Yume Hour: Saying Yes To Zero Waste

The Melbourne Food and Wine Festival is a celebration of delicious dishes and perfect blends of wine, running throughout March. YUME HOUR shines the spotlight on the bleak realities of mass production and easily accessible food: wastage. The downside of grocery stores stocking virtually any condiment, fruit or meat, all year round, is the generation of an unprecedented volume of food waste. From the farm, to the supermarket and home, one billion tonnes of food is thrown out annually – an alarming, even unfathomable, statistic I’m sure. This is where YUME HOUR steps in.

YUME is a Melbourne-based app that champions a ‘zero waste’ world and calls on restaurants and foodies to find a balance between trendy tapas and sustainable living. The brains behind YUME is Katy Barfield – CEO of food rescue organisation SecondBite – who has enlisted popular chefs from notable restaurants around the city to join her cause.

On Saturday, 5 March, some of Melbourne’s top chefs joined the cause and offered one dollar dishes between 3pm to 4pm through the YUME app. Jesse Gerner – known for his delightful menus at Bomba and Green Park – put jamon croquetters made from jamon off-cuts to the market place.

But the man of the hour goes to Chris Moran for his two equally salivating options. The first was the sage and beef meatball with tomato sugo and polenta pecorino fries. And if polenta doesn’t suit your palate, the second option was a lamb, prosciutto and broccoli empanada.

Honourable mention to Alejandro Saravia who prepared a mean and hearty South American Shepard’s Pie filled with slow cooked, smoke pork neck and alpaca heart, topped with sweet corn and potato off-cut puree, a dish that cannot be taken lightly and demands respect.

All proceeds raised during YUME HOUR will be donated to Melbourne’s four main food rescue charities – OzHarvest, FareShare, Foodbank and SecondBite – who work tirelessly to prevent surplus and edible food from being thrown out.

How does YUME work? A local restaurant either donates or sells (at 50% off) surplus food, a dish or ingredients to YUME. All you need to do is be quick enough to snap up the exclusive offer. This a great opportunity for restaurants to act in an environmentally conscious way and a great chance for customers to enjoy some cheap bites.

Go ahead and download the YUME app and start chasing down some fantastic meals!