Trash. No, really, this is the idea.

[lordgrunt]

How about new item, semi useless, long despawn duration while on ground, double if paved, gets washed away with rain, trash?
Trash would be produced automatically and randomly when cooking stuff or harvesting. Like boiled mussels would be dropped on ground as empty shells, but like with mulch, single word "trash" for all of them is fine, easier to move around like dirt is these days. Make it stack to 4.
Also farming would be decent contributor to trash production, as, we heartlings are not some wild creatures to gobble entire turnip, we chuck away few parts of it. Or any other tuber. Grape stems, those do not go into the juice as green coloring, nope. And so on.
Quality of said trash would be related to product created via cooking or farming action, (TrashQ * 2)/3, so it is not abused and made in the spirit of how bone ash is gained from spitroasting.
One main use of trash would be as mulch alternative, for garden pots for example. A curio made with use of it would be cool too.

[Sevenless]

Seems like a really convoluted and annoying way to create an autism minmax quality grind.

Sorry, not for me.

[Anonymously]

excellent update to all