When I first heard about dumpster diving, my immediate reaction was "yuck!".

Over time I've heard more and more about this, including dumpster finds of food in perfect condition and still packaged and non-food items in perfect condition thrown out for puzzling reasons. I also read stories from freegans and it appears that this might be a viable way to eat.

I'm also appalled at all the we throw out in our society, so I've my interest in this topic has grown over time.

Here's a new site that offers dumpster diving tips and dumpstered food cooking ideas: Freegan Kitchen:

I know the idea of eating food from the dumpster (also known as dumpster diving) may seem quite repulsive at first and may take a little getting used to - it did for me. But consider two things; first, enormous amounts of food are thrown out every day by grocery stores. Much of the food found by dumpster diving is perfectly safe to eat and is discarded solely because of an expiration date or to make way for "fresher" produce. Second, this food is most often found in a protective package or wrapper. Obviously, this type of cooking is limited to certain types of food products, such as produce or bread-type products. You wouldn't want to be using meat or fish (or some other food prone to rapid bacterial growth) found in a midnight dumpster diving session.

So the real aversion to consuming this dumpster food is due to cultural and psychological preferences. But, just how "clean" is the food you purchase in a grocery store anyway? Consider the many steps your food traveled along the typical production/distribution value chain before you placed it in you refrigerator: someone had to pick the food, process, package, store, ship, stock, scan, and bag it. Do you think someone used clean hands and tools every step of the way? And that shopping cart isn't anywhere near sterile either. We live in a society that is as dirty as it is wasteful. So, although I'm not aware of any definitive scientific studies, I don't think the food found in a dumpster is any dirtier than the food bought in the checkout line. We've never gotten sick from anything we've cooked up, which is more than I can say from some of the restaurants I've patronized. This "gourmet freeganism" is more ironic considering that I am a clean freak that washes my hands constantly. Go figure...

Dumpster Diving Tips video