How "green" is my favorite meal?

Reflecting on the environmental geography of my meal:

          My Meal was generally green compared to most meals. I made homemade gnocchi, tomato sauce, salad, and had a water to drink. My meal isn’t necessarily a solution as a whole, but it also isn’t the problem as a whole.  Certain ingredients such as the tomatoes I used were homegrown, without pesticides, and only watered with rainwater. This is a great solution to cut down on water use and pesticides that damage our environment. Unfortunately, the only time my family is able to grow tomatoes is during the warmer seasons because they don’t survive during the winter. My meal also consisted of a few other water demanding products such as lettuce, potatoes (for the gnocchi) and lemons. If all of these products were grown at my house, without pesticides, my meal would have been much “greener”.

         My meal contributed to the solution of global problems in many ways. By home growing some of my ingredients, I cut down on pesticide damage, water use, and most importantly the transportation of these goods that emits pollutants into the atmosphere. This also helps reduce local demand for the products, which means transportation declines, water use declines, and pesticide use declines. Overall, the most negative impact comes from the pollution from transporting the goods to my local market place. Since we live in a place where most goods cannot survive in the harsh winter, we have to have certain goods transported to us. However, if there are products that do not use pesticide or are organic we can help support them by only buying those products and forcing other carriers to change to organic and more eco-friendly methods. These methods would also help our local community be “greener” when buying goods.

         At the micro-scale of my household, growing our own goods keeps the products at our fingertips. We prevent the amount of pollution that emits from our cars driving into town to get groceries, and also the transportation from bigger farms that grow our products.  We also only rely on rainwater for our products, so our water use is not a significant negative impact either.

         The main dish of my meal, gnocchi, is simple and for the most part, an eco-friendly dish that anyone could make and eat. By encouraging people to eat healthier and to grow all the goods they can at home, they are saving gas, money, and saving the environment one good at a time. If everyone did this, even only when the seasons allowed, the amount of water use and pollution emissions would decrease significantly. We can’t always have eco-friendly meals, but it is a great thing to keep in mind when cooking up your next meal. Avoiding meat is one of the most environmentally friendly things you can do when it comes to food. The amount of energy and waste that comes with meat production is insane compared to the amount that is actually produced. This activity definitely made me more conscious about my food, how it impacts the environment and myself, and where it came from!

Thanks for reading,

Ellen

Environmental Impacts of my Lunch

After cooking up some homemade gnocchi, I assumed that my meal wouldn't have had as much of an impact on the environment as it did. To fully understand the environmental impacts of my meal, I broke down the key ingredients of my gnocchi, salad, and beverage as simply as I could.

Gnocchi: 

Egg- eggs are considered one of the "greener" proteins, in comparison to meat, but they still have an impact on earth. Some impacts include: land use, and ammonia emissions from chicken waste.

Potatoes- potatoes generally have a low environmental impact as for production, the emission of greenhouse gases comes mainly from cultivation and transportation of the product. Other greenhouse gas emissions from potato production is caused from fertilizers and plowing, but not as nearly as much as transportation.

Tomato Sauce:

Tomato- the two tomatoes that I used were homegrown with black soil and no fertilizer, although I did do some research on tomatoes and their impact on the environment because we do not have tomatoes available all year round.

-Their water use is significant
-Growing, packaging and transporting one pound of tomatoes to the supermarket requires between 700 to 850 pounds of water

Rosemary/basil-homegrown, black soil, no fertilizer

Salad:

Balsamic Reduction: bottle production and waste, high emissions of greenhouse gasses

Iceberg Lettuce: nitrate groundwater contamination from pesticide use, significant water use impact

Beverage:

Lemon: water use

Glacier Mist Spring Water: "bottles used to package the water take over 1,000 years to bio-degrade and if incinerated, they produce toxic fumes. It is estimated that over 80% of all single-use bottles used in the U.S. simply become litter."

-wastes resources that could be used to heat homes, like oil
-transport releases high amounts of green house gases


Where did my ingredients come from?

This was something that I found very interesting because I never thought to think twice about where my food is coming from. I always knew locally grown or growing at home was even better. When going to the grocery store, I would never search for certain foods that were only from nearby places. Learning about the impacts of the location alone from products that I consume was very eye opening. 

Iceberg Lettuce: "Tanimura & Antle" was from Selinas, California

Eggs: "Natures Touch" were from Templeton, California

Lemon: "Sunkist" was from Califronia and Arizona

Potatoes: "Green Giant" were from Salinas, California

         For the most part, my meal was more on the “green side” because I avoided meat products. Meat products have a huge impact on the environment considering all the environmental costs it takes to produce very little product. My gnocchi was potato based, which means the majority of the product I used in making my gnocchi was the potato. The potato is unfortunately a significant contributor to the water and eutrophication impact. Another significant contributor to impacts that include water was the iceberg lettuce. This product also had a high amount of water use, but also contributed to contamination of ground water (specifically nitrate contamination) because of pesticide use.

        
       Even though the tomatoes that I used were homegrown, I did some research on the tomatoes that we often use while cooking because tomatoes from our garden are not available all year round. The affects that tomatoes have on global warming, respiratory effects, and smog are mostly attributed to from the transportation of the product. The production of my products that created my meal were considered to be low impact besides my water bottle and the plastic used in creating the balsamic vinaigrette bottle. My water bottle was a complete waste of product that will takes many years to bio-degrade and if it is incinerated it will emit toxic fumes.  I do not believe that many of the impacts regarding my products are local because the majority of them are grown, processed, packaged, etc. far away from home. On the other hand, many of the impacts created by my meal are affecting the world globally. The emissions from transportation and production pollute the air, which can travel quite far.

         

         
           The bulk of the environmental impacts were associated with transportation, distribution, and consumption of the ingredients of my meal. Like I mentioned earlier, most of my products, not including the water bottle or the balsamic container, had significant impacts on water use but were still considered more efficient than other products, such as meat. The main issue from my meal is that the majority of them were transported from places like California or Arizona. The transportation impact was the biggest impact but also varies depending on how they were transported. The transportation was the largest contributor to harmful emissions. My products were transported to my local supermarket by truck from California. A few of my products, including the tomatoes and the basil were grown in our garden behind our house. We used absolutely no fertilizers and only black soil. We watered them with household water and also relied on rain.  Even though there was still a notable amount of water used, it was much “greener” to produce our own vegetables than to purchase them. My water bottle was the biggest waste out of my entire meal. It was left over and even though I am able to reuse it, it will be burned or sit in a landfill waiting years and years to biodegrade. I learned to think more about my consumer choices and to learn more about where my products came from before they came to a supermarket near me.

Thanks for reading!

Ellen

Sources:

http://thewaterproject.org/bottled_water_wasteful

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21177468

http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/conserve/tools/stewardship/docs/tomato-packaging-assessment.pdf

http://www.slv.se/en-gb/Group1/Food-and-environment/Eco-smart-food-choices/Fruits-and-berries-vegetables-and-legumes/

http://www.ifr.ac.uk/waste/Reports/DEFRA-Environmental%20Impacts%20of%20Food%20Production%20%20Consumption.pdf

http://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1062&context=agedsp

Today's Lunch

Today's Lunch: Homemade Gnocchi

For lunch today I was craving something fresh and homemade so I decided to make homemade gnocchi. Gnocchi is a type of dumpling that is made from flour, egg, and potatoes! They are very simple to make as well as very delicious. Along side of my gnocchi, I had a salad dressed with balsamic reduction dressing, salt and pepper. To drink I had a bottle of water with a lemon on the inside.

Gnocchi: To start my gnocchi I needed two cups of flour, one egg, and a cup of cooked, mashed, and peeled potatoes. I mixed all the ingredients together and formed a dough ball. I let it sit in the fridge for 15 minutes to set and then cut the dough ball in four sections and started to roll out my gnocchi. I then pressed them with a fork to create their shape. Then I cooked them. Being fresh, they only took about 3-5 minutes.

Gnocchi ingredients all sitting in a bowl waiting to be mixed.

Gnocchi after being set, rolled, and shaped with a fork. (un-cooked)

Tomato Sauce: I then heated up about 3 tablespoons of olive oil in a small pan; I added my two chopped tomatoes and 2 tablespoons of freshly chopped rosemary. I kept this on the stove on a low heat until everything came to a thicker consistency. I served this on top of my cooked gnocchi with parmesan cheese, and a couple basil leaves.

Cooked gnocchi with tomato sauce (tomatoes, olive oil, and rosemary), parmesan cheese, and basil leaves.

Salad: I used plain ice burg salad chopped and added balsamic reduction dressing. The dressing consisted of concentrated balsamic vinegar and pure cane sugar. I also added salt and pepper to my salad.

Iceberg lettuce that I used to create my salad.

To my salad I also added salt and pepper.

This balsamic reduction (with cane sugar) was the dressing for my salad.

Water: to drink I had a bottle of water from “Glacier Mist: Spring Water” to which I added a slice of lemon to.

I added a sliced lemon to my bottled water.

This is the brand of water I had for my lunch beverage.

I am very curious to learn how this meal effects my environment! I eat this meal quite often and I really enjoy it so I hope that it won't be too bad.

Thanks for reading!

The Battle of the Bag: Should the plastic bag be banned?

  After watching the “Battle of the Bag” documentary I found myself shocked as to how much it negatively affects our world today. As an American consumer I go grocery shopping with my family each week and even though we do have environmentally friendly bags, we often still use plastic as well. I had no idea how much of a negative impact on our environment I was making, each time I chose plastic.

   Shown above is a consumer alert promoting awareness for the area of California specifically. (In reality it holds the whole world accountable.) It is a "mockumentary" of the famous t.v. show, Planet Earth, instead it shows the life of a plastic bag, and it's journey to it's Great Pacific Garbage Patch (show below). It was a great video, definitely a must watch.

   Before watching the documentary, I was aware that plastic bags were by no means helpful to our world, but I still had no idea how hurtful they have been. Not only has the plastic bag indirectly hurt people, but it has also hurt innocent creatures among us. The emotion I felt during the scene when they pulled 50 kilos of plastic out of a cow’s stomach was overwhelming. I am a huge animal lover and this was almost unbelievable to me. Especially in India, a place where cows are sacred. After they have a meal or two of plastic, their digestive system can become blocked which slowly starves them to death. I learned a lot from this video and I am actually quite interested in where the process of “banning the bag” is now in America. I learned that a few countries have made it illegal to have certain types of plastic bags in possession, like Delhi, India. I hope that we can make a positive change for our country too, and soon.

 I have never actually thought about what plastic was made of before. When the Consumer Psychologist asked people on the street, “What is plastic made of?” I was just as clueless as the rest of them. I was very intrigued to think that it is made with oil. I also never thought about the life span of a plastic bag before. I was intimidated at the fact it can “live” 100-400 years. Much like the lifespan of a turtle, before it unfortunately mistakes a plastic bag for food.

  Many of the people I learned about in the video were trying to solve the plastic bag problem by first taking action in their communities. These people were passionate about saving our planet and its inhabitants. They were solving the problem by attempting to eliminate the plastic bag completely out of their communities by talking to local shop owners and businesses about how plastic bags affect our planet. All of these business owners agreed to go biodegradable. An interesting way plastic bag use was managed in another county was that the prices of plastic bags were raised an extra 30 cents per bag at a grocery store. They stated that the use of the bags dropped by 90%. Lastly, the last strategy used in this video to reduce use of the plastic bag was a fabric bag for groceries/shopping.

    I think we should deal with plastic waste in a very particular way. I think in order to have effective recycling, we should have a specific place where it can all be recycled together. Process. Procedure. Location. I believe this is a problem that we should solve locally and globally. First with a small step, locally and soon I believe the whole world will follow. I think that is it very important to make a specific place for all plastic including plastic bags to be recycled together because then we will be able to productively reuse the plastic that we produce everyday.

           As the manufacturer suggested, I think plastic bags are “misunderstood” to a certain point. I only believe that they are misunderstood because the purpose of them clearly was not to affect the world in a negative way. Unfortunately, I believe the plastic bag has more cons than pros. In conclusion, I think that recycling is a very important responsibility that each person on earth has to hold. We also need to continue to be more aware of where we leave our trash so that it doesn’t end up in an animal’s stomach. Most importantly, we need to eliminate the plastic bag, and go green.

Pictured above are cows in India eating plastic, eventually it clogs their digestive systems, causing them to starve, like mentioned in the documentary.

Above I found an interesting video on our impact on our environment (birds), it may not directly relate to the topic, but in general it is very important not to litter, animals will pick up and eat almost anything they see, mistaking it for food, like the turtle in the documentary that died after eating plastic.

Thanks for reading! 

Ellen