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Today’s post is by web editor Colleen Tully.
I hate being dependent on plastic, but especially those disposable plastic wraps and baggies designed for food storage and food waste. Every time I throw away some plastic wrap or a grocery bag I feel terrible. So this month I chose to exorcise the following demons from my life forever: plastic wrap, baggies, grocery bags, and garbage bags.
My husband and I are apartment-dwellers. He tends to be wrap-happy with food, having grown up in the country, where mice or insects would otherwise raid their pantry. I copied his habits and developed an addiction to Ziploc. I expected this experiment to be grossly difficult for us both, but I couldn’t have been more wrong! Here’s what we did:
Leftover dinners
Out came Mason jars, Corningware casserole dishes with lids and glass IKEA refrigerator-type boxes I had been using to store tea bags. Leftovers live happily in these covered containers I already had on hand – no more lazy plastic wrap slapped onto a bowl.
No more grocery bags
Given the growing movement to bring your own bag, the hardest part here was just remembering to actually bring the bags to the store. We have about 10 tote bags that live near the front doorknob, and two live in the car just in case. Now it feels like I’ve forgotten my wallet if I don’t have a bag with me when I leave the door. It’s just a good habit that forms eventually.
Refrigerator and freezer foods
Things like half an onion, cut-up lemon, cheese, tofu, meat to freeze in smaller portions – these lived in my Ziploc heaven. I used to be good about reusing my Ziploc bags, but then somewhere along the line I grew lazy. The shame.
What now houses my cut-up, refrigerated items is trusty old waxed paper I found – like the glass containers – in the back of my cupboard. When I can’t make the paper stay folded over I cheat with an elastic band, but my skills are improving. I re-use all this paper too. I keep waxed paper scraps in a heart-shaped tin box in the kitchen, “Because I LOVE the environment!” I jokingly told my husband, but the joke worked. We both always know where the scraps are to wrap things. Aluminum foil scraps from freezer items also live in my heart-shaped box. Because we re-use these scraps all the time, the box is never overflowing – unlike the “grocery bag mountain” that used to live under my sink!
Kitchen garbage
I had ambitious plans to use paper bags for the kitchen garbage, but knew it would end in disaster once day. Then I discovered Canadian-made Bag-To-Nature compostable garbage bags by Indaco Manufacturing Ltd. Miraculous! They look and perform just like plastic, but Bag-To-Nature is made from a blend of organic biopolymers which degrade completely, leaving no residues, and are made from renewable resources – primarily corn. They’re even designed to be thrown into your composter and are available all across Canada.
Bag-to-Nature bags are a little pricier than most garbage bags – about $5 for 20 bags – but I’m no longer using Ziploc, plastic wrap or even that much aluminum foil or waxed paper. With these more expensive garbage bags my costs are still down, and they make me feel better about myself.
Plus it’s good to have expensive garbage bags – you think twice before throwing something out!
It was so stupidly easy and painless to train myself and my husband to obliterate baggies, plastic wrap, grocery and garbage bags from our lives that I’m embarrassed I didn’t do it sooner. Anyone can accomplish this feat with little to no financial investment and hardly any thinking at all. Go for it!
How do you feel about plastic in your kitchen, and what are you doing about it? What are some of the eco-friendly – and thrifty – tricks you use for food storage?
Today’s code word: plastic
Read more:
• Eco-friendly online shopping
• Are plastic drinking bottles bad for your health?
• Go green: Shopping at the Yellowknife dump
Trying to elliminate plastics has been a big thing to our family as well. I love to cook, and one of the ways I have tried to cut back on plastic is to stop buying too many kitchen gadgets. It’s amazing how well you can get on with a few gadgets and how many others sit in a drawer unused for weeks or months. I mean, do we really NEED melon ballers or garlic crushers or special cheese graters just for parmesan cheese?
I also bought some great glass bowls from the Dollar Store. They do come with plastic lids, but everything is reusable and the glass bowls clean up nicely. Because they only cost me a dollar, the are great for sending home extra food with family members after one of our big feasts.
Comment by Angela — March 30, 2008 @ 4:46 pm
Angela, you’re inspiring me to clean out my kitchen junk drawer! You’re right, there are far too many gadgets that don’t get used.
There’s also the option of buying metal versions of things instead of plastic. Metal production is also hard on the planet but the chances are good that those items will last a lot longer.
Comment by Kat — March 31, 2008 @ 10:12 am
Another reason to reduce plastic use in the kitchen is that food stored in plastic starts to taste like the plastic. I remember thinking to myself, how is it that homemade, day-old muffins taste perfectly yummy if eaten at home, but when I brought them to the office in a little ziploc bag they tasted so bad? The answer was they tasted plasticky. Same for sandwiches. I’ve since switched back to wax paper, which my mom used to use for my lunchbox sandwiches when I was a kid. Or sometimes I’ll wrap my sandwich or muffin in a pretty cloth napkin. Because surely, the fact that something tastes like plastic can’t be good.
Comment by Helen — March 31, 2008 @ 10:46 am
Tnank you for saying that, Helen. I thought it was just me that had taste problems with food stored in plastic bags!
Colleen, thanks for the link to Indaco. Ottawa recycles garden waste in those big Bag-to-Earth garden bags, but I’d never seen the garbage bags on sale. Are they designed for the “green” garbage schemes, where you put in all kitchen waste including meat and bones and dirty pizza discs? I’ve come accross little bags like that, but only in areas where these recycling schemes exist. Ottawa isn’t going to put it’s toe into that particular pond until 2009. Anyway, I e-mailed Indico to ask whether I could buy these bags in Ottawa, and got this reply:
Hello
Thank you for your interest in our bags. Try the Giant Tiger, Costco, Cdn. Tire or Home Hardware stores, some carry our product. Unfortunately we ship to their warehouses, so we are unsure what stores have them.
Next time I get to C Tire, etc, I’ll ask.
Comment by Caroline — April 1, 2008 @ 12:46 pm
My family is trying to do our part for the futer…will look for Canadian Tire Bag to Nature.
What really makes me mad are swiffer mops. What happened to sweeping?
Comment by Denise — April 1, 2008 @ 3:20 pm
I hear yeah Denise…what happened to sweeping..I do however own one of those Swifter…but use a mircosoft cloth instead of the dusters meant for the Swifter. I bought some clothes at a Home & Garden show & then found some at Home Hardware.
Machine washable and work great on easy dust bunny collection.
I am in the process of cutting down/out on plastics. Its almost impossible to get out of the grocery store with no extra added packaging….I love the Bulk Food Stores/areas…I know you have too purchase in plastic bags, but I figure its way better then all the packaging from the other stores.
Comment by Val — April 1, 2008 @ 10:10 pm
Hi Val,
I take my own bags for bulk food whenever I can - I just throw them in my canvas bags so they’re there when I need them. Ziplocs also work great for bulk!
Comment by Kat — April 2, 2008 @ 11:28 am
I just moved to PEI and am glad to say they are really green here, far ahead of anywhere else I’ve been in Canada and almost as environmentally conscious as they are in Holland.
I greatly fear that we will soon see a movement towards even greater packaging - in Holland every vegetable you buy is now wrapped in plastic. I was horrified by this new and vastly wasteful notion. Why on earth do food companies feel this is necessary? Do they own plastic manufacturing plants too? Not only do I hate the waste this adds to our landfills but I don’t like not being able to see, feel and smell the produce I am buying. I hope there is some way we can prevent this from happening here in North America.
Comment by Wendy — April 3, 2008 @ 6:20 pm
I think we need to be much more aware of the whole process of food production - from seed to table. I am becoming more and more frightened by the control huge corporations are imposing on this most basic of human necessities.
Large food corporations now control seed production and they are ruthlessly forcing out farmers who use traditional seeds and the process of natural seed selection.
New seeds developed and sold by these multi-national food producers will only thrive if farmers use the manufacturer’s designer fertilizers and pesticides.
We need to worry not just about living green but actually being able to buy food that has not been tampered with in any way whatsoever. If farmers are forced to stop growning seeds that have developed a natural resistance to disease and bugs, we may find ourselves unable to grow our own organic non GMO food in the back garden. Where will we get seeds that will guarantee the possibility of growing these foods.
I hope everyone will think about planting a small plot - even a containter garden with traditional, non hybridized, non-GMO seeds so we can save them for the future and keep our food chain free to some small extent.
Comment by Wendy — April 3, 2008 @ 6:27 pm
ON NOT LETTING PLASTIC BAGS COME INTO THE HOUSE:
My local Food Basics store charges people for bags, but offers empty cardboard boxes for free. When I regulalry shop there, I find I actually run out of plastic grocery bags!I put the boxes out at the kerb filled with paper.
I’m collecting those “recycled polyester” and similar bags and use them a lot. I’m not convinced that the polyester has actually been recycled, but at least they last.
Fifteen years ago, I was living in Germany and bought a load of collapsible plastic baskets which will go in a shopping cart, in the trunk of the car, or stored on end in a corner of the garage. Okay, they are plastic, but they are fifteen years old and still going strong!
Old school bags, backpacks, gym bags, totes, beach bags and wicker baskets are all usable for carrying stuff.
If you are in a shop that insists on giving you a no-bio-bag, ask them if they would pay you to walk around with it, advertising their store. If they won’t pay you, why should you take it?
ON RE-USING THE GROCERY BAG
Look up the latest Ganadian Living magazine for a crochet pattern to make a bright beach bag from recycled grocery bags
Use as stuffing for craft projects. We used to use them for those awful “puffy” curtain toppers, remember?
Line garbage cans with them instead of buying special liners.
Buy liner and garbage bags that are are made of re-cycled plastic, not new stuff.
Some grocery bags are already re-cycled. Usually it says so in small print somewhere on them.
Use them to keep down weeds around your tomatoes in the summer.
ON RECYCLING GROCERY BAGS
My local LOEB store has a largge bin for dumping old grocery bags. Some people but bread bags ad clean ziplocks in too, but I don’t know if that is a good thing or not.
I have donated grocery bags to my local Salvation Army store, to the used book shop, and to localschools.
Wendy- I agree about our food. Anyone who has read Stuart Laidlaw’s “Secret Ingredients” and Bill Lambrecht’s “Dinner at the New Gene Cafe” will have big qualms about Canadian farming. But take heart- heritage seeds swaps flourish, organic farmers can actually MAKE money, unlike many “ordinary” farmers, and local farmers markets are on the rise!
Comment by Caroline — April 4, 2008 @ 9:20 pm
I never buy anything in plastic that I can avoid or even in cans.I buy tomatoe sauce in glass jars and use them to store leftovers,Juices in glass bottles and put water in the refrigerator.I also do emergency storing just in case.I keep water in all these containers.I store dried foods in themand anything you may need if something drastic could happen.Canned things will last for up to 20 years and if you rotate them as you use them they are safe.I will not buy anything in plastic lined cans either.A lot more people would be smart to do this because some day it may save your life.And don’t forget to store food and water for your pets.You will need them for emergencies so don’t forget them too.
Comment by Eva Walker — April 26, 2008 @ 8:30 pm
For single portion leftovers or for half an onion try just putting them in a bowl and covering the bowl with a saucer- works great. Thank you Wendy for the comments on corperated food and the evil of corperate seeds that do not reproduce. Check out a documentary called “We Feed the World” for more on this.
Comment by shauna — April 28, 2008 @ 12:29 pm