Thanksgiving is just around the corner. A typical holiday leads to about 316 million pounds of food going to U.S. landfills. Worse, the turkey and milk account for over half of that waste. All of this wasted food impacts the environment.
This year, plan your Thanksgiving meal to ensure that more goes to your compost or curbside recycling bin than to the trash. RecycleNation’s Thanksgiving Cleanup Guide helps you plan, shop for, and have a fantastic meal without as much waste.
Pre-Thanksgiving Prep & Storage Setup
Reducing food and packaging waste starts a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving arrives.
Shop With Waste in Mind
As you make your Thanksgiving plans, shop with reuse and recycling in mind. The box of packaged stuffing may seem appealing, but there’s the box (recyclable) and a plastic bag (not as easily recycled). Prepped broccoli comes in a plastic bag, while a head of broccoli avoids it.
One way to reduce waste is by talking to friends and family and making bulk purchases. You don’t need a warehouse store’s bundle of three smaller milk cartons, but you and two friends could split the three and avoid waste. Other tips:
- Aim for Thanksgiving décor that can be reused for years.
- Buy cloth napkins you can wash and reuse; otherwise, get unbleached napkins and paper towels.
- Consider rechargeable or battery-powered candles over wax ones that will melt and end up in the trash.
- Get fresh or silk flowers over plastic ones.
- Purchase a cloth tablecloth instead of a single-use plastic one.
- Use plates and cutlery you can wash and reuse; otherwise, choose recyclable ones.
Inventory Containers and Food Wraps for Leftovers
Check your stock of reusable containers, aluminum foil, and freezer bags now. You don’t want to run out on Thanksgiving and end up throwing away food that you could have saved. If you don’t have enough, ask guests if they could bring their own containers to bring home leftovers.
Kitchen Prep Scrap Bowl and Prep Tips
Have a scrap bowl labeled and set up near cutting boards to ensure fruit and vegetable scraps go into a bowl for quick transfer to outdoor compost bins or piles.
Use a Three-Stream Waste Station Setup (Bins, Labels, Location)
Set up a three-stream station for guests after the meal. Label them to avoid any confusion.
It’s helpful if you print out a quick guide to tape to each bin to ensure you’re not having to fix someone’s mistake later in the day. Have a list of the compostable foods being served. If your municipality only accepts plastics with #1, 2, and 6, make sure that’s noted.
Compost Sorting Guide: Where Thanksgiving Essentials Go
Most families have a turkey, stuffing, vegetables, and rolls or bread at their gathering. Here’s a quick guide to composting these essentials.
Backyard Compost
Backyard composting is a great way to convert food waste into soil for growing your own produce and flowers. When you’re adding your “greens” and “browns,” aim for a mixture of about three parts browns for every one part greens.
Greens (Nitrogen): Save and compost fruit and vegetable scraps, coffee grounds, tea bags/leaves (remove any metal staples and ensure the bag is not plastic; if it is, remove it from the bag), and decorations like flowers that are made from plants (chop up first).
Browns (Carbon): Save and compost carbon-rich materials like dried-up leaves and cornstalks and unbleached napkins and paper towels.
Municipal Organics
It’s hard to compost some items in backyard composting bins, but some municipalities accept these items for composting in specialized facilities using high temperatures.
- Bones
- Dairy
- Greasy boxes
Fats, Oils, and Grease (FOG) Management
Cooking oils and grease from bacon, sausage, and turkey are harder to compost. Save it in a can or jar over time until the jar is full. Scrape it into the trash and rinse the jar or can for reuse.
Ideally, you should try to render them and reuse them.
If you’re rendering turkey fat, let it cool completely. Remove the gelled turkey broth and warm the remaining fat. Strain it through a coffee filter or cheesecloth.
With bacon or sausage grease, use a spatula to remove as many browned crumbs as you can. Strain the warm grease through cheesecloth or an unbleached coffee filter.
With all rendered fat or grease, store it in the refrigerator for up to a month or up to six months in the freezer. Use a thermometer to ensure the refrigerator is no higher than 40°F and the freezer is at 0°F.
Food Recovery, Safety, and Upcycling
With any foods you make, there’s a two-hour time limit before bacteria grow and make it too risky to reuse that food. Make sure leftovers are put into the refrigerator or freezer before two hours pass.
If you have more leftovers than you can possibly eat, make sure your guests go home with some food. The more that is eaten by everyone, the easier it is to keep food waste out of the landfill.
Fridge and Freezer Leftover Timelines
Label and date each item. Once they’re in the fridge or freezer, they must be used before they’re too old to safely reheat and eat.
- Cooked Turkey: 3 to 4 days in the fridge or up to 4 months in the freezer
- Cranberry Sauce: One or two weeks in the fridge and up to 3 months in the freezer
- Macaroni and Cheese: 3 to 4 days in the fridge or up to 2 months in the freezer
- Mashed Potatoes: 3 to 4 days in the fridge or up to a year in the freezer
- Pies: 2 to 4 (cream or meringue), 3 to 4 (pecan or pumpkin), up to 7 days (fruit).
- Rolls: Don’t refrigerate, if possible; freeze for up to 3 months
- Stuffing: 3 to 4 days in the fridge or up to 1 month in the freezer
- Turkey Gravy: 3 to 4 days in the fridge and up to 4 months in the freezer
- Vegetable or Sweet Potato Casseroles: 3 to 4 days in the freezer and up to 2 months in the freezer
Upcycling Food Scraps
You can “upcycle” some of your food scraps. Instead of throwing away the turkey carcass, make turkey bone broth.
Place the turkey carcass in a large slow cooker or stock pot and cover it with water. Add:
- 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 2 celery stalks and scrap
- 2 carrots and scrap
- 2 onions (halved)
- 1 bay leaf
- Fresh parsley, rosemary, sage, and thyme
- Salt and pepper to taste
If you’re cooking on the stovetop, simmer for over two hours. The longer, the better. If you’re using a slow cooker, aim for at least 8 hours on high or longer on low. Allow the broth to cool.
Strain into jars or freezer containers and follow the food safety timeline for turkey gravy.
Bin, Compost, or Trash: A Handy Summary
CURBSIDE BIN | COMPOST | TRASH |
Cardboard (clean and dry) | Bread | Candle stubs |
Foil sheets, pie pans, and roasting pans (clean) | Coffee grounds | Cheese and milk* |
Glass bottles and jars | Compostable cups, dishes, and utensils (rinse off) | Floral foam |
Metal cans and bottles | Corn stalks and corn cobs | Foil items with stuck-on food |
Paper (clean and dry) | Flowers and greenery | Heavily greased paper boxes* |
Plastics #1 – #7* | Fruit cores, peels, rinds, and seeds | Non-recyclable cups, cutlery, and plates |
| Straw bales | Plastic bags* |
| Tea bags (remove staples) | Pop-up timer |
| Unbleached napkins and paper towels | Turkey carcass* |
| Vegetable scraps | Turkey grease* |
|
| Turkey mesh bags and plastic wrapping |
|
| Wax-coated boxes |
*Depending on your municipality.
Not every municipal recycling depot accepts every plastic. You might be able to send the plastic bags inside boxes or produce bags for plastic film recycling. Bones, dairy, greasy items, and meats may be compostable in a facility that composts them at high temperatures.
RecycleNation’s search helps you find your local plastic film drop-off, composting facility, and plastic recycling facility. All you need to do is choose the item from a drop-down list and enter your ZIP code.
You can also use our AI search feature to look up highly specific items like turkey bones or fats, oil, and grease. Once you have the results, click on your facility’s website to read their rules on compostable materials to see what they accept.
