Cambridgeshire wedding guests enjoy recycled meal

The couple catered with out-of-date food collected from supermarkets and a wholesaler

A passionate food waste campaigner treated her wedding guests to a "risky" meal with a difference - whatever the supermarkets threw out.

Zoe Chambers, 29, from Cambridgeshire, volunteers for charity FoodCycle, which collects fresh waste produce from shops for community meals.

The charity's volunteers helped prepare her meal of roasted vegetables and salads from food destined for the bin.

The couple donated money to the charity and put out collection boxes.

Guests were served roasted vegetables and panzanella salad, with beef provided by the couple

Mrs Loughlin normally volunteers for a food charity on a Saturday

Miss Chambers, now Mrs Loughlin, married fiancé Charles on Saturday in Newton, Cambridgeshire.

"We thought long and hard about the food and looked into different catering options, but just kept coming back to FoodCycle," she said.

"We thought it would be wonderful to practise what we preach."

The charity collects fresh produce about to be thrown out on a Friday and turns it into a meal on Saturday in a Cambridge church hall for "people at risk of social isolation and food poverty", which went ahead as usual.

"It's cooked using almost entirely surplus food - so food that's perfectly good to eat but that supermarkets are throwing away," said Mrs Loughlin.

As meat cannot be donated, the couple, from Haslingfield, supplemented it with cold roast beef for their wedding breakfast.

Mrs Loughlin admitted it would be "a risk and not everybody would want to take that gamble", but the couple said they were thrilled with how the meal was received by their 150 guests.

"I'm so happy with the way it has gone, lots of people were going back for seconds," said Mrs Loughlin.

Produce including carrots, peppers, spinach, tomatoes and stale bread was turned into Moroccan roast vegetables and panzanella salads.