Try pumpkin pie!

Zero Waste Scotland is calling on Scots to tackle the huge number of pumpkins wasted every Halloween. Research reveals that 1.8 million pumpkins were carved in Scotland for Halloween last year with over 1.1 million thrown away. That’s enough pumpkins to stretch from Edinburgh to Stornoway.

Despite 79% of respondents saying they were concerned about the issue of food waste, seven out of 10 pumpkins carved for Halloween didn’t get eaten with over half of all respondents saying they had never thought of a Halloween pumpkin as food.

More than half of those surveyed said they wouldn’t know how to cook pumpkin but 83% said they felt guilty when they throw food away. That’s why Zero Waste Scotland as part of its ‘Love Food, Hate Waste’ campaign is creating a toolkit with easy pumpkin recipes to encourage people to use up their pumpkins this Halloween.

Ylva Haglund, Food Waste Campaigns Manager, Zero Waste Scotland said: “Halloween is now the second biggest party night after New Year’s Eve in Scotland and as such it’s important we don’t just keep creating an ever-larger mountain of food waste. That’s why, through our ‘Love Food, Hate Waste’ campaign we want to inspire everyone about what they can do with their pumpkin carvings including making a delicious meal the whole family can enjoy.”

Recipes can be found on the organisation’s website. room, and educational training facility.

The event is open to all members, with a small charge for non-members wishing to attend.

Today’s picture, sent in by a Broughty Ferry reader, shows Kirkcaldy Harbour. Can you spot the painters suspended from a cradle – with nothing between them and the water!

“Geraniums at Glamis village provide a splash of autumn colour,” says reader John Crichton, who supplied the photograph.