Reduce, recycle – but don’t reuse

When I was growing up, finding out what leftovers were available in our refrigerator was like a treasure hunt. That’s because we used plastic tubs from margarine, cottage cheese, Cool Whip, and other ready-to-eat foods to store leftovers. All of the plastic was opaque, so there was no way to tell what was inside. Sometimes it was a tasty surprise, but other times it was more like a science experiment gone awry. Not only did using margarine tubs to store leftovers make it difficult to know what was in the containers, it turns out that the tubs may have leached chemicals into the food.

It is not a good idea to reuse plastic food containers, say food safety experts. This includes ‘to-go’ containers in addition to the types of tubs mentioned above. These plastics are not created from the same materials as storage containers that are purpose-built for reuse. The single-use plastic tubs may contain BPA or PFAS chemicals that allow them to be more flexible or UV-resistant. Most of these containers are also not meant for high-heat use, meaning using them to heat up leftovers could accelerate the leaching of chemicals into your food.

Even though I have mainly switched to glass containers for leftovers, I have been known to reuse a yogurt tub or two to house leftovers. It seems like such a waste to just pitch them in the recycle bin, because only a very small percentage of plastic ends up being recycled despite our good intentions. It would be great if we could purchase items like this in non-plastic containers, either glass or waxed cardboard. Until then, I guess the plastic tubs go straight to the recycle bin and fingers crossed they do get recycled.