Before there was mottainai labs, there was Empty the Fridge.

It was a blog I started just to share the recipes that my friends kept asking me for. With each new entry the focus became clearer: zero waste cooking.

I shared recipes, tips and tricks to cook with leftovers and prevent food waste.

It took off as more and more chef’s and home cooks were eager to find solutions to waste less. After a few years my blog evolved into an award-winning cookbook. But as my knowledge about zero waste cooking expanded, so did my awareness of waste in other areas of my day-to-day life.

In the the kitchen it naturally evolved to paying attention to waste water, buying local and seasonal produce with a minimal amount of packaging and transport, using less energy to cook with. Soon, I noticed that many of the ways I saved in the kitchen had analogs outside of it. Buying vintage clothing was like cooking with left overs. Saving rain water in a bucket was like using pasta water for my plants. Using traditional fermentation techniques to save veggies about to go bad was like fixing a cup with kintsugi instead of replacing it with a new one. But it went beyond quotidian shopping habits. I saw fruits rotting on a branch in the park, time lost in virtual spaces, skills and methods being forgotten.

In fact, it was while testing kintsugi on my favorite cup that I discovered mottainai: the Japanese word that denotes a sense of regret over waste. It slipped instantly into my vocabulary. Indeed, I felt I finally had a way of expressing the state of mind I had been exploring for so long. Emboldened with this concept, I became even more driven to master the art of not wasting. I took courses on foraging, traditional herbalism, and conceptual food art.

I began leading more and more workshops on food waste and preservation techniques such as canning and fermentation. Mottainai Labs is the culmination of the work. Where Empty the Fridge was trapped in the kitchen, Mottainai labs is a place that can expand to include waste wherever it appears.