The Upcycled Foods Series: Using Ice Cream Innovation to Rescue Wasted Food

The Upcycled Foods Series:

Using Ice Cream Innovation to Rescue Wasted Food 

To celebrate Earth Month, we’re launching one of our most renowned and innovative menus of the year to highlight creative and delicious solutions to help rescue wasted food: The Upcycled Food Series. With 229 million tons of food going unsold or uneaten each year, we’ve been able to rescue over 45,000 pounds since we first launched this series to use in the creation of these special flavors. To help craft this menu, we’ve partnered with five thoughtful brands that are dedicated to reducing food waste in the US. Each ice cream flavor uses groundbreaking recipe development tactics and tells a unique story about different ways brands and people alike can rescue wasted food. We’re proud to announce this menu and each flavor is officially Upcycled Certified®, awarded by the Upcycled Food Association (UFA).    

WHAT IS UPCYCLED FOOD: 

Upcycled foods use ingredients that otherwise would not have gone to human consumption, are procured and produced using verifiable supply chains, and have a positive impact on the environment. The food we use to Upcycle is what we would have considered to be “wasted food”. It’s the perfectly delicious bread or donuts that were baked this morning, but the grocery store can’t market as tomorrow’s “fresh” batch. Or the pulp left over from nut, oat, or soy milk that tends to be overlooked. Wasted food is happening on an individual and a brand level, and we’re here to prove there is something that can be done about it. Oh, and it can be incredibly delicious.  

WHO ARE OUR PARTNERS: 

Urban Gleaners - featured in: Chocolate Caramel Potato Chip Banana Bread

In 2006, Urban Gleaners founder Tracy Oseran began a local movement that has grown into a vibrant volunteer-powered organization feeding thousands of families every week by rescuing fresh, unsold food—made up of the region’s best ingredients, from hand-roasted coffee and organic produce to fried chicken, gourmet deli sandwiches, and gluten-free cookies. 

Urban Gleaners now feeds over 8,000 people every week through school pantries, summer free farmers markets, and Mobile Markets at low-income housing communities. Together, we can make a difference. Join Urban Gleaners as a volunteer, a food donor, or with your financial support. urbangleaners.org/volunteer  

The Spare Food Co. - Featured in: Passionfruit Yuzu Mochi Donuts & Whey Curd

The opportunity for impact and change to the food system is vast – and urgent. Few are focused on reducing the amount of waste we create in the first place. This is where The Spare Food Co. begins… at the beginning: preventing food from being wasted by shifting our perspective and making the overlooked, essential. 

Whey is the co-product of Greek-style yogurt production. In this process, cultured milk is strained to remove liquid and create the thick, creamy yogurt we know and love. About 2-3 cups of liquid whey is produced for every 1 cup of yogurt manufactured, most of which gets discarded. For the yogurt industry (and environment) at large, whey as waste is a massive problem. We have a solution: keep whey as the valuable food source that it is. It’s not waste. It’s an ingredient. And it’s the primary ingredient in Spare Tonic.

Co-founder Adam Kaye likes to say that the ethos of The Spare Food Co. is captured in every can of Spare Tonic. "We take an unused ingredient and craft it into a delicious food. In the process, we eliminate climate-destructive waste, support a regional food system of farmers, producers and vendors, and bring a healthful product to market." Learn more at sparefood.com

EverGrain® – Featured in: Malted Chocolate Barley Milk (v) 

We’re thrilled to be collaborating with EverPro®, a barley rice protein that enabled us to create an ice cream that not only meets our Upcycled Certified menu requirements, but is also the FIRST allergen free Salt & Straw variety beyond a sorbet! EverPro was created by EverGrain®, AB InBev’s sustainable ingredient business that creates high quality, plant protein by upcycling brewer’s spent grain (BSG), a byproduct of the brewing process that would otherwise typically have gone to waste.

EverPro delivers almost everything you could possibly want in an ingredient – a mild flavor that is highly soluble so it can be easily paired and blended to create something as delicious as our Malted Chocolate Barley Ice Cream. And, because it’s reduces food loss, uses less water and land to grow and requires no additional transportation to produce, it is one of the most sustainable proteins on the planet. Learn more at evergrainingredients.com

Renewal Mill – Featured in: Salted Caramel Chocolate Brownies (v)

We’ve been long time admirers of Renewal Mill and the work they’re doing in the Upcycled Food space. They're truly paving the way for how climate-friendly food can start impacting change. Renewal Mill is dedicated to creating a new circular economy of food that closes the loop in today’s current supply chains, keeps valuable nutrition from going to waste, and reduces the impact of the food system on the environment. And they believe that doing good for the planet should be absolutely delicious!

Renewal Mill's proprietary production process works with all kinds of byproducts but they're first targeting the byproducts of plant-based milk production (i.e. soybean pulp and oat pulp). They dry and mill these pulps, without using synthetic processing techniques or unnatural fortification, to produce nutritious ingredients that are rich in macronutrients including fiber and protein. Renewal Mill sells these ingredients on their own to folks looking for better-for-you, better-for-the-planet flour alternatives, and also uses them to craft a line of "just add oil & water" baking mixes that can be found nationwide at Whole Foods Market. Learn more at renewalmill.com

Doing good never tasted so good. Visit your local scoop shop or order our Upcycled Foods Series for nationwide delivery to indulge in these uplifting flavors.