How a mouldy pumpkin started a food waste movement in West Vic

Rachel Yeo is cooking $5 lunches for Creswick North and Newlyn primary schools using vegetables that supermarkets won't sell, sometimes preparing up to 100 meals a week with rescued produce. 

Yeo is the creator of Happy Scraps, an initiative aimed at redefining waste and nutrition by cooking with food deemed unworthy of sale. This can be as simple as a vegetable “not looking quite right”. 

🗣️ “I was working at a yoga ashram in Rocklyn, and I started discovering how much food goes to waste. This one pumpkin had a mouldy spot. I cut one wedge out and used the rest of it. Farmers don’t have the license to do anything with it, so it goes in the bin.” Yeo told the Brolga. 

The produce “scraps” Yeo utilises come entirely from local farmers, like Istra Smallgoods and Mount Franklin Organics. 

🍅The happy origin: Originally from Melbourne, Yeo moved west with her husband at the end of 2019. Seeking a country getaway, the couple loved the lifestyle so much they decided to make it permanent and soon purchased a farm in Smeaton . 

• “It’s been a dream,” said Yeo. “I want to have land that works holistically, that focuses on soil and grass and healthy, happy plants and encouraging native plant life.” 

Happy Scraps was launched in 2024, when Yeo said the post-pandemic hangover had people struggling financially and looking for cheaper ways to put healthy food on the table.

🍜 An enterprising chef: Yeo said she always finds a use for produce. 

🗣️ “As long as it’s edible, I just say yes; what doesn’t sell at market, what’s wonky. 

The only thing that will stop me from eating something is if it’s too mouldy to eat.” 

“If I get a box of kale, cattle will eat the stalks so nothing is going to waste. Cattle will eat a lot of what I can’t use, or it goes back into soil. I use 98% of what comes through the door and repurpose that into food.” 

🌏The bigger picture: Food wastage occurs on an astronomical scale across the world. 

• In Australia, 7.6 million tonnes of food is wasted each year according to the Great Unwaste, a national campaign aimed at reducing food waste in Australia driven by research program End Food Waste Australia. 

• Figures from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) show one third of food produced for human consumption goes to waste, with oversupply and cosmetic presentation being the key driver of produce landing in the bin. 

🏡 Local impact: Yeo is working to change this on the homefront. 

The Happy Plates Project, currently in motion at Creswick North Primary School and Newlyn Primary School, creates $5 morning tea and lunches from food that may not be presentable enough for the supermarket, but is completely healthy and full of nourishment. 

$5 take-home meals can also be ordered online, with Yeo delivering the bundles herself on a monthly basis. 

🗣️ “Every delivery is a chat, it’s really interesting to see who is buying the food and I like learning about them,” said Yeo.“There are some really cool people out there that I normally wouldn’t cross paths with.” 

🍠 Closing the loop: Yeo told the Brolga it’s all too common for the connection to our food to be lost. 

• “I think it’s really important for people to know where their food comes from. When I'm in the city, people don’t like to know where their meat comes from. Maybe you should think about who is growing your food; the animal it’s come from”.