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Daily Roundup: November 25, 2009

Goin' to Copenhagen: The White House announced that President Obama will attend the December climate summit in Copenhagen and the U.S. will commit to reducing emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. Los Angeles Times, New York Times, and Sierra Club

Pedal Problems: Toyota will repair accelerator pedals on 2004 to 2008 model Prius hybrids as part of the automaker's largest-ever recall. Bloomberg

Good Gobble: President Obama pardoned the White House turkey, continuing a presidential tradition that began in 1989. CNN

Birds on the Brain: Martha Stewart discussed the horrors of the meat industry with vegetarian author Jonathan Safran Foer on her show's Thanksgiving episode. Ecorazzi and Green Daily

Home Grown: The first official state dinner for the Obama administration featured a menu inspired by the White House garden. The meal's arugula was harvested from the White House grounds. Treehugger

--Della Watson

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Green Your Thanksgiving: Want Not, Waste Not

Don't let this pie go to waste It's almost time for Americans to visit with loved ones, express gratitude, and eat a really, really big meal. This year, we're providing tips to help you celebrate Thanksgiving with less impact.

Tip #4: Streamline Your Meal

Most people expect to be well-fed on Thanksgiving, but you can reduce waste by considering portion size and guests' personal tastes. If no one actually likes mincemeat pie, don't make it just to satisfy tradition. Fill the bigger platters with local vegetables and serve more carbon-intensive food in a small dish with a small spoon to encourage dainty portions. Keep waste out of the landfill by sending leftovers home with guests and composting food scraps.

Share your tips: How do you reduce food waste during Thanksgiving?

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Green Your Thanksgiving: Rethink the Turkey

Rethink the turkey It's almost time for Americans to visit with loved ones, express gratitude, and eat a really, really big meal. This year, we're providing tips to help you celebrate Thanksgiving with less impact.

Tip #2: Buy a Heritage Bird or Go Meatless

Want to celebrate "Turkey Day" without supporting environmentally destructive factory farms? You can help preserve species diversity by purchasing a free-range heritage turkey from a local farm. If meat isn't a must-have, consider skipping the bird altogether and building a hearty meal around vegetarian dishes such as autumn tempeh salad or butternut squash enchiladas.

Share your tips: What is your favorite turkey substitute?

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Green Your Thanksgiving: Local Foods

Shop at your local farmers' marketIt's almost time for Americans to visit with loved ones, express gratitude, and eat a really, really big meal. This year, we're providing tips to help you celebrate Thanksgiving with less impact.

Tip #1: Try Regional Recipes

Traditional Thanksgiving meals tend to favor fall produce, so it's a great time to focus on locally grown fruits and veggies. Consider adapting time-honored recipes to reflect your region's growing season and history. For a fun challenge, plan either one dish or the entire meal with ingredients grown or produced within 100 miles of your home. Check out the Daily Green's 100-mile Thanksgiving meal plans for five different U.S. cities to find examples of creative, local solutions

Tip #2 Buy a Heritage Bird or Go Meatless

Tip #3 Appreciate the Natural World

Tip #4 Streamline Your Meal

Share your tips: Do you make a Thanksgiving dish that's unique to your region?

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Serious Cereal

Cereal, that most beloved of breakfast (and lunch, and dinner, and late-night snack) foods, has gone green. For those shoppers facing the ever-growing array of eco-conscious cereal brands lining supermarket shelves, Sierra Club staffers valiantly agreed to blind-taste more than 25 varieties in our effort to help you sift the savory wheat from the inedible chaff.

The winners, below, were drenched in compliments. The losers, which shall remain unnamed, suffered the verbal equivalent of getting dumped in the compost bin: "like eating socks," "dis-freaking-gusting," "tastes like sunscreen," "looks like sawdust," "cloying," and "Styrofoam."

 To qualify for the tasting, a cereal had to be certifiably planet-friendly, whether organic, made with solar power, or produced by a company that donates to environmental causes. We limited the choices to cold cereals and let our 14 tasters opt for low-fat cow's milk or soy milk. They rated each cereal on a 1-to-10 scale, and we averaged their scores to determine our winners. SMSO09_EN_cereal1

1. Early Bird Granola, Aloha Recipe | Score: 7.8 | $8 for 12 oz.

This "not too sweet" granola with a "bright and lovely" appearance reminded one person of Christmas, another of Cracker Jacks. Most agreed that it has a "good balance between crunch and fruit" and that it "holds up well to milk." Though it was "too buttery" for one and "too chewy" for another (and, we'd imagine, too expensive for many), it's a "wholesome," "fresh-tasting" delight flecked with coconut, macadamia, and tangy dried fruit.

Early Bird owner Nekisia Davis says she buys organic ingredients whenever possible, recycles and composts all waste, and uses rice-paper packages that biodegrade faster than plastic.

2. Cascadian Farm Organic, Kids Cinnamon Crunch | Score: 6.8 | $3.99 for 13.25 oz.SMSO09_EN_cereal2

"Cinnamon Toast Crunch? Or at least a good imitation," mused one taster. Another described it as tasting "like childhood," though a few complained of too much sugar. Tasters also gave high marks to Cascadian Farm's Dark Chocolate Almond Granola, which was called "lightly sweet" with a "good, nutty flavor."

Cascadian Farm, now a General Mills brand, has been organic for more than 35 years and doesn't use synthetic pesticides, herbicides, or GMOs to grow its ingredients.

Continue reading "Serious Cereal" »

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Fall Harvest Week: Lookin' Good

Show us your favorite farmers' market Fall officially begins with the autumnal equinox on September 22, so this week on the Green Life, we'll explore some of the ways to celebrate the harvest season. 

Tip #4: Show Off Your Favorite Market

Bring a camera the next time you visit your local farmers' market, because the folks at the Fans of Farmers' Markets group on Climate Crossroads are collecting photographs of vendors and veggies. They'll use the uploaded images to create an online photomap of sustainable markets across the country. Put your region's seasonal bounty on display by joining the group, uploading a photo, and including a caption that states the location of the market.

Share your tips: Where do you buy seasonal produce?

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Fall Harvest Week: Preserves

Preserve seasonal foods to eat locally all year Fall officially begins with the autumnal equinox on September 22, so this week on the Green Life, we'll explore some of the ways to celebrate the harvest season. 

Tip #3: Consider Canning

Want to be a locavore this winter? Fall is a great time to stock your pantry with preserved food. The season's raspberries and blackberries are ideal for making jams and jellies. Try your hand at canning your favorite local veggies or experiment with pickling or drying. If you're not ready to make your own preserves, support sustainable businesses buy purchasing goods like homemade applesauce or local pickles through a CSA or at a farmers' market.

Share your tips: What types of preserved food do you make or eat?

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A New Way to Find Veg-Friendly Restaurants

Veggiefood For vegetarians and vegans who love to dine out, Opposing Views has launched an interactive restaurant database. It looks like a spreadsheet and provides a place for vegetarians and vegans to search for delicious finds.

The long list can be a bit overwhelming, but the search box is very effective. You can even search within your initial results until you find exactly what you want, where you want it: We typed in “Middle Eastern,” then “San Francisco,” and the site served up two great finds.

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Back to School Week: Reducing Lunch Waste

Lunch boxes reduce waste Summer vacation is winding down, which means it's time to prepare for new teachers, new classes, and new friends. This week, we're providing green tips for going back to school.


Tip #2: Cut Back on Packaging

If you're planning to send your son or daughter to school with a packed lunch, consider what's going to end up in the trash. According to Mother Jones, the average child throws away 90 pounds of leftovers and packaging per year. Avoid single-use snack items and processed foods. To reduce waste, buy staples in bulk, then pack sandwiches, side items, and drinks in reusable containers

Share your tips: How do you reduce lunch waste?
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Book Roundup Wednesday: Books About Eating Green

Books about environmentalism Every Wednesday, we review a selection of new and upcoming books addressing a specific aspect of environmentalism. Since the last time we recommended books about food and its relation to the environment, a new crop of books on the same topic has found its way onto our desks, so here’s another roundup of books that’ll help you eat green.

Big Green Cookbook: Hundreds of Planet-Pleasing Recipes & Tips for a Luscious, Low-Carbon Lifestyle (by Jackie Newcent, $25, Wiley, Apr. 2009): This chunky volume is well-designed and packed with non-intimidating recipes for people committed to eating conscientiously. Sprinkled in are tips for greener cooking, such as which coal to use when barbecuing (natural-lump charcoal from sustainably sourced hardwood), and using the microwave instead of the oven, thereby conserving two-thirds the amount of energy.

Cool Cuisine: Taking the Bite Out of Global Warming (by Laura Stec with Eugene Cordero, $25, Gibbs Smith, Sept. 2008): Recipes are just part of the equation here: The rest of this colorful book provides the context for why your dinner might be linked to global warming (the authors call the standard American diet [SAD] “a Hummer on a plate”), what you can do about it, and a discussion of “America’s changing palate.”

Continue reading "Book Roundup Wednesday: Books About Eating Green" »

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