Are you challenged to find a flour that tastes good for your gluten-free baking needs?  Well, Living Without  magazine offers some terrific solutions.  Click on the link above to see more gluten and dairy-free recipes to suit every palate.

Mary’s All-Purose Flour Blend (Recipe by Mary Capone)
2 cups brown rice flour
2 cups white rice flour
1 1/3 cups potato starch, not potato flour
2/3 cup tapioca starch/flour

Mix ingredients together.  Store in a tightly covered container in the refrigerator until used.

Simple Solution – just like a Keep Your Fork Kit is a simple solution to using less plastic silverware and paper napkins.  May the Fork be with You.

The Environmental Working Grouponce again offers an on-line guide to the safety of your sunscreen, cosmetics, skin and hair care products.  Don’t be out in the sun unprotected – and don’t be out in the sun with poison on your skin either! 

To learn more and to check on the safety of your favorite brand click here….   http://www.ewg.org/skindeep/

How’s this for innovation and vision!  FoodCorps envisions a nation of healthy children who know what healthy food is—how it grows and where it comes from—and who also have access to it every day.

FoodCorps is a national non-profit organization that addresses childhood obesity by increasing vulnerable children’s knowledge of, engagement with and access to healthy food. Recently, FoodCorps service members gathered in Washington to kick off planting season in local school gardens.  To learn more about these wonderful programs visit their website at http://foodcorps.org

“Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much.”  Helen Keller

May the Fork be with You……

Berries are delicious, but they’re also kind of delicate.  Raspberries in particular seem like they can mold before you even get them home from the market.  Fresh berries are just starting to hit farmers markets, so here is how to keep them fresh!    

Wash them with vinegar.

When you get your berries home, prepare a mixture of one part vinegar (white or apple cider is best) and ten parts water.  Gently put the berries into the vinegar/water mixture and swirl them around.  Drain, rinse if you want (though the mixture is so diluted you can’t taste the vinegar,) and pop them in the fridge.  The vinegar kills any mold spores and other bacteria that might be on the surface of the fruit, and voila!  Raspberries will last a week or more, and strawberries almost two weeks without getting moldy and soft.    It is a berry good idea to eat fresh and local whenever you can – the more colorful the better!

May the Fork be with You!

Many communities now offer restaurants that are designed to feed those who are hungry – regardless of whether or not they can pay for the meal.  Customers pay through volunteer work (washing dishes, helping in the kitchen, waiting on customers) or pay what they can afford to pay. 

To learn more about these restaurants in your community visit the One World Everybody Eats Foundation to see a list of restaurants throughout the United States.  WOW – please consider supporting these heart-felt missions. 

Click to go to the website:  oneworldeverbodyeatsfoundation.org

May the Fork Be with You

Many urban environments are “fresh food deserts,” meaning you can only find mostly non-nutritious junk food at the local grocery store.  Local groups have begun to encourage and build backyard and community gardens; many of these in public places where people were previously scared to be.  They also are working with the neighborhood grocery stores to provide local fresher and healthier foods. 

There are many projects that are great success stories provided through the Community Food Security Coalition, a national coalition of more than 500 organizations dedicated to building food systems that are healthy, sustainable, just and democratic.  The coalition’s stated goal is to end hunger by promoting public health and supporting sustainable agriculture through policy advocacy, education, research and organizing.  For more information about helping to transform a “Fesh Food Desert” in your community visit:  www.foodsecurity.org.

William Davis, M.D. and cardiologist made some interesting comments about wheat in his book called  Wheat Belly, published by Rodale Books, 2011. Wheat, in its original form, was unchanged for 20,000 years as was called eichorn wheat. Then in the mid-20th century the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, in an effort to combat world hunger, made thousands of new varieties of wheat. They boasted increasing yields from 8 bushels per acre to 65 bushels per acre. This high-yield wheat now comprises as much as 99% of all wheat! This high-yield wheat has new gluten structures not previously consumed by humans. Approximately 95% of the parent proteins are retained while the other 5% are new proteins. Some of these proteins are gluten proteins not found in original wheat. 

Celiac disease is now common along with IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) and acid reflux. Our modern mystery wheat and the growing epidemics of obesity and diabetes may be directly connected.  The new wheat has a high glycemic index causing blood sugar and insulin spikes which can cause many problems like mood disorders, depression, energy loss, foggy brain, difficulty concentrating, blurred vision and difficulty sleeping.  To learn more read the book or article by Dr. William Davis recently published in the Spirituality & Health magazine. http://www.spiritualityhealth.com/magazine/2012-january-february/wheat-belly.html

Why not pack a healthy wheat-free lunch in 2012!  May the Fork be with You!

It’s that time of year. Time to think about giving gifts. (Oh yeah! Time to receive gifts too!) Consider it as an opportunity to build relationships, stimulate your local economy, and take care of the planet.

” The fallacy of the story that material consumption is the path to happiness is quickly exposed and replaced with the fact that we truly come alive as we reduce material consumption and gain control of our time to nurture the relationships that bring true happiness.” (David Korten, We are Hard-wired to Care and Connect, YES! Magazine, July 30, 2008.)

Korten’s complete essay is worth the read, and is available online at www.yesmagazine.org.

Here is an excerpt from this article, which I found particularly intellectually stimulating, confirming and motivating:

Despite the constant mantra that, “There is no alternative” to greed and competition, daily experience and a growing body of scientific evidence support the thesis that we humans are born to connect, learn, and serve and that it is indeed within our means to:

• Create family-friendly communities in which we get our satisfaction from caring relationships rather than material consumption;
• Achieve the ideal, which traces back to Aristotle, of creating democratic middle-class societies without extremes of wealth and poverty; and
• Form a global community of nations committed to restoring the health of the planet and sharing Earth’s bounty to the long-term benefit of all (see YES! Summer 2008: A Just Foreign Policy).

These three pointers define what sustainability is:

Equity – Relationships and Empowerment. The best gift you can give is you and your time. A family-friendly community is one where neighbors, teachers, parents, business owners, and children know each other by name. Since moving to my house in January of 2008, I have become very close friends with my next-door neighbors, two adult daughters and their 93 year-old father who built their house in 1951.  Our friendship has helped add years to Lee’s life, and given me one more reason to say, “I love this town!”.

Economy – The Exchange of Goods. I’m sure, no matter what part of the country you live in, there are holiday bazars that showcase local artists and artisans peddling their wares. Take the time to visit these local spots, where you’re sure to find hot drinks and treats to tide you over while you shop. Another idea is to organize a gift-making party among your family and friends, recycling and repurposing materials while making a personalized gift for a loved one.

Environment – Knowing and Loving Place. Packaging material is the number one use of paper. This year, consider giving a gift that doesn’t come packaged in paper or plastic. My favorite gift as a child was movie tickets. There are a lot of gift options for the social bee in your life – concert tickets, hair cut, manicure/pedicure, sports tickets, lift tickets, and more. Consider eliminating the packaging from your material gifts, or saving this years’ wrapping paper to use again next year.

In my last post, “What a Waste”, I shared some statistics concerning the amount of waste produced from the consumption of goods and services, both nationally and internationally. I also listed some ideas for you to reduce your own personal waste, at home, at work, and while you’re on the go. What I want to share with you in this post, are some relevant sources for you to go to if you’d like more details about 1) tracking trash from our community to its final destination, 2) the impacts our waste has on our economy, 3) the impacts our waste has in our communities, and 3) the impacts our waste has on the environment.

Tracking Trash

You probably know more about your trash ‘supply chain’ than you do about your trash ‘removal chain’. I’m providing you with two relevant sources to learn more about how cities and nations are tracking their removal chain, and using what they learn to develop systems that work to manage our resources and promote behaviors that limit our production of waste.

According to this website, http://senseable.mit.edu/trashtrack/ “  Trash Track uses hundreds of small, smart, location aware tags: a first step towards the deployment of smart-dust – networks of tiny locatable and addressable microeletromechanical systems.These tags are attached to different types of trash so that these items can be followed through (a) city’s waste management system, revealing the final journey of our everyday objects in a series of real time visualizations.”

“The project is an initial investigation into understanding the ‘removal-chain’ in urban areas and it represents a type of change that is taking place in cities: a bottom-up approach to managing resources and promoting behavioral change through pervasive technologies. TrashTrack builds on previous work of the SENSEable City Lab in its exploration of how the increasing deployment of sensors and mobile technologies radically transforms how we understand and describe cities.”

All Rivers Do Lead to the Ocean

The Algalita Marine Research Foundation, in Long Beach, California, has mapped ten years worth of research showing the highest debris accumulation in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre. For those of you who have heard of the North Pacific Garbage Patch, this is it! Go to their website to watch and learn how they collect their data, and what they’ve found: http://www.algalita.org/research/Maps_Home.html

Environmental Impacts

If you’ve seen the movie ‘Bag It’, you’ve seen the clip showing the remains of Albatros chicks on Midway Island. If you haven’t seen the movie, you can go to Chris Jordan’s website (http://www.chrisjordan.com/gallery/midway/#CF000313%2018×24) to view his photos of Midway Island and the effects of plastic on the lives of the Albatros who live there.

Community Impacts

Are there alternatives to purchasing more products to live our lives comfortably, while reducing the impacts this waste has on our community health?

Consider this advice, posted in The Green Life, a Sierra Club online journal:

“If your neighbor has a shiny new toolbox, why would you need one too? Rather than ”keeping up with the Joneses,” many people are opting for opportunities to pool and share resources. By planning clothing exchanges, crop swaps, and tool-lending libraries, you’ll save money, reduce waste, and build a stronger community.”

Learn more about planning clothing exchanges in your community by going to this website, http://swapforgood.org/.

Learn more about starting a crop swap in your community by going to this website: http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-10-11/how-start-crop-swap

Learn more about starting a tool-lending library in your community by going to this website: http://tinyurl.com/tool-library

How do you share with friends?

Post your ideas on our comment page. And, if you start a crop swap, clothing exchange, or tool library, let us know and we’ll share it.

Economic Impacts

Is all this waste costing our communities valuable money and resources that could otherwise be spent on more productive, worthwhile projects? With all the talk about reduced spending and budget cuts, doesn’t it seem odd that our spending habits haven’t decreased more than 2.0% since the 2008 ‘recession’ (Bureau of Labor Statistics.Sept.27,2011). According to this Bureau of Labor report (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cesan.nr0.htm) spending on food, housing, entertainment, cash contributions, personal insurance apparel and pensions decreased. The only major components of spending that increased were health care and transportation.

Recycle Yard, "Intolerable Beauty". www.chrisjordan.com

Millions of people, all around the world, waste food. Here are the facts, from the EPA, and ideas to help you be a part of the solution.

Heifer International’s Holiday 2011 issue of World Ark Magazine lists important “Facts and Figures” related to the amount of food wasted throughout the world.

Consider these statistics, and what you can do about it.

40% - In the US, an estimated 40 percent of food gets thrown away.

• Limit your meal portions. If you’re still hungry, then eat more.
• Save your left-overs for another meal.             

50% – The US’s per capita food waste has increased 50 percent since 1974.

• Monitor your own food waste to see what you’re contributing to the US’s per capita food waste.
• Talk with your family members to create a plan to reduce your waste.

20% – Food rotting in landfills produce 20 percent of all methane imissions, contributing to global warming.

• Collect your food waste and compost it, or give it to a friend who composts.
• Know your local farmers! Donate your food waste to a local farmer, or neighbor who raises chickens or pigs.
• Learn to be a “Locavore.” Buy food at local farmer’s markets, and learn to freeze and can produce so they last longer.

14% – Food waste makes up more than 14 percent of the municipal solid waste stream.

• Take a tour of your local solid waste treatment plant to learn about waste management in your community.

33% - Worldwide, roughly thirty-three percent of all food produced is never eaten.

• Know your grocer and your local food pantry! Talk to your grocery store manager about helping to distribute food to local food pantries.
• Learn more about President Clinton’s 1996  ”Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act”.
• Learn more about food gleaning, and encourage your local grocers and farmers to be a part of this movement.

925 Million – All together, industrialized countries toss 222 million tons of food each year. That’s enough to feed 925 million people.

• Get involved with a local charity to help serve meals to those in need, in your community.
• Read food labels. Learn more about where your food comes from by reading the label on your food container.

Learn more about what you can do to reduce food waste:

• www.divethefilm.com
• http://feedingamerica.org/
• Search “gleaning” for an abundance of articles and projects focused on reducing food waste.

RAISE YOUR FORK and ACT NOW!