I Tumble For Ya

I am officially composting.

Saturday brought a bright sunny Colorado spring day, Marc was without flu or hangover and we set to building the Backyard ComposTumbler. Thanks to my expert instruction reading, our composter was set up and filled with old leaves just a scant 45 minutes.

I was even able to take out my first bag of refuse from the kitchen pail, after cleaning veggies from the weekly store run. And, it's looking like I will be able to take another load out in the next few days thanks to my Roast Banana-Pumpkin Bread baking frenzy and our daily coffee habit. The website says I should have compost in 4-6 weeks ... just in time to start my garden! I wonder if it will come together faster if I wear a denim shirt while I use it.

I'm So Excited

And I just can't hide it. I'm about to lose control and I think I like it.

I'm also glad Marc isn't here right now to see how giddy I am over the arrival of my compost pail! It's basically just a mini trash can to hold all my kitchen scraps before they are off to the ComposTumbler but it's stainless steel (goes with the toaster) and has a charcoal filter in the top to help eliminate odors. Best of all, I got some BioBags, which are fully biodegradable trash bags that I can use in the Pail and put directly into the compost pile.

They will also be a big revelation in dog poop pick up. No more fossilized golden retriever poop.

Now, if only I had some vegetable scraps to put in it. It's almost enough to make a girl want a pre-dinner apple.

Pizza Hut Goes "Natural"

Well, I have to hand it to Pizza Hut for being the first mainstream fast food chain to jump on the Natural wagon. I saw an advertisement today for Pizza Hut's new "Natural" pizza. What's so natural about this pizza? Well, I'm-a-gonna-tell-ya.

1. Multi-Grain Crust (note - not organic, not whole wheat, but a multitude of grains)
2. Sauce "made-with" organic tomatoes
3. Choice of new "natural" toppings (which from the images they showed consists of sliced tomatoes and begs the question - are the rest of the toppings not-natural?)
4. "All-Natural" mozzarella cheese

It's just yet another example of the bastardization of the term "natural." Junk food purveyors of the world are all racing to slap the term "natural" on their packaging to win the hearts, taste buds and market share of pseudo-conscious consumers. What's next - Organic Special Sauce?

Oh - and I should note here that my local Pizza Hut has a Hummer delivery vehicle parked out front of its store. I wrote a sharply worded email to corporate HQ but have yet to receive a response.

Scrooge McAnnie

Sometimes, the hardest thing about living the organic lifestyle is parting with my pennies.

To celebrate Marc's birthday this weekend, I made Whole Grain Pancakes with Blueberry Syrup - a recipe we have been salivating over since I purchased a copy of Bon Appetit last month. The recipe required a trip to the store, of course, so I went by the Safeway up the street. Everything was going smoothly - I didn't mind the $5.99 price tag on the Kodiak whole grain pancake mix (it looks good!) and I didn't even flinch at the $4.49 sale price on O brand organic butter. $5.99 for Organic Pure Maple Syrup - sure! It takes a lot to tap those trees. But when it came to the frozen blueberries, I stalled.

The Safeway Brand Organic Wild Blueberries were on SALE for $4.99. The regular blueberries were $2.99. I'm not sure why I was so appalled at this price ... it just seemed like a shocking difference. After much pondering, I eventually bought the organic berries rationalizing that I was either an organic shopper, or not.

The pancakes were delicious, by the way.

And, We're Back

Sorry for the hiatus, but as many of you know - Marc and I were on a month-long adventure in Southern Patagonia, Argentina. We kept a couple of blogs going intermittedly, which you can check out here:

http://adventureedge.blogspot.com/
http://patagoniawino.blogspot.com/

I did find some interesting "green" things to report back on from our trip - which I will be outlining in the coming days. Nice to be home!

Stuck On You

I just read this in today's Ideal Bite and I had to share!

You know the little stickers you find on apples, oranges, lemons and jicama (just to name a few)? Well, it turns out produce producers are utilizing a standard system for identifying your juicy favorites. Look for these numbers and you'll know what you're feeding your body!

Look for the labels stuck on your fruits and veggies:

• A four-digit number means it's conventionally grown.
• A five-digit number beginning with 9 means it's organic.
• A five-digit number beginning with 8 means it's Genetically Modified.

Tap That

Did you know that when you buy that plastic liter bottle of water at the 7-11, you're actually consuming 6 liters of water? Yeah - that's because it takes nearly 5 liters of water to manufacture the plastic bottle holding all that H2O. I saw it on Oprah so it must be true.

Not enough to get you to quit the Evian habit? According to the Green Guide, Americans tossed over 22 BILLION empty plastic bottles into the trash. To produce those bottles alone, the US will drain 1.5 million barrels of oil over the course of just a year. That's a lot of Texas Tea we could be using to power our planes, trains and automobiles ... but instead we're tossing it into the landfill where it will sit for the next thousand years.

Do we seriously still think our tap water isn't safe to drink? Sure, we think we're making the "healthy" choice when we opt for Dasani in lieu of a Coke on our road trips, but what about the refill? What's so wrong with re-using those bottles with cold tap water? Or hey, here's a novel idea: how about we use a little forethought and bring our own bottle with us when we're out and about (maybe it could stow in one of your handy canvas totes?).

I'm all for drinking plenty of water and there are times when I will buy a bottle at the airport, but I refuse to buy plastic bottle after plastic bottle. What am I, too good for the tap?
Not anymore! I have my aluminum Sigg bottle set and ready to go in my carry on for next week's trip. I will fill it up at home and at various stops along the way, because it's just not worth it to create the extra trash.

Plus, the cool leaf design on the jug is a much finer fashion statement.