How to Have a Low Waste Easter

There are plenty of fun ways you can celebrate Easter without creating mountains of rubbish. All you need is a little bit of planning and effort to have a zero waste Easter at home or in the workplace. Get started with these low and zero waste Easter ideas.

An easy way to avoid all the packaging waste that comes with Easter food is to bake your own sweet treats. There are many recipes out there for homemade hot cross buns, Easter eggs, chocolate Easter nests, simnel cake, and more. Store them in reusable containers or recyclable foil – more sustainable than plastic wrapping.

Making your own Easter eggs is easier than you may have thought too. Choose a chocolate bar in paper, recyclable, or minimal packaging and use an old plastic mould or casing from an Easter egg from last year. Melt it into the mould, then when it’s solid decorate it with bits of chocolate, icing, and other treats.

Homemade Easter cards add a special touch and are a great way to use up any paper, card, and other materials you already have at home. If you’ve kept cards from last Easter you could cut them up and design a new card using these pictures.

You can still buy Easter cards, just make sure they’re made from recycled paper or card and don’t have any glitter or plastic bits that prevent them from being recycled. Alternatively, just send an email or social media message to celebrate Easter, as sending Easter cards isn’t as big as Christmas or birthday cards.

One of the main reasons for food waste at Easter is that we buy too much. It’s easy to get carried away planning a big roast or feast, but portion control is important for a zero waste Easter meal. Plan for the number of people you’re cooking for over Easter and how to store any leftovers.

There are lots of recipes to make the most of leftovers, such as hot cross bun crumble, Easter tray bake, and Easter tiffin to use up eggs before they go off. Savoury items like meat and veg can be added into casseroles, stews, and soups, while you can use bones to make stock. Consider freezing some food items too.

Lots of waste food can be composted if it’s no longer edible. This includes any fruit and veg peelings, eggshells, bread, meats, and dairy products. Learn more in our guide to composting

Creating waste is as inevitable as feeling a bit sick after scoffing ten crème eggs at Easter. Rather than throwing away all rubbish you produce across the spring celebrations, there are many more sustainable options. Use these Easter recycling tips to avoid adding to landfill levels and have a more positive environmental impact:

• Remove food from recycling – reduce the risk of contamination by clearing off all bits of chocolate, sugar, and other foodstuffs from any Easter packaging.
• Check Easter egg packaging – you can recycle cardboard, paper, and foil that’s clean and dry from Easter egg packaging at home. However, check the symbol and number in the plastic shell and whether it’s recycled by your local authority.
• Take plastic wrappers to collection points – check if any plastic wrappers for packs of chocolate eggs and Easter sweets can be recycled in your household bins. If not, find a local supermarket with a collection box for plastic film or take them to a TerraCycle recycling point.
• Separate your recycling – make Easter recycling at work easy by ensuring you have individual bins for cardboard, paper, and plastics. Or consider a dry mixed recycling bin to combine many materials that makeup Easter packaging.
• Find ways to reuse materials – cut out designs from Easter cards and wrapping for arts and crafts activities, save decorations to use next year, and reuse any big boxes for storage. Consider any other ways to reuse such materials to reduce waste.

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