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Zero-Waste Chef

07.31.23 sliced fresh tomatoes rack and baking sheet before dehydrating

Posted on September 1, 2023September 1, 2023by Anne-Marie Bonneau
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Fresh tomato slices arranged on a silver wire cooling rack set inside a silver baking sheet before dehydrating. The baking sheet sits on a dark wood background.
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New recipe alert! Epic pumpkin and spice muffins m New recipe alert! Epic pumpkin and spice muffins made with fresh pumpkin (or kabocha squash). A whole fresh pumpkin cooks in my very basic, secondhand pressure cooker in a mere eight minutes. Along with fresh purée, I also bake these with freshly ground nutmeg, which grinds up quickly. The fresh pumpkin (or squash) combined with freshly ground nutmeg take these pumpkin and spice muffins to the next level. While the oven heats, I toast the nuts for the muffins. While the muffins bake, I roast the pumpkin seeds in olive oil and salt for a bonus no-waste snack. The muffins freeze well. I put a bunch in a linen bag I made out of my favorite pants after they wore out beyond repair. Swipe for the recipe cards and save the full directions! For metric conversions, see the full recipe on my website. Link in profile.
Ordinarily, I wouldn't be too thrilled by a hole i Ordinarily, I wouldn't be too thrilled by a hole in the wall but getting the gas capped in the kitchen made me so happy. This represents one more step toward getting our home off of planet-heating fossil fuels. If you are in the market for a new range or cooktop, consider induction. I am in love with my new induction electric range. It is so quick and responsive and gives off no fumes. And it cleans with a wipe! Gas stoves pollute homes with pollutants similar to what comes out of a car’s tailpipe: carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, particulate matter and formaldehyde. These pollutants have been associated with a host of respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. And of all the unburned methane gas that gas stoves emit, about 80 percent leaks from loose couplings and fittings between gas pipes and stoves. In other words, gas stoves emit most of their methane when they sit idle. Swipe to see thermal a image of gas in action, then induction. Orange indicates heat—not flames. Although the small pot shown in the second image sat on the appropriately sized burner, you can see a lot of heat escaping. Those are not flames lapping the sides of the pot. Induction in the third pic has heated only the pot. This was not an inexpensive switch—I'm fortunate to be able to do it—however, I did apply for a rebate from @bayren_official which will help. The IRA will also provide a rebate for induction electric stoves next year. That rebate isn’t retroactive but 2024 is right around the corner. I've written a detailed blog post about making the switch. I included stuff I wish I had known before we started and I provide info on rebates too. Link in profile for the post, If My New Induction Electric Range Were a Man I’d Marry It.
🍉 Did you know? Watermelon rinds are edible 🍉 After making watermelon gazpacho on the weekend, I started a batch of watermelon rind “pickles.” Peel the rinds, cut them into bite-size pieces, submerge in brine in a clean jar and wait. Of, if you have leftover brine from another ferment, submerge the rinds in that. The jar on the right is made of new brine. I also added fresh dill and the jalapeño top and ribs left over from making my soup. (That small amount of jalapeño added a nice spicy kick and put those bits to good use.) The jar on the left is made with pickle brine left over from a jar of fermented dill pickles. These pickles taste yummy, provide gut-friendly probiotics practically free and keep watermelon rinds out of landfills. Swipe for the full recipe and pics of how I weigh these down. And save this post so you'll have the recipe cards for your next watermelon! 🍉🍉🍉
Dehydrated tomatoes take up little cupboard space, Dehydrated tomatoes take up little cupboard space, preparing them requires minimal hands-on work and, like other food preservation techniques, dehydration prevents food from going bad and going to a landfill where it would emit planet-heating methane gas. I dehydrated these in a car parked in full sun. You could also use a dehydrator, a solar dehydrator, the oven or an air fryer with a dehydrator setting.
After saving up and freezing my fruit scraps all s After saving up and freezing my fruit scraps all summer, I made a vat of fruit scrap soda, a carbonated fermented drink that costs almost nothing to make. Essentially, you put fruit scraps, sugar and water in a jar, cover and stir a few times a day. Drink once it becomes bubbly—after 2 to 3 days—or bottle it to increase the carbonation. This batch contained a generous 4 cups of frozen fruit scraps—strawberry tops and scraps; whole peach and cherry pits with a bit of fruit clinging to them and even date pits; 8 cups water and 1/2 cup of sucanat. Any sugar will work however. Sucanat is a bit less processed. (TIP: Pour the water into the fruit jars before adding it to the vat in order to get every last bit of fruit out.) The scoop of sugar looks like a shockingly large amount but it feeds the lactic-acid bacteria present on the fruit scraps. You don’t consume much sugar (unless you want to add more for a sweeter drink). These good bacteria need it for fuel to enable them to reproduce and ferment the drink. This batch was no longer sweet after two days of fermenting at room temperature when I bottled it. It was fairly boozy—not as boozy as a beer, more like 2 percent or so. (I didn’t measure but as a lightweight, I can detect low levels of alcohol.) As I bottled the drink, I also added a bit of lemon juice. Usually, I make a second, more concentrated infusion but because these spent scraps had zero sweetness or flavor left in them, I composted them. See my recipe index for the full instructions.
I scored a deal on organic, local nectarines yeste I scored a deal on organic, local nectarines yesterday at the farmers’ market. The end-of-the-day price was $2 per pound compared to the wake-up-early-price of $5.50 per pound. (Sometimes arriving late pays off.) I also bought discounted blueberries and pastries. I bought more than we can eat but none will go to waste! I sliced up several, spread them across a bare baking sheet and froze them. After a couple of hours in the freezer, they easily pop off the baking sheet. At that point, transfer the frozen wedges to containers and put the fruit back in the freezer. This one tray filled three large jars. Most of the nectarines will go into galettes, some will find their way into smoothies. Freezing food extends its shelf life and keeps food out of landfill where it would emit methane, a planet-heating greenhouse gas much more potent than carbon dioxide. And freezing is easy! You don't need special equipment. Just do a little prep and squirrel it away in the freezer to enjoy later.
Thank you @latimes for the interview! ‘But even Thank you @latimes for the interview! ‘But even though Bonneau has been plastic-free since 2011, she doesn’t want anyone to “get hung up on ‘zero waste.' " It is, she says, "just a goal.” ‘ Link @zerowastechef for the article.
After visiting the repair café at our library thi After visiting the repair café at our library this past Saturday, I once again have a working bedside lamp. Repair cafés help build community and resiliency while giving useful items a second life and keeping them out of landfills. Rather than dropping your item off and returning to pick it up at a later date, in a repair café, you sit with the volunteer repairing it, you explain the problem, you learn a bit about the repair process and you have a social interaction. About 20 volunteers fixed broken items at Saturday’s repair café. Some of them fixed electronics, some clothing, some small appliances. Every time a volunteer repaired an item, we’d hear the sound of a metal handbell ringing. It rang several times during my lamp’s straightforward repair (it needed a new socket and some tightening up of the base). If your city doesn’t have a repair café and you’d like to start one, read the book Repair Revolution: How Fixers Are Transforming Our Throwaway Culture, written by John Wackman, founder of the first repair cafe in New York, and Elizabeth Knight, a community sustainability activist and organizer. It outlines the history of the repair movement and provides the practical nuts and bolts for launching and operating successful repair cafés. Thank you volunteers for all the repairs you executed and @sunnyvalelibrary for hosting the event!
When searching for solutions to our waste crisis, When searching for solutions to our waste crisis, whether dealing with wasted food, plastic pollution or random clutter, source reduction works best. When source reduction isn't possible, secondary solutions include donating food and unwanted goods, reusing whatever can be reused and implementing policies such as forcing polluters to pay for the waste they create. Ideally though, businesses, institutions and individuals would stop waste before it happens—at the source—rather than having to manage mounds of waste after the fact.
A sunflower jungle is growing where cement had cov A sunflower jungle is growing where cement had covered the soil for decades. We had this and another section torn out last year and plan on removing more this year. The concrete is recycled at a facility in San Jose. Bees buzz around the flowers all day long. Birds make pit stops on the plants. And I’m looking forward to watching critters feast on the mature seeds. Witnessing the transformation brings so much joy.
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