Be My Green Valentine!

Did you know that over 1 billion Valentine cards are sent annually?  That's a lot of trees!  Here are some suggestions to celebrate sustainably:

For the kids--homemade decorated cookies  or lollipops are a sweet solution and scads of ideas for making your own valentines can be found at  Family Fun.  The most fun (and messy) idea is for plantable Valentines found at Thrifty Fun .  

Flowers--if you aren't aware of the eco-issues surrounding the cut flower industry, you should at least be concerned about bringing these pesticide-laden lovelies into your home.  You can help enact change by seeking out flowers with the Veriflora certification--ask for them at your favorite florist or online at Organic Bouquet. 

Food--the Obama's chef, Sam Kass, believes in healthy and local food which is a much-needed boost to the local food movement.  Show your family some love every day by serving locally-produced organic food!  The February issue of Bon Appetit gives us a Valentine's Day menu that's easy enough for the kids to help as well as 50 ways to Eat Green.  Try to avoid take-out:  besides being laden with fat and salt, the plastic clamshell containers, disposable chopsticks or plastic cutlery, packets of condiments and napkins are definitely not eco-friendly.  If you haven't visited this site already, Planet Green has a valuable Food & Health section where a search will provide recipes for some take-out favorites like this one for Spring Rolls.

Yellow is not Green

Jeana found this on WiseBread.

In this day and age of the internet, free Google 411 and a host of other paperless directory services, what use do the big, fat phone directories serve? I don’t know about you, but when I get those large plastic bags filled with 3lb phone books, I usually put them straight in the recycling bin. We never use them. Now a website similar to the National No-Call registry is asking you to sign up and stop receiving these archaic books.
The facts speak loud and clear; the massive amount of money and resources the phone directory industry sucks up is phenomenal. This, from YellowPagesGoesGreen.org :
• 540 million directories are printed annually in the United States.
• The average weight of each directory is 3.62 lbs.
• 1.79 directories are printed for every man, woman and child in the US.
• The phone directory industry is worth over $13 billion in the US (that figure doubles to $26 billion worldwide).
• It takes 24 trees to make 1 ton of paper.
• It takes over 19 million trees to make half a trillion directories.
• It takes 380 gallons of oil to produce that ton of paper (over 7.2 billion barrels per 500,000,000 books).
• 3 cubic yards of waste are taken up by one ton of paper (that equates to 1.6 billion lbs per 500,000,000 books).
• Over 270,000 cubic yards of landfill are taken up per 500,000,000
• 7,000 gallons of water go into the production of one ton of paper.
• 4,000 kilowatts of energy are also needed to make that ton of paper (3.2 billion KW hours/500,000,000 books).
So much money, so many resources, all for nothing.  However, if we all do something about it, maybe we can speed that process up.  Simply click on this link and you’ll be directed to an opt-out page where you can opt out of both the yellow and white pages. 

Green Dinner Table Talk

Did you know?….that you can cook your family’s meal without the use of gas or electricity. The solar oven “Sun Cook” can reach temperatures up to 400 F, with sunshine alone. For more fun facts and photos about this style of cooking visit http://solarcooking.ca/ .

Did you know?…..that the energy efficiency of a one-mile urban trip by bicycle, when the cyclist is fueled by meat (which contains the embodied energy required to produce and transport one mile’s worth of meat energy to the cyclist’s home), according to one analysis, is equivalent to 31 miles per gallon.
But…the energy efficiency of a one-mile urban trip by bicycle when the cyclist is fueled by bread is 300 miles per gallon

Did you know?….Germany currently generates more solar power than any other country, in spite of having more cloudy days than sunny days.

Did you know?....Portugal has just plugged in Europe’s largest wind farm, located in its northern highlands. Cervantes would have loved it…..imagine Don Quixote and 120 wind turbines. Jointly, these turbines provide enough electricity to power one million homes. Other green projects under way in Portugal include a second, smaller wind farm; the world’s largest solar photovoltaic farm (in the south); and the world’s first commercial wave power plant. Vive Portugal!

Did you know?...The California EPA Air Resources Board has approved the scoping plan for California’s Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32) as of December 11, 2008. The plan includes a renewable energy standard, adoption of a low carbon fuel standard, green jobs bills, water conservation, and sustainable forest and agriculture plans. Go California! [You can locate this 142 page plan at http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/scopingplan/document/psp.pdf ]


Submitted to the GCP blog spot by Louise F.

Meatless Monday

Happy New Year!  I'm in the midst of taking down the decorations and wanted to comment on how much I liked with the LED lights I used this season.  Unlike strands I'd purchased two seasons ago, the newer lights I got this year were easy to find and reasonably priced.  I was pleased with the brightness of the lights, although the white-only strands had either a blue or green cast to them.  What I found incredible was that each strand used so little energy that the manufacturers allowed 43 strands to be hooked together, compared to a maximum of three strands of incandescent lights.  That completely solved the extension cord problem that I've had in the past.

Did you know that eating lentils at the new year is supposed to bring you prosperity?  A quick online search reveals this custom began with the ancient Romans, possibly because lentils resemble small coins.  The following is a recipe I've been using for over 30 years and is a family favorite.  It is adapted from the More-with-Less Cookbook which I stumbled upon as a new bride and, thankfully, taught me how to really cook "from scratch".

Baked Lentils with Cheese

serves 6

375° for 1 hr., 15 min.

Combine in shallow 9 x 13" baking dish:

1 3/4 c. lentils, rinsed

2 c. water

1 whole bay leaf

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

1/8 tsp. each  dried marjoram, sage, thyme

2 large onions, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 c. canned tomatoes (approx. one 14 ounce can)

Cover tightly and bake 30 minutes.  Uncover and stir in:

2 large carrots, sliced 1/8" thin

2 stalks thinly sliced celery

Bake covered 40 minutes until vegetables are tender.  Sprinkle on top:

3 c. shredded cheddar cheese

Bake, uncovered, 5 minutes until cheese melts.

Thoughts for a Greener Hanukkah

A dear friend of our family is a rabbi, and as I was gathering material last week for this entry, I emailed him for his perspective. Rabbi Andrew Goodman shared these thoughts about Hanukkah: "... from the most basic level, Hanukkah is an important celebration for two reasons... neither of which are gift giving. On one hand, the holiday commemorates a victory over oppression from the Greeks. It commemorates religious integrity and standing up for/fighting for what you believe in and knowing when to act in the face of imminent annihilation. On the other hand, there is the theological importance of the miracle of oil, which should only have lasted for one day lasting for 8. From both of these perspectives, I think that a strong argument can be made for greening your life. We are aware of limited resources and should never forget the importance of having these most basic needs, and thus need to guard them. Also, as the Jews fought the Greeks, we too need to fight (not literally) for our existential longevity. Without our earth, we will not be able to survive and so, this threat is akin to the Greeks... and we too must act."

So how can you make Hanukkah a bit greener?  Here are a few tips I've gathered:

• shop for vintage menorahs, dreidels, gifts at antique stores, thrift shops or eBay.  Shop online for sustainable dreidels and menorahs
• shop for locally grown and organic potatoes, cheeses & other ingredients
• candles-- beeswax candles  burn slowly and are odorless, smokeless and virtually dripless; or look for them locally 
• fair trade gelt sources:  Chocolate coins can be purchased online at Serrv and Global Exchange. They are also available at Whole Foods and Wegmans stores.
• Green menorah campaign 
• A Light Among the Nations 
• suggestions for 8 days of environmental action to commemorate Hanukkah
• Thinking Outside the Gift Box  -- green gift suggestions

Holiday Dinner gone Local!

Recently, Louise D. and I had a chat about the importance and benefits of buying food locally and she told me about all the fresh goodies found at Hamilton Farms.  She's followed up by writing this description of her T-day dinner:

I procured the majority of my Thanksgiving dinner at Hamilton Farms and nearly everything was marked Jersey Fresh. They had wonderful new potatoes which I mashed with their skins on and used some more of them in our traditional "Aunt Sally's potato rolls". The waxed turnip was delicious and the first time there wasn't a speck of turnip left over ( hint- I mash it with butter, milk, salt, pepper and the secret ingredient a sprinkling of sugar). The carrots were incredible ( they still had the
tops on) and I love to cook/mash them with parsnips, which I also got at the farm. For those I mash them with the milk, butter, salt, pepper and some freshly grated nutmeg. The apples were all Jersey Fresh and I bought 1/2 bushel- so we will be having lots of apple items in the near future. My apple pie was sweetened with fresh local honey that I also got at the farm. My trick there is, you sweeten the pie with the honey and then sprinkle about a table spoon of sugar on the top of the pie. I bought the pie pumpkins- cut them in half- took the seeds out which I roasted ( yum yum) put them upside down on a baking dish and baked for about an hour. I then ran the pumpkin through the food processor and just added the other ingredients as well and the filling was ready for the crust. There were fresh Jersey cranberries, onions, celery, butter, milk, eggs, etc. I was checking out ( no lines) and said "if only I could get my turkey here". The answer was "you can". Those need to be ordered in advance but there were still 2 left- so I took them both and of course they were Jersey Fresh as well. Hint on cooking turkeys- I cook them in a brown paper bag. They take about 1/2 hour less time to cook, don't require basting ( none of that energy lost opening and closing the oven door), come out moist and tender and clean up is a snap. I didn't even have to soak the roasting pan. There was very little fat and the juice made wonderful gravy.

Hamilton Farms is a wonderful resource that is right in our back yard- open daily including Sunday. The produce store will be open through December and then open again April 1st.

Thanks, Louise!

Christmas Trees

Is it December already?  Here are some thoughts about the different choices surrounding your tree:

• 85% of artificial trees begin in overseas factories, contain metals and plastics that sometimes include PVC or lead and ultimately end up in landfills which make them the least eco-friendly choice.  If you already own an artificial tree, keep using it or donate it to someone who will.
• Potted or ball and burlap trees could be a good choice if the tree is maintained under the proper conditions:  the tree should be adaptable to our climate, stored away from the wind and sun, not be allowed to freeze, remain indoors for only 7 to 10 days, kept moist but not flooded, and decorated with lights that don't give off any heat.  After the holiday, the tree can't go directly outdoors into freezing temperatures; remove it to a sheltered location for a few days to acclimate.  It is often wise to dig the hole where the tree will be replanted early and cover with mulch to keep the soil from freezing.  Remember a 6 foot tree with root ball could weigh as much as 250 pounds.
• The Arbor Day Foundation supports the use of traditional Christmas trees because the trees "are a renewable, sustainable resource, provide jobs in rural areas and support American families, provide the usual benefits of trees, including oxygen, CO2 uptake, erosion control, and wildlife habitat, help preserve open space and are biodegradable and recyclable." (taken from the November/December 2008 issue of Arbor Day.)

If you choose a traditional Christmas tree, consider supporting local growers for the freshest tree possible and remember to recycle that tree after the holiday!  For more Green Christmas tips, visit this page at the National Geographic site!