Lucid Food_ Cooking for an Eco-Conscious Life - Louisa Shafia [8]
4. CARRY YOUR OWN SILVERWARE
Even at the most eco-conscious health food restaurants and buffets—where they admirably serve food on compostable paper plates—plastic cutlery and disposable chopsticks are often used. All of that plastic, paper, bamboo, and wood ends up in a landfill. Carrying a personal set of cutlery as an environmental act started several years ago in China, where activists have taken to bringing their own reusable chopsticks stored in cloth bags into restaurants, in the hope of preserving some of the 25 million trees that are cut down each year to make chopsticks. It’s easy to fashion a makeshift carrying case by wrapping cutlery in a clean dish towel, or get fancy and make a washable cloth pouch that snaps shut. This small act could make a big change; activists in South Korea have succeeded in getting disposable chopsticks banned in many restaurants, where metal ones are now used instead.
5. AVOID USING PLASTIC AROUND FOOD
Plastic food storage containers can leach many harmful toxins into food. Aside from harming our health through contact with our food, plastic has many other unfortunate characteristics: It releases chemicals such as benzene and dioxin into the air as it is manufactured; it is largely considered disposable; it takes hundreds of years to decompose; and it remains a danger to the water table once it’s in a landfill. Happily, there are several viable alternatives to plastic food storage containers, such as glass, metal, and ceramic bowls with plastic lids. These choices are all heavier and more expensive than plastic, but they are safe and will last indefinitely.
6. BRING YOUR LUNCH TO WORK
Instead of buying lunch on the go, spend twenty minutes the night before packing a homemade lunch. This is a great way to avoid all the extra packaging that accompanies takeaway, and at the same time save enough money for a meal in a nice restaurant once a week. There are many alternatives to carrying your lunch in plastic containers. Pyrex bowls with plastic lids are a good choice, and stainless-steel “tiffin” sets with several stackable bowls, like the ones used in India, can be found on the Internet. Food-safe ceramic containers are another option. For wrapping sandwiches, the washable Wrap-N-Mat, available through online retailers, closes with Velcro and unfolds so it can be used as a placemat.
7. SOAK BEANS AND GRAINS BEFORE COOKING
Soaking certain foods reduces cooking time as well as gas or electric use. In the case of beans, which soak up a lot of water as they cook, it can also mean less water use. It takes only a few seconds to throw a cup of beans or grains into a bowl of water before going to bed, and it will cut the cooking time by half. But even soaking for an hour can make a big difference. This method applies to noodles, lentils, and white rice, foods that you wouldn’t normally think to soak. If you have trouble getting beans to cook all the way through, try boiling them for 10 minutes, then letting them soak in the hot water with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar for 1 to 12 hours. Drain and then cook the beans as usual. Another energy-saving approach is to use a pressure cooker. Pressure cookers cook foods in roughly a third of the time required for conventional pots and pans. There are several high-quality models available that are either plugged in or used on the stovetop.
8. REDUCE OR ELIMINATE PAPER TOWEL USE
Like any paper product, paper towels are made