Meatless “Shepherd’s” Pie
Apr 23, 2010 Eco Friendly Home
For our Earth Day dinner last night, I made a recipe called Vegetarian Shepherd’s Pie. Well, approximately. I didn’t have all the ingredients. No Vegemite or similar, and we were out of carrots. But I came pretty close.
Cooked the lentils and barley in veggie broth for about an hour all together. Threw in some garlic and a variety of spices. Sauteed some chayote squash and asparagus, and added them when the barley was close to done. Added in some frozen green beans. Thickened the remaining liquid with a flour and water mixture.
Topped with mashed potatoes and some mozzarella, then threw the thing in the oven for long enough to melt the cheese.
In other words, I didn’t follow the recipe very precisely. I took the idea and ran with it. That’s pretty much how I cook.
I did most of the cooking in my cast iron skillet. I love that thing. No transferring a hot mess into a casserole dish to cook in the oven, and it really saves on cleanup.
A Hit?
Finally, a new vegetarian recipe that went over well with my family. My oldest daughter in particular loved it. It took my husband nearly two hours before he said “you know, you could just add the lentils to regular shepherd’s pie.”
I was wondering how long it would take him to get to the “just add meat” stage.
That’s longer than usual, though. And he agrees with my point that it is a good meal on its own and really useful for saving money or just not having to worry about whether or not there’s any meat defrosted.
One step at a time. One step at a time. I’m just glad to have a new, highly acceptable vegetarian meal to rotate in.
Tags: cooking, earth day, meatless meals, recipe
The Trouble with Earth Day
Apr 22, 2010 Environmentally Friendly
Earth Day is a great concept. Encourage people to take better care of our planet. Make them more aware of what we’re doing to our environment and how to help make things better.
But this is the real world. And that means corporations loooove Earth Day. What better chance for them to show that they’re wonderful, delightful, responsible corporate citizens who care about the things that we care about?
No matter what they really do.
I’ve been having a lot of fun going around reading various Earth Day posts, and I see that I am far from the only one frustrated with this. No surprise there. I rather liked this video:
I picked that one up over at It’s Getting Hot in Here.
Jennifer Lance at Eco Child’s Play is frustrated with Lockheed Martin recommending green books for kids, and I have to agree with her point, even if some commenters bring up points on where the company makes some green efforts. I find it particularly scary that the study she mentions where they’re paying people to drink water contaminated with perchlorate every day for six months is happening not that far from me. Ewww!
Sometimes I Just Have to Laugh
Not all posts remind me of how much greenwashing goes on. Sometimes they make me laugh because what they want me to do is almost impossible for me.
Take this post on Mother Nature Network about Disney’s hat offer to celebrate the release of their movie, Oceans. All you have to do is six plastic bottles or aluminum cans to your local Disney store on April 22 and you’ll get a free hat made from recycled bottles.
Do you have any idea how long it would take me to save that many plastic bottles or aluminum cans??? I mean, if they take milk jugs I could manage it in a few weeks, I haven’t entirely eliminated plastic from my life, but I don’t buy drinks in small containers if I can help it.
What Can You Do?
If this frustrates you like it does me, just keep trying to be green and encouraging others to do so as well. Don’t let the greenwashers fool you. Speak out when you see greenwashing in action.
Most of us won’t manage to live a perfectly green life, even on Earth Day. But we can keep trying to do better.
Tags: earth day, greenwashing
What Small Green Steps Have You Taken? Ready for More?
Apr 22, 2010 Environmentally Friendly
A few months ago I joined the One Small Change challenge. Today being Earth Day, I thought I would share how things went and where to go from here. Plus I’ll share some Earth Day tips from around the web.
How Did One Small Change Go?
My ability to stick with my changes for One Small Change were pretty varied. Getting to the co-op for fresh, mostly local and/or organic produce has been difficult to say the least. Saturday mornings just have not been the right time for that to be easy for me. But I’m determined to keep doing it when the schedule works out. I love the variety available.
Washing my hair with baking soda and vinegar is actually working pretty well now. I’ve used shampoo every here and there, but it’s maybe every 3 weeks. My hair seems to be adjusting pretty well. So far no complaints from family members. The baking soda and vinegar do a very nice job of keeping my hair clean.
Eating at least one vegetarian meal a week has been very challenging. The month I chose to do it in had a lot of disruptions to my routine, which meant more meals were put together as fast as possible, too little spare time to find new recipes. But once again, I mean to stick to this.
I didn’t even come up with a new resolution for this month. Those schedule disruptions continued in too far. Things are easing up now.
Each of these changes sounded pretty easy, but it’s amazing how hard it is in real life. The ones dealing with food require pretty serious changes in my routine. The hair care routine isn’t really much different from washing my hair more conventionally, so it has been easier to do.
From here, of course, I’ll just keep trying to live as eco friendly a life as I can manage. How easy that will be I just don’t know. But this is Earth Day, and that means people have spent all week posting suggestions.
More Ways to Go Green – Earth Day Blog Posts from Around the Web
Green and Clean Mom offers 10 Ways to Make Earth Day Everyday with tips such as spending less money, using post consumer recycled toilet paper and eating local.
Mother Nature Network of course has plenty of posts on the topic of Earth Day, but I like the reminder to do things, not just attend local Earth Day celebrations. I especially like the reminder to not eat meat for the Day. The guerrilla gardening tip is fun too. My husband loves making seed bombs. And don’t forget the great reminder to let your representatives know you care about our planet!
Mashable isn’t a site focused on green topics, but they get into the act with
5 More Ways to Go Green for Earth Day. I rather think kids will enjoy their link to Green My Parents. Could be a good tool for helping your kids learn about the very real financial and environmental costs of your lifestyle.
Blisstree shares 10 places to volunteer during Earth Week, and they share links to Serve.org or Volunteermatch.org just in case none of the opportunities they list are near you.
Read, Read, Read!
Books are wonderful for learning more about what you and others can do for the environment. If you know you’ll only read the book once, try to get it from your local library. If you’re like me and reread just about everything, your own copy isn’t that bad a deal. If you already own a Kindle
Here are some books to consider. I haven’t read all of them, but they look promising, whether by being good for the environment or being good for your family.
I have to start out with two of my favorites, Free-Range Kids and Last Child in the Woods. They aren’t specifically about the environment, but how else are we to get kids to care about the environment if they don’t experience it? That includes giving them the freedom so many of us had as kids.
More titles to consider:
Girls Gone Green
Green Guide Families: The Complete Reference for Eco-Friendly Parents
The Omnivore’s Dilemma
Unquenchable: America’s Water Crisis and What To Do About It
Power Trip: From Oil Wells to Solar Cells—Our Ride to the Renewable Future
Green to Gold: How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage
Eco Barons: The Dreamers, Schemers, and Millionaires Who Are Saving Our Planet
Getting Green Done: Hard Truths from the Front Lines of the Sustainability Revolution
Tags: earth day, eco friendly, Green Step By Step, one small change
Resolve to Make Small Changes
Dec 31, 2009 Green Step By Step
I’ve been posting a few small steps people can take to be more environmentally friendly in their lives. I’d like to suggest that you make it a resolution.
That’s the idea behind Hip Mountain Mama’s One Small Change. Their idea is to have people make one small change in their lifestyle each month until Earth Day, blogging about the change they make each month. Or if you don’t have a blog you can post comments about it at their site sharing the changes you’re going to make.
You blog throughout the month about the change you make and how it’s impacting your life, then summarize the entire experience on Earth Day, April 22, 2010.
I’m thinking on doing it myself, although it would be challenging. Many of their suggestions I already do regularly. Others I can’t do as a renter. And then there are things that relate to stuff I rarely do anyhow, such as printing things out.
Bringing more plants into the home sounds fun to me, although my husband should be worried that I can even think it. I’m a little hooked on an orchid my mother gave me and if more get into the house there could be trouble. They might start taking over.
Oh, wait. I have a soon to be toddler. Talk about a home’s natural defense from going overboard on plants of any sort!
Seriously, we aren’t perfect and I’m sure I can find some areas to work on. I’ll be giving this a go.
How about you? And you? And YOU?
Tags: earth day, small changes
What to Do for Earth Day?
Apr 22, 2009 Environmentally Friendly, Going Green
Today is Earth Day. These days I find it to be an interesting combination between environmental concern and consumerism. So many companies take the opportunity to greenwash.
That’s not to say there aren’t good things to buy for Earth Day. If there’s a truly green change you’re wanting to make it’s a good time to do it.
For example, you might choose to use more energy efficient lightbulbs, such as CFLs
You get the idea. Just be sure that you’re really making an environmentally sound choice, not falling for greenwashing. There’s a lot of that out there.
If you’re living a generally green life already, you may feel like there’s not much to be done to improve your home, at least not within your current budget. That’s fine. There’s plenty more you can do.
There are Earth Day events in most communities. Some will be today, others on the weekend. Last year, for example, my family and I attended an event where people were able to help plant trees in an area that had burned in a wildfire. Our kids were too tired that day to help, but they enjoyed the educational parts of the event and a short hike through the nature reserve.
You can also encourage people you know to get more involved. One day doesn’t do much for the planet, but if you can use it to get people who aren’t thinking about the environment to consider it more, you could help with the problem. These things take time, after all.
Tags: consumerism, earth day, environmentalism, green shopping
