SUSTAINABILITY: One Bite at a Time, Part III

Where to Shop? (when cooking/eating sustainably)

Farmers Markets

Farmers markets are the best place to find fresh, local, seasonal, and oftentimes organically grown produce and other food stuffs (ie honey, and cheese, and bread and even meat). By buying from local vendors you are supporting your local farmers and strengthening the community while eating/buying your way to a more sustainable lifestyle, reducing fossil fuels associated with packaging and transporting and cooling non local produce. Furthermore when you but organic you are reducing the negative impact harmful synthetic chemical, pesticides, and fertilizer used in non-organic farming have on the environment, polluting local waterways and diminishing soil health. More than all this, farmers markets can be a fun weekend outing. Find your local farmers market (and perhaps bike there!) and spend the day perusing the stalls of fresh produce and local food vendors. Spending the day at the farmers market really makes you enjoy every aspect of your food, not only did you enjoy cooking it and eating it, but you enjoyed the process of buying it.

So here’s a link to the LA times listing of LA area farmers markets, I’ve only been to the Santa Monica farmers market but I intend on going to as many as I can while I live in LA! Check it out:

http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-farmersmarketlist,1,5715921.htmlstory

Whole Foods

Beware that not everything at Whole Foods is the sustainable choice, getting a bundle of organic asparagus grown in Argentina is not entirely sustainable. Just because an item has an organic label doesn’t mean that it is free of environmental costs. Thus I would caution when shopping at organic friendly stores like Whole Foods, still be a smart shopper, make sure you know where your food is coming from and remember the tenants of sustainable cooking and eating: local, seasonal, organic, minimal packaging and processing.

Check out Whole Foods guide to all things organic here: http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/values/organic.php

Your Backyard!

There’s no less sustainable way of cooking and eating than using produce from your own garden. By cultivating your own fruits and veggies your food is guaranteed fresh, as local as you can get, seasonal and free of pesticides and chemical fertilizers. Home grown vegetable emphasize quality over quantity, and you can truly enjoy your food. You can’t imagine how thrilling it is when you harvest your garden and enjoy all your hard work in a delicious garden fresh meal! Compost your food scraps and green and brown waste and apply it to your plants to fertilize your garden without the use of harmful synthetic chemicals.

I don’t have the greenest thumb in the world, thus I’m leaving the gardening advice to the experts. Check out these helpful and informative websites on starting your own garden:

http://journeytoforever.org/garden_sqft.html

http://kitchengardeners.org/

http://www.helpfulgardener.com/vegetable/2003/vegetable.html

Tips on navigating your traditional supermarket:

To make the best choices when meandering around supermarket with your empty cart ready to be filled, I’ve assembled some basic tips here from my extensive grocery store experience. Always keep in mind the tenants of sustainable eating described in the previous chapter/post: fresh, local, organic, in season, less processing/less packaging the better, minimal meat/animal products and you’re ready to tackle the sustainable living proving grounds that is the supermarket.

- Navigate the outside edges of the store first. The outside edge is where all the good stuff is anyways: Think about it, the produce section, bread, etc, meat and dairy sections are always around the edges of the store. This technique minimizes the purchase of highly processed and packaged food that you always find in the middle aisles of the store- this would be your pop tarts your fun size chip bags, your soda, your frozen pizzas, etc.

-Take your time in the produce aisle and fill up your cart with delicious fruits and veggies. Look at labels- where are the fruits and veggies from? Chile? Argentina? Try and stick to local California produce, this way you are also buying fresh and most likely seasonal, while reducing the transportation impact on the environment.

-Be a smart shopper, read labels and ingredient lists. If you’re shopping in the organic aisle do your homework and be informed on what the organic label actually entails and buy accordingly.

SUSTAINABILITY: One Bite at a Time, Part II

The Meat Question: Carnivore? Moderate Meat Eater? Vegetarian? Vegan?...confused? let me break it down for you.

The Facts:

The amount of US Grain fed to animals: 70%

Pounds of corn and soy to produce just 1lb. of pork: 7 lbs.

Water needed to produce 1 lb. of wheat: 14 gallons

Water needed to produce 1 lb. of meat: 441 gallons

Of all water used for all purposes in the United States more than ½ goes to livestock production

Now that you have some of the facts about meat production in the United States it is easy to see that the amount of water, energy, and grain used to produce livestock to provide for meat-heavy diets is by far greater than that which is required to subsist on a vegetarian diet. The meat-heavy diet that has come to define the American dinner table is harmful to the planet in its fossil fuel dependence, pollution, use of land, water, and grain, contribution to global warming. A meat-moderate diet or vegetarian/vegan diet is better for you as well as the environment. Eliminating the high fat content of corn fed beef in one’s diet can decrease the risk for obesity and diseases like diabetes and heart disease.

My key word in regards to diet is moderation. You can enjoy the occasional meat item and still lead a more sustainable life. The bulk of a person’s diet should focus on fruits veggies and grains and minimal meat and animal products. If you do eat meat, eat grass fed, pasture raised meat and animal products like milk and cheese and eggs. Make wiser choices regarding what meat to eat; eat less beef, more poultry, and try to phase out meat consumption to twice or three times a week, and then work your way down to a vegetarian or as close to that as you can. I started my own personal sustainable eating journey indulging in meat twice or three times a week, and after a week or so of adjustment I found it relatively painless (and as a matter of fact , entirely enjoyable) to reduce my meat consumption to ZERO! Just try it; it’s not all that impossible I promise. And remember my motto; moderation. You can enjoy meat and other big ticket unsustainable food items, just do so sparingly!

Less is More: Processing and Packaging

When it comes to both processing and packaging in regards to food, less is most definitely more. Processing entails cooking, freezing, preserving, canning, etc. food and requires much more energy and fossil fuel waste and thus a greater negative environmental impact than if you were to pluck an apple off a tree and bite into it. Packaging often goes hand in hand with processing food. When food is transported all over the country (and world too!) to get to your cupboard, it is stored in cardboard boxes and plastic containers and bags. This packaging represents a lot of unnecessary waste that ends up in a landfill somewhere when we indulge in Costco packages of fun-sized snacks and vacuum-packed veggies. Processing and packaging are symbols of the industrial food complex and its unsustainable practices. Eliminate the negative environmental impact of the industrial food complex by reducing your consumption of pre-processed and packaged foods, with a focus on fresh and local food avoiding the two p’s is easy!

SUSTAINABILITY: One Bite at a Time

Introduction:

Sustainability in the kitchen should not be a practice that is only reserved for the radical environmentalist or vegan or health nut. Sustainable practices in the kitchen and at the dinner table are completely doable for the average American family. Sustainable changes don’t have to be complicated or expensive or radical, its merely an emphasis on simplifying the industrialized, commercialized food industry down to what food was intended to be, nutritious (and delicious too!). With a focus on locally grown, seasonal, and organic produce as well as meat-minimal diet and downsizing the consumption of processed and packaged food, the American family can nourish their bodies while doing their part to prevent further degradation of the environment. Food, something so simple and basic has become so complex and in recent years that a guide is necessary to help the average person navigate through the industrialized and commercialized food industry and make sustainable decisions. Food has become less about nutrition, and more about new products fueling the industrial food production complex. This guide is intended to refocus the average persons’ diet and practices/behavior in the kitchen on sustainable nutrition by providing tips and techniques on what to buy, where to buy it and how to cook it all up into delicious and nutritious meal, achieving sustainability one bite at a time.

WHAT TO EAT? (when eating/cooking sustainably)

Organic Produce-

What exactly does “organic mean”? We see it everywhere, on fruit labels, on signs of your local supermarket, at Farmer’s Markets, but it’s important to know what organic food/produce actually means. Food grown according to organic principles is free harmful herbicides and pesticides. Organic farmers rely on healthy, vibrant, and live soils to grow their crops in rather than synthetic chemicals, fertilizers and pesticides. Natural soil is replete with microbiotic organisms that can exist in harmony with plants. Organic farmers utilize, maintain and manage these organisms to promote their crop growth rather than destroy the natural soil with toxic chemicals and be forced to supply fertilizers. Organic farms do not leach harmful chemicals into groundwater or pollute waterways with runoff of toxic chemicals, fertilizers, and topsoil/sedimentation. They also do not rely on chemical inputs like fertilizer and pesticides that are derived from petroleum, and have a significant environmental cost due to not only their application but production as well.

Organically cultivated produce is not only better for the environment; it is generally a better product than traditionally cultivated produce. By growing in a synthetic pesticide/fertilizer free, live soil where organic matter and microbial activity create nutrients and minerals that are free to be absorbed into your food. Thus organically grown produce is healthier and more nutritious than “synthetically fed” traditionally grown produce and are free of any toxic residue. Not only are the organic produce healthier/more nutritious, they are often much more flavorful and tasty.

Fresh local seasonal produce-

Pretty self explanatory right? Local produce from local growers and farmers from within or surrounding your community, by buying locally you are also most likely buying seasonally. Buy buying seasonal produce, you reduce the waste associated with growing nonseasonal produce in heated greenhouses, or packaging and freezing nonseasonals, and also most nonseasonal produce must be shipped long distances to get to you, as in Grapes from Chile in the middle of … or bananas from Mexico year round. There is a massive environmental cost associated with the shipping and refrigeration of these nonseasonal and nonlocal produce from pollution and burning of fossil fuels, packaging. This environmental cost can easily be eliminated by buying local seasonal produce from community farmers. Not only does buying locally help the environment, it also helps your community by supporting small local farmers who struggle to make ends meet and who are overwhelmed by huge monoculture factory farms. Along with the benefit to the community, local produce gets to you faster and fresher- produce loses some of its nutrition the longer it sits on a shelf- thus local food tastes better and is nutritionally better for you.

Here's a link to Southland Farmers Market Assos. Guide to Seasonal Produce, check it out:

http://www.sfma.net/consumer/inseason.shtml#mayaugust

Sustainable Fisheries:

Here is a link to Seafood Watch pocket guide to help you make wise choices when eating fish.

http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/cr/cr_seafoodwatch/download.aspx

Many fisheries are being fished irresponsibly and depleted almost to the point of no return. Avoid these unsustainable fisheries and instead choose fish that is either fished or farmed responsibly and sustainably. It is important to help maintain the health of the ocean and ocean species as well as land in our eating habits.

Soon to come:

The Meat Question: Carnivore? Vegetarian/vegan? or Moderate Meat-eater?

Packaging and Processing

Where to buy food when eating/cooking sustainably/how to shop!

Sustainable Eating Manual/Cookbook Project: Progress Report

As of now in the process of creating a Sustainable Eating Guide and Cookbook I am in a research phase, I’m reading articles and reviewing literature about sustainable practices in the kitchen, enjoying Michael Pollan’s Omnivore’s Dilemma and attempting to practice what I will by the end of this quarter be preaching in my cookbook. I’m a week and a half into eating vegetarian and still going strong, at first I had a few slip ups, stuff like absentmindedly asking for bacon in my weekly Saturday brunch omelet or eating an entire tamale before realizing “crap! That had chicken in it didn’t it?” These absent minded unconscious meat-mistakes eventually disappeared as I got the whole vegetarian idea into my head and I got into a “meatless routine” I don’t even really have to think about avoiding meat. In Granted I occasionally miss my lunchtime turkey sandwiches and my weekend bacon splurge. While I will include vegetarian/vegan recipes in my cookbook, it will not be exclusively vegetarian I will emphasize meat in moderation into some of my recipes. . Unfortunately I do not have a kitchen in my 11x13 foot dorm room, so I am counting the days to the next weekend I go home and actually have an oven and a stove to try out all my potential recipes that I may be including in my sustainable cook-blog.

My approach to sustainable eating/cooking will focus on this word “moderation.” Allowing yourself to enjoy some of those big ticket items like meat and the occasional processed food in moderation, while the bulk of a person’s diet should consist of self prepared, organic or locally grown (or even better home grown!) food. My cookbook does not aim for Radical Simplicity at mealtimes; its goal is to provide a feasible, everyday guide to making more sustainable meal choices. Food, nourishment, something that should be so simple, has gotten so confusing and complicated in the last century. My Cookbook/guide will help the average person navigate the rows of their local grocery store, decode the mystique of Whole Foods and local and organic foods, and offer up satisfying recipes that employ this sustainable knowledge, so that they can eat their way to a more sustainable lifestyle.

Here’s a taste of what to expect in the coming weeks of my Sustainability Project:

My (rough) Outline of the yet-untitled Sustainable Eating Guide and Cookbook:

· General Introduction to the rationale of eating/cooking sustainably and an outline of the basic tenants of Sustainable cooking- aka why you should read my book and eat your way to a more sustainable life!

· Where to get your food??

o The farmers market- local and organic

o Navigating the “regular grocery store” for more sustainable options

o Whole Foods

o Your own backyard garden!

· What to eat?

o Vegetarian/vegan options

o seasonal fruits and veggies

o minimizing processing and packaging

o sustainable fisheries

· How to cook all these sustainable ingredients into delicious and nutritious meals!

o Recipes: appetizers, main courses, desserts, Yum!

· Conclusion: how eating and cooking more sustainably can be incorporated into an overall more sustainable and environmentally conscious lifestyle