kale, collards, green leaf, green chard, cucumber, parsley, celery, carrot.

I'm not gonna have to cook dinner tonight.

What's next to the Trashy chips?

-Oh, they're like gummies.

♪♪ -This is called Climate Candy.

[ Laughs ] -It's good.

-So we have a mug cake to try.

-Mm.

-Yeah.

Number one.

-This is number one?

-Well, don't go eating all of it.

I need to try it.

-It tastes like hot chocolate.

-It's not bad.

I think that probably is my favorite.

-Mm-hmm.

Definitely.

-We have a winner, folks.

Okay.

So now we have all of these pet treats.

Do y'all want to see what Tina and Calloway are interested in?

-You bet.

-Teensy.

♪♪ -Do you really think that Tina should be on the table?

-Where else are we gonna put her?

-This is not what usually happens.

-You can do it, Calloway.

Okay.

-You want to hold Tina?

Alright.

Dental minis, mighty mint.

-Tina needs some of those.

-With upcycled sunflower seeds, spearmint and mint.

This is gonna make your breath taste good.

-Tina's, like, eyeing it.

-She's all about no food waste, am I right?

Okay, Calloways, how about this one?

This looks good.

Soft-baked pumpkin nut partay.

-Let's put your little paws up here.

-Here you go, Calloway.

It's got pumpkins.

I think -- Oh, we've got a winner.

-Looks like she's smoking a cigar.

[ Laughs ] ♪♪ Even if aging apples are not a problem in your kitchen, I bet if you ever buy bags of grapes, you find that at the bottom of that bag, there's some grapes that just kind of never get eaten.

They're a little bit smushy, maybe a little discolored, disconnected from the vine.

Well, we're not going to waste grapes in this house anymore.

Or at least in this church kitchen.

The way we're going to tackle this is through one of my favorite methods of cooking these days, which is a sheet pan dinner because I, like everyone else, hate washing dishes.

So we're going to build a whole dinner on a sheet pan using our old grapes.

♪♪ We're going to start with some bratwurst sausages.

So you could use Italian sausage.

You could use andouille.

You could use a basic smoked sausage.

Really anything you have but a sausage in its casing.

We're going to take our sheet tray, and we're going to position these sausages kind of evenly on the sheet tray because they, as they cook, are going to render and provide additional oil for the Brussels sprouts and the grapes to roast.

So you want to position them evenly on the baking sheet.

Then I'm going to take my Brussels sprouts.

I've halved these and I'm also going to spread them evenly around the sausage, and I want to make sure that I'm not crowding my baking sheet, that I'm not putting a bunch of Brussels sprouts on top of each other.

Everything needs room to breathe, room to roast, room to caramelize.

And then the star of the show are my old grapes.

You never heard that before, right?

So, you know, you might think like grapes and sausage and Brussels sprouts?

Well, I just want to say that pork and fruit is almost always a match made in heaven.

Pork and apples, pork and peaches.

You know, pork lends itself to sweet elements.

So this is a match made in heaven, I promise you.

Okay, so now that I've got everything on my baking sheet, I'm going to drizzle it with some olive oil.

Gonna season it with some salt, taking great care to get over these Brussels sprouts.

And a little bit of chili flakes.

Once I get that on there, I'm going to get my hands in it, and I'm gonna really pay a lot of attention to these Brussels sprouts and make sure that my olive oil gets in all these little crevices because just because you pour olive oil on a baking sheet does not mean it finds your food.

And we want the Brussels sprouts to get crispy.

We're going to transfer this to a 375-degree oven for about 25 minutes.

♪♪ And while that roasts, we're going to whisk up a little glaze.

Another thing that I think goes great with pork other than fruit is mustard.

So we're going to take a little bit of Dijon mustard.

Could use smooth or whole grain or both.

Some honey and some LJ as I call it at the restaurant.

Lemon juice.

And we're just going to whisk all of that up.

And when my sheet pan dinner comes out of the oven, I'm going to drizzle this on top, and it's going to mingle with those grapes and just make an incredible sauce for the Brussels sprouts and the sausage.

♪♪ Alright.

Look at this beautiful sheet pan sausage dinner.

I am gonna plate this the way that I would eat it.

♪♪ I'm kind of speechless because it's so beautiful.

[ Laughs ] Then I'm gonna perch my sausage right on top of that, and then I'm just going to drizzle my honey mustard glaze all around.

It looks like something you might even have in a restaurant, it's so beautiful.

And I actually think this may have been even easier than throwing the grapes in the trash.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -Major funding for "Kitchen Curious with Vivian Howard" is provided by... the ETV Endowment of South Carolina, the proud partner of South Carolina ETV and South Carolina Public Radio.

With the generosity of individuals, corporations, and foundations, the ETV Endowment of South Carolina is committed to sharing entertaining and uplifting stories and series like "Kitchen Curious."

And by... Additional funding provided by... Building community in Florence, South Carolina.

And... ♪♪ ♪♪