Flexible cooking

Abstract

This graduation project is part of the bigger interdisciplinary project “Food Waste: Transition from Excess to Enough”. The goal of this project is to change the behaviour of consumers relating to food waste, in an effort to reduce the amount of food wasted in the Netherlands.
Food waste is one of the biggest and fastest growing problem in todays’ society. There is a huge contrast between people that suffer from hunger and parts of the world that are prone to an abundance of food resulting in obesity and food waste. Food waste has a great social influence and influence on the environment. In Europe, over 40% of all food waste takes place in the consumer and retail stages of the food supply chain. In the Netherlands this results to 33,4 kg of food wasted per person per year (Van Lieshout & Knüppe, 2022). The most problematic consumers that contribute to food waste in the Netherlands are people in the age groups of 18-40 years of age (Voedingscentrum, n.d.). Especially single person households, smaller households and households with younger children show more food waste compared to other demographical groups. Therefore these people were the target group during this project.
Literature research shows that food gets wasted because of various reasons and types of behaviour. To get deeper insights into the behaviour leading to this phenomenon, three user researches were carried out to find why this happens in Dutch households. The result of the studies showed a potential opportunity in stimulating leftover consumption during lunch at a workplace or university, which resulted in the following design statement: “I want to reduce food waste by giving consumers the tools and opportunity to make leftover meals more valuable and versatile to use on a daily basis, by making it more user-friendly and convenient to take leftovers with them to consume in more scenarios and environments.”
Multiple concepts were generated, after which they were evaluated on their potential to effectively change the behaviour and finally one was chosen for further development: Backie. The idea of Backie was to create the ultimate on-the-go food storage container, with many features to boost and encourage the usage of leftovers during lunch. It helps to remember when the leftover was produced and for how long it will remain safe to eat with a date tracker. It ensures food safety on the go by passively cooling and insulating the leftover. A vacuum feature is added to prolong the leftovers’ life and increases the amount of opportunities for consumption. A silicone inner layer allows for usage in both the microwave and oven for more reheating options. Finally cutlery is included for an all-in-one solution.
All these functions of Backie should promote the consumption of leftovers, with a reduction in food waste as a result.