Warming Up a Rainy/ Snowy Day

Snowy Rain on Knapp Street

Yes, it's raining again today - it even snowed.  That makes almost a week of rainy, cold days.  I think I could stand one or the other but getting the rain and the cold at the same time is pretty miserable.  We can expect more of this with global warming, I understand.

But let's be positive!  The rainy/ snowy/ cool weather got me to finally do a project I've been saying all winter that I'm going to do - make Granola!  I'm not sure of the carbon impact of making granola at home.  It does, after all, entail heating up the oven.  I expect it's more efficient for great big companies to toast those oats than it is for everyone in the U.S. to toast their own.  On the other hand, look at all of that garbage that gets eliminated - a box and a plastic bag (and maybe another plastic carrying bag from the store) for every 14 oz. or so of granola- and maybe less gas expended in delivery.  That's what I'm thinking of when I decided to finally make my own today.

Here is today's batch:

Granola Right Out of the Oven
Oven temp:  300,  cooking time:  1/2 hour

And here are the benefits I see to home made granola:

• It's an easy project to do with a three year old.  Andres got to pour and stir all of the ingredients and we didn't worry about measuring.
• It filled the house with a wonderful aroma thanks to the vanilla and coconut we added.
• It tastes great.
• I think it has less sugar than the store bought stuff.  Tastes that way, anyway - just sweet enough, but not too sweet.
• You can put about anything you want into your granola.   We used what was in the fridge and on the shelf:  oats, some sesame seeds, walnuts and almonds - raisins - coconut, vanilla, wheat germ, honey and a little sesame oil to smooth out the honey. (I added the raisins after baking.)
• It warmed the house up to have that oven on - particularly since I opened the door every 10 minutes during the 1/2 hour cooking time to give the oats a stir.
• I'm reducing waste - no more cardboard boxes and plastic bags from the prepackaged kind.

One word of warning, if you want to try granola on your own, remember to stir it often!

I still remember my first batch of granola, back in my college/ hippie days (I was never technically a hippy because I didn't own a pair of jeans or one of those cute long flowery dresses, but close to the earth was popular back then too, and making your own granola was kind of expected.)  I shared a house with a few other students, and the granola was a joint effort, but I must have been in charge.  That first batch - full of wonderful nuts and dried fruits - was fondly dubbed Christy's Hard As Nails Granola.  I didn't stir it while it was cooking and the honey congealed the oats into hard, barely chewable, clumps.  Ah well, it tasted good anyway.

15 Things You Will (Almost) Never Throw Away Again

So much of what we talk about reducing our carbon footprint our parents would have just called thrifty - or necessary.  At last night's Timely Topics presentation, Kit talked about growing up in a family that had a big garden because the produce was a necessity to supplement their small income.  Besides eating and growing vegetables, they also practiced frugality with their food - waste not, want not.

Kit shared tips for ways she uses up the parts of vegetables that we perhaps throw away.  I must admit that I throw away a lot of vegetable scraps, peelings and ends and feel bad about it, particularly in the winter when the compost bin is buried under several feet of frozen snow.  I've already forgotten most of Kit's quickly shared tips but luckily, when I got home I sat down to read one of Cathy's handouts - a past edition of "Mix" a Twin Cities Coop publication - and there was a great review of the book "An Everlasting Meal" by Tamar Adler.  The article was by Tricia Cornell (Minnesota author) and included a great sidebar titled "15 Things You'll (Almost) Never Throw Away Again.  Thanks Tamar and Tricia.  I'm now going to share a bit of your wisdom.

15 Things You'll (Almost) Never Throw Away Again

1.  Leek Tops.  Cook with other vegetables or meat for broth.  Add to a pot of beans.

2.  Parsley stems.  Chop finely for tabouli.  Use to brighten stews.

3.  Chard stems.  Cover in vinegar and spices to make quick refrigerator pickles.

4.  Kale and collard stems.  Use in vegetable stock.  Boil and blitz with garlic and oil to make pesto.

5.  Onion skins.  Save and dry to color eggs.  Add to vegetable stock or to pots of beans.

6.  Carrot tops.  Blend with plenty of oil, garlic and salt for a universal green sauce.

7.  Radish, turnip and beet greens.  Saute.  Douse with vinegar.  Enjoy.

8.  Tomato seeds.  Push through a sieve to catch the flavorful juices.  Shake with Tobasco and salt.  Drink.

9.  Potato peels.  Scrub clean and deep fry for a crispy snack.

10.  Broccoli stems and leaves.  Roast or saute along with florets.

11.  Cauliflower cores.  Boil for soup or mash with oil and cheese.

12.  Bones.  Save raw and cooked bones separately in the freezer.  Simmer for stock when you have a big batch.

13.  Stale bread.  Grind or grate to thicken soups and stews.  Cube for croutons.

14.  Bean cooking water.  Season and drink on its own.  Use as a soup base.

15.  Brine from pickles and olives, oil from tuna and sardines.  Use to launch vinaigrette or dress cold roasted vegetables.

Here is something I have been doing this year with vegetable peelings:  put them in a zip lock bag in the freezer and when there is enough, make a vegetable stock. This isn't particularly recommended for cabbage and broccoli, but works well with onion skins, potato and carrot peels, herbs etc.  I don't tend to do this when I'm not using organic produce because I worry about pesticide residue - so there is one more reason to bite the bullet and buy organic produce.

So what are your tried and true tricks to use up everything?

And why is it important?  Again, the methane gas from our landfills is a huge, huge contributor to climate warming.  We just need to reduce, reduce,  reduce our waste.  I hear of people who have hardly any garbage.  It can be done.  I'm still working on it.

Sharing Seeds

Seed Order

I'm getting ready to put in an order for vegetable, flower and herb seeds for this year's garden.  This is the first year that I've ordered seeds and I don't really know if I'll get them all planted and successfully grown, but I'm going to try.

The advantage to starting vegetables and flowers from scratch is that I have a much larger variety of plants to choose from.  I can actually plant varieties that I wouldn't see at the market.  Even more importantly, I can choose to order from a grower that doesn't use pesticides on the plants so that I don't have to worry about harming the bees and other pollinators.

What I notice, though, is that each seed packet contains from 25 to 100 or more seeds and even though I only buy one packet per variety of plant, I'll end up with way more seeds than I will need this year.  I've sent out a notice on our neighborhood list serve that I would like to share this seed order with someone else.  I expect there is someone out there who would like some of the same seeds I'm buying.  Are you one?  Let me know.

Here is my seed order:

Mayflower pole bean
Dwarf Blue Curled Scotch Kale
Apollo Arugula
Forellenschluss Romaine
Mantilla Bibb Lettuce
Charentais Melon
Bull's Blood Beet
Romaneso Brocolli
Five Color  Silverbeet Chard
Green Tomatillo
Waltham Butternut Squash
Basil Emily
Cilantro
Marigold Brocade Mix
Mexican Sunflower
Bright Lights Cosmos

An Easy Way To Start Seeds Without Windows or Grow Lights

Plastic Containers To Become Seed Starters

I've been allowing used milk jugs and produce containers to pile up in the basement.  Even though I'm trying to avoid buying things in plastic containers, the family continues to buy milk in plastic jugs and we had plastic produce containers from before my ban.  But no worry, they all have a very good use.  I'm going to start this year's vegetables and flowers in these containers and set them outside to await the warmer days of spring.

I've always avoided starting plants from seeds because the few times I've tried it's just been too putzy.  However, last year at a garden club meeting the speakers shared this great method for sowing seeds in milk jugs and other plastic containers in the winter or early spring, putting them outside and pretty much forgetting about them.  I tried it with a few seeds last year and thought it worked pretty well.  I'm going to try again this year with many more seeds, so I hope it works this time too.

Check out the website mentioned at the bottom of the instructions.  Wintersown.org.  It has photos and links to more information that looks very helpful.  Also, I see a tab marked Free Seeds!

Here are the directions:

WINTER & SPRING SOWING INSTRUCTIONS

Michelle Mero Riedel

For milk, distilled water, and similar containers, gallon sized, rinsed, toss cap.

1. Cut four 1/2 - 1” holes in the bottom of the milk jug with a utility knife. Twist knife to make a hole.

2. Cut a horizontal line with utility knife from one side of handle to the other, about 3-5” from bottom of

milk jug, leaving a 1” hinge.

3. Grab handle and pull back to open container. Again, don’t cut all the way so you have a hinge.

4. Add soil to 1” from cut line.

5. Water well so soil is muddy and you see water coming out bottom.

6. Take a break to make sure water will flow out the bottom.

7. Flatten soil so there isn’t any peaks or valleys.

8. Add seeds, as many as you wish.

9. Cover with enough soil, the diameter of the seed (example if seed is 1/8” in diameter, add 1/8 inch of

soil). Additional soil is not needed if seeds are very tiny.

10. Lightly add more water to moisten.

11. Add a plant label along inside container wall with name of plant, color, light requirements, and height.

This label will go into the garden.

12. Close cover and duct tape in place. Clear duct tape is best.

13. Label container lid with plant name and date.

14. Remember to toss the container cap.

15. Place outside on the east, south, or west side of your house. Allow snow to pile on top and collect rain.

Can put container on patio, in garden, on grass, on picnic table, on deck. Do not put under deck, awning,

or roofline.

For bakery, takeout, produce, or rotisserie chicken containers:

1. Follow same instructions as milk containers except add holes at top of the container.

2. Add as much soil as you can.

3. Place plant label inside on its side.

4. No need to tape unless the container won’t stay closed.

5. Label container top.

Hints

1. Plant perennials in February and March

2. Plant annuals, herbs, and vegetables April 1-20.

3. After late April, they can be direct sown in the ground

4. Most Aprils are wet, so you won’t have to water until early May.

5. Watch containers for drying and water if necessary with hose attachment on mist. Be gentle with

small seedlings.

6. If you wish, as weather warms up, open containers during the day, and close at night if temps are too

cool or below freezing.

7. Bring your tender plants (what you sowed in April) indoors or in your garage if temps are at or

below freezing. Perennials can remain outside. They can take the cold.

8. On hot spring days, you might want to move your containers to receive less sun (east side of home)

so they don’t completely dry out.

9. Can cut off lid when weather warms up, usually after May 15.

10. Wait for mature roots before dividing.

11. For additional information, go to wintersown.org.

Copper Mining or Copper Recycling?

Birch Lake, Minnesota

The battle is raging in Minnesota over whether or not to allow PolyMet to begin mining for copper adjacent to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area.  This is in the iron range - mining country - and lots of folks in that area want the mine because of the jobs it will bring.  Lots of other folks are terrified that a copper mine in the Boundary Waters watershed area will pollute the water and have frightening environmental and health consequences for hundreds of years to come.  

The environmental hazards of copper mining are pretty scary to me.  See this article: Sulfide Mining in Minnesota.  This is also disturbing: Recycling copper saves up to 90% of the energy of mining and processing virgin ore, yet the United States only recycles about half of its copper scrap.  The rest is exported to other countries!  Here's a quote from a Bloomberg Business Week article on exporting scrap metal to China: 

"Demand for copper in the U.S. is too low, and labor is too expensive, to be worth any scrap yard’s time." .... "for the last decade  (China) imported more than 70 percent of the scrap copper it uses. Meanwhile, the U.S., which throws away far more scrap metal than it can ever use, has become the world’s most attractive market for the savvy Chinese buyer."

So why do we need to build copper mines here that will harm our environment - and our drinking water - when we have so much recyclable scrap copper here that we export it overseas?  I imagine it is so that we can export even more copper.  Hmmm.Let's save that 90% more energy that mining uses and build some copper/ metal recycling plants on the Iron Range.

Whatever your views are, the environmental review for the PolyMet project is in process.  The last of the three public hearings is tomorrow at RiverCenter.  Show up if you can and make your views known. (5PM Open House, 7PM Public Comments)

If you can't make it,contact a key official.  Here are a few names:

Govenor Mark Dayton
Tom Landwehr, Commissioner Minnesota Department of Natural Resources
Tom.Landwehr@state.mn.us
Lisa Fay, Environmental Impact Statement Manager
Lisa.Fay@state.mn.us
Douglas Brunder, Project Manager, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
douglas.w.bruner@usace.army.mil & mvp-reg-inquiry@usace.army.mil
Tim Dabney, Deputy  Forest Supervisor, U.S. Forest Service, Superior National Forest: t.dabney@fs.fed.us
John Stein, Commissioner, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
John.Stine@state.mn.us
Rep. Betty McCollum
www.mccollum.house.gov
Sen. Amy Klobuchar
202-224-3244
Sen. Al Franken
202-224-5641

Regrowing Vegetables I've Bought at the Store - In My Windowsill

Rooting Celery, Scallions and Romaine Lettuce

Here is a dandy way to reduce food waste, save a little money and garden in the middle of winter all at once - use the ends of your lettuce and other vegetables to grow new ones on your windowsill.

I didn't grow up on a farm and sometimes I miss the most obvious things.  One is that those vegetables I buy at the supermarket can often be used to grow a whole crop of new vegetables.  Peppers, onions and garlic are an example.  Then just a few weeks ago Elizabeth Andrew (who by the way is about to publish a great new novel) circulated this great blog post
 "10 Vegetables & Herbs You Can Eat Once and Grow Forever".  Now that is an idea that appeals to me.  Does growing garlic sprouts, carrot greens basil, scallions, Romaine lettuce, bok choy, onions, cilantro, ginger and mushrooms in the middle of winter appeal to you?  Me too.  Read that post for details.

The onions & ginger will require some soil right away, but all of the other vegetables can be grown or at least started in water right by a bright window.  I've started the Romaine, scallions and celery so far.  It seems amazing to me that I can grow a new head of Romain from the stump of an old head that's been sitting in the fridge a week, but, by gum, there is a nice little head of greens forming.  It's about an inch and a half tall after a week - no roots.  The greens are just popping up from the middle of the stump.  I have no idea how big they will grow, but I'm hoping for something harvestable.  Here's a close up:

Romaine Growing in Water

I've only started the scallions, from some slimy ones in the bottom of the crisper drawer.  The celery stump has been at it just under a week.  There is a root growing and a tiny bit of green coming up from the center.  It's going to be fun to see how they grow.

Day 17: Eat at Home or Eat Out?

Photo by Hong Borrowed from the Cafe 99 Review on Urban Spoon

We are going out to dinner tonight with Bill and Vicci at Cafe 99, a new local Chinese restaurant that was pretty tasty the first time we tried it.  We have been going out to eat a lot this month.  We seem to do this in clumps - eat at home almost all of the time and then we will have a month of eating out several times a week.  I think our current burst of restaurant visiting is a reaction to the cold weather we've been having.  We need to get out of the house but a nice walk in the neighborhood is just plain cold!

Our increase in eating out is not following national trends, however.  A new report by USDA's Economic Research Service says that Americans are eating out less, eating fewer total calories and eating better at home -  and by eating more at home, people are having more family dinners.  That's got to be a good thing for health and family ties. (Summary article from NBC News)  It's hard to believe though.  One of our recent restaurant visits was to Crave downtown Minneapolis on the last Holidazzle Parade weekend.  It was expensive and it was packed!  Downtown was packed.  I had trouble getting a 5PM dinner reservation anywhere. So even if people are eating out less, they must still be eating out a lot.

What's this got to do with global warming?  I'm not totally sure, but I do see some good signs:

• The trend to eating out less included less eating at fast food restaurants so that may mean less cups, wrappers and plastic containers to throw away (though at regular restaurants serving sizes are so big there is always the temptation to take home leftovers in those ubiquitous styrofoam  containers). 
• People who are eating at home more are not necessarily doing it to save money.  Rather they are more concerned about eating healthily.  Perhaps that means more organic products are being purchased which is good for the earth.  
• And, of course, eating at home instead of a restaurant means the car stays in the garage saving us some carbon costs.  (We will carpool tonight and we are not going far, so our outing is somewhat climate friendly.)

Though we have been eating out a lot this month, we have studiously avoided fast food and take out.  That is our little contribution towards reducing waste. You might then ask, how do we handle those big plates at restaurants.  Do we take home leftovers in styrofoam cartons?  No.  We just eat it all.

Day 16: Fighting Climate Change Through Micro Lending

This is Simon.  He lives in Tanzania and I just lent him $25.  I am helping him buy a biodigester for his farm and other biodigesters to sell. The biodigester will convert food and animal waste into fuel for electricity and cooking  Just as climate change will be reduced through the action of millions of individuals, Simon will get his biodigesters through the small gifts of many individuals.  Welcome to the world of micro finance.

The loan is being made through KIVA, a micro lending organization that facilitates small loans to individuals around the world.  I was aware of this avenue for helping poorer people get access to capital and improve their lives, but I hadn't thought before about using these loans to help reduce greenhouse gases.  It's an exciting idea to me.

Today was the first time I've made a loan through KIVA.  I was able to make four loans totalling $100 for the price of $50 thanks to a couple of Groupon coupons I purchased back in December.  Three of the loans will directly impact climate change - two biodigester projects and one solar heating project, so less propane, less oil, less charcoal, more trees.

It will be interesting to follow the progress of the projects and see if the loans are repaid.  Since I purchased Groupon coupons through a two for one offer, the loan repayments won't come back to me but will go into the general lending fund of KIVA.  Next time, I'll lend directly through the organization.  Then I can use the repaid funds to lend again and again.

The Good and the Bad of Recycled Clothing

My "new" used sweater

I have become a fan of doing my clothes shopping at used clothing stores.  This came to me after the umpteenth time of complimenting a friend's outfit and then being told that it was purchased at a consignment shop.  Duh - if all of my friends have been shopping this way for quite a while, why haven't I?  So now I am and what a delight it is!

The above ensemble is today's purchase from the Goodwill Store in Roseville.  I had not shopped at Goodwill in many years on the thought that I should save all of those good prices for people who needed the discounts more than me.  But now that I am concerned about reducing my carbon use, shopping for used clothing seems the way to go - and it's more fun too.  My goodness, the Goodwill Store in Roseville is really nice - well laid out, lots of happy people working there.  They even dust the clothing racks of all things.  The clothes are nice and the price is right.  It was a much calmer shopping experience than at the mall - and the dressing rooms were quite nice as well.

The primary benefit to the world in buying used clothing is it reduces the amount of new clothing that needs to be manufactured and since clothing manufacture and fibre growth have pretty serious environmental impacts (see this article), reducing that impact is a good thing.  Having a market in used clothing also reduces the amount of clothing that is thrown in the landfill.  In 2006, 2.5 billion pounds of clothing was kept from landfills because of used clothing sales.  (See this article.)

We still have a long way to go in that regard. Americans discard about 68 pounds of clothing a year compared to buying 10 pounds of used clothing.  In fact, the rate at which clothing is purchased and discarded in our society is a real problem.  Even if you contribute your used clothing to charity, as I discussed in yesterday's blog post, you may be contributing to international economic woes.  In fact, when I googled "Impact of buying used clothes", I found more articles on the negative impact to African economies caused by the re-marketing of used American clothing than I did articles on the positive impact to the environment.  Here is one of those articles.

So first of all, buy less and when you do buy - buy used.  Here is another plus to that approach.  We did go to the mall today, after our trip to Goodwill.  Gordon was still lacking a bathing suit for that infamous trip to Acapulco we are going to take.  Since I am trying to limit my clothes buying to used clothing, I didn't feel the need to look at clothes racks in the mall at all.  It was a very freeing feeling.

Getting Rid of Stuff

Cooking Tortillas in Mayan village

If you have clothes to wear, food to eat and a home to live in, you have more than 70% of the people on earth.

During church today we talked about turning points in people's lives.  Jan shared the story of when she had to rush to Walter Reed Hospital from her home in Puerto Rico to be at her husband's side.  She quickly packed a small travel bag, not carefully thought through because of her hurry, but with a few pairs of jeans, t-shirts etc., expecting to be gone a week or two.  She was gone seven months and during that time, she got by with the contents of that small bag.   For her it was a turning point in her thoughts about the import - or rather the un-import of stuff and it changed her life.  She realized that she didn't need a lot of stuff - she could get by without it. Even today, years later, she and her husband live by a creed that if they are to buy something it must be either useful or beautiful and they don't keep - or buy in the first place - things they don't really need.

But getting rid of things you already have - that is the tough part.  We talked about the things we have that may not be beautiful or even useful but are precious because of some attachment - a piece of jewelry owned by a great aunt, a trophy from a special time in your life, a gift from a loved one, your father's tie.  What do you do with these things that accumulate and to which you are attached, but you won't ever use?  I don't really have an answer, but here are a few thoughts people shared:

1.  Try to identify what is really important - is it the item, or the memory attached to it?
2.  Take a photo, for instance, of your child next to the art work they've just created with the date and age.  Keep the photo rather than the artwork.
3.  Find other family members to pass things onto.  Perhaps the young nieces and nephews would be happy to have one of grandpa's books now that they are older.
4.  Find a meaningful use for your object in another place and know that it will be loved by someone else.  Martha's Closet, for instance, takes good professional suits and clothing that people can use to look presentable for a job interview.
 
And then, of course, there is just all of that other stuff - not precious, not needed.  Kathy Magnuson sent me this great article from the Women's Press with one woman's fine tuned recycling resources.  Want to know what to do with your metal scraps, plastics, coat hangers, fabric, mesh bags etc., etc.?  Click here

Of course, there is always the garage sale and, my favorite - put your items on the curb and say FREE!  It's amazing how quickly that big old sofa will disappear.

Goodwill and other charitable organizations would love to pick up your used items.  In fact, the big yellow card from the Epilepsy Foundation came in the mail yesterday.  I think that tomorrow, I'll go through the house and gather some items to leave by the curb for them to pickup next week.


What ideas do you have?

Getting Rid of Junk Mail

Paper, paper, paper.  It does accumulate, doesn't it?  For my part, I can pass up the exciting opportunity from Bank of America promised on the envelope above as well as a good many other offers and solicitations I receive each day by mail.  I'm not alone here, right?

Tonight my daughter came home and hit the computer to get her name off of mailing lists and so was an inspiration to me.  She complained a bit about the process she used, so I went on line and found a few suggestions of my own.  I was directed by an official looking PDF document from the state of North Dakota to the following site:  DMAChoice.org, an online tool developed by the Direct Marketing Association to help people manage what marketing mail they received or don't receive.  You can register with the site and then select the companies you want to receive mail from - or you can blanket select to not receive marketing mail at all.  Now filling out my name and address on a marketing site in order to not receive marketing mail seems a little counter intuitive, but since the referral came from a government site, I'm pretty comfortable doing it.  Any thoughts out there?

I have now gone in and requested no marketing mail in all four categories.  This means that in the next 30 to 90 days, my mail box should get lighter.  This will not stop mail from any companies where I have recently shopped or organizations where I have recently contributed  - and I am not sure how long recently is (I read it, but immediately forgot!)  I'll have to contact them directly if I want to stop their mail. Also, this is only going to affect me and only me as I spell my name, so as I see mail come in to me with a different spelling, I'll need to go into the site and add those names and to stop mail coming for my husband, I'll need to set up an account for him.  It's a process, but I'm on my way.

Now to be fair to the marketers, DMA reminded me that shopping through the mail saves gas expended on trips to the mall, paper is a renewable resource from trees planted specifically for that purpose and direct marketing supports many small businesses.  These are fair points, so let's consider this blog post as a plug to get rid of the paper you don't want, not to give up on direct mail entirely.

Here's a link to a Wiki with a pretty detailed list of other ways you can reduce paper in your household:

Wiki How to Reduce Paper