Kitchen Stewardship

Wanting somewhere to start?  Try the top 10 tips for making changes that make a difference (without tooooo much work).

Monday Mission Checklist (What is a Monday Mission?)

1. Handwashing and Antibacterial Soap : Wash hands well and rid the house of triclosan.
2. Reduce Food Waste:  Salvage bread heels and leftover cooked veggies.
3. Reduce Energy Waste: Using your dishwasher wisely.
4. Meal Planning:  Level up in your meal plan organization.
5. Safe(er) Plastics:  Avoid BPA in drinking containers.
6. Traditional Bone Broths:  How to make the most delicious, frugal, nutritious chicken stock in the world.
   The next 15 weeks are a series of Super Food challenges.  See this page for details.
7. Legume Recommend Beans:  A challenge to include beans/legumes in your meal plan once a week, with how-to prepare and recipes.
8. Making Yogurt:  Easy how-to steps to make homemade yogurt, plus alternative baby steps for those who aren’t ready to take the plunge to homemade.
9. Eat More Eggs:  A simple challenge to include more of this super food in your week.
10. Can the Cans:  Commit to never allowing canned vegetables in your cupboards.
11. No Nukes for Cruciferous Vegetables:  Try steaming your vegetables instead of using the microwave.

Bonus: Mind the Microwave in May and its origins

12. Be Aware of the Dirty Dozen Produce Items:  Memorize the list of 12 top pesticide-laden fruits and veggies.
13. Plastics, Part two:  Rethink Plastic Food Storage
14. Fats, Part one:  Search Out Trans Fats (and a look at monounsaturated fats)
15. Fats, Part two:  Increase your Omega-3 Fats (salmon, flax)
16. Whole Grains:  Find a New Oat Recipe
17. Eating Orange (veggies) and Revisiting Meal Planning
18. Learn About Complete Proteins:  You can reduce meat consumption (budget help) if you know how to pair non-meal proteins for best nutrition.
19. Plastics, Part Three:  Reduce Your Consumption of Plastic Bags
20. Use up ALL your Spinach: Ideas to make sure you don’t waste spinach when you buy a fresh bag or box.
21. Try Something New:  Learn about Pomegranates, Green Tea, Cranberry Juice and Artichokes.
22. Condiment Awareness:  Take a small step (or two or three!) to making more healthy condiment choices.
23. Analyzing Aluminum Foil:  Some tips to help you Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle this non-renewable resource.
24. Analyzing Aluminum Cookware and Bakeware:  What are you cooking on?  Ideas to avoid aluminum pots, pans, and cookie sheets.
25. Conserve Energy with your Stovetop/Oven:  10 tips to cutting your energy and budget waste while cooking and baking.
26. Switch your Baking Powder to Aluminum-Free:  You can buy it for just a teensy bit more than conventional baking powder or make your own.
27. No More Bleach in the Kitchen:  It’s overkill and killing the environment.  My easy, natural kitchen cleaning solutions.
28. Make Your Salads Count:  Bring more to your mouth than just lettuce, including healthy fats.
29. Release Your Fear of Fats:  Time to put your thinking caps on and learn a little about how necessary fat is to your body.  This will challenge your “low-fat” mentality.
30. Switch to Butter:  The real thing is where it’s at.  Read my journey about what I put on my toast and consider yours.
31. Consider Full Fat Dairy:  My family’s been eating dairy with all the healthy fats included since Christmas.  See what happened to us!
32. Pare Down the Polys:  To balance your omega-3s and omega-6s, you’ve got to take some steps to cut back on polyunsaturated fats such as soybean and corn oil.
33. Read up on Canola Oil:  There is a lot of conflicting research on Canola, but it’s no longer a staple in my kitchen.  Part two:  Find a Healthy Fat Recipe at the Healthy Fats Carnival.
34. Try Coconut Oil or Ghee:  Time to try a new healthy fat.  Learn about a few that I’ve tried in the past year.
35. Beef Tallow and Lard:  Animal fats got a bad rap last century.  Let’s give them a chance for a comeback.
36. Figure out the Fats Vocabulary:  How does the pressing of oils affect their nutrition, how to decipher all the labels on your packages.
37. Soak Your Oatmeal:  Increase the nutrition of a frugal breakfast and make it more digestible.
38. Repurpose Kitchen Containers:  Part of Decreasing Disposables in December, this first challenge saves money and resources while keeping your home organized.
39. Decrease Holiday Disposables:  From wrapping paper to cards to big parties, December creates terrible waste.  Some ideas to cut it down.
40. Switch to the Real Thing or Reuse:  7 Choices to decrease disposables on the table, from serving parties with real plates to using cloth napkins.
41. Cleaning Tips to Decrease Disposables:  Throwing away lots of paper towel?  You can stop now.  Also see my posts on microfiber cloths and Skoy cloths.
42. How do you Meal Plan? Some tips for finding meal planning inspiration and keeping organized.
43. Level Up Your Yogurt Profile: Take the next step toward making homemade yogurt (mission no. 8), including my newest tips for success.
44. Green Resolutions:  A comprehensive list of green cleaning substitutions and a challenge to pick one…and change it.
45. Healthy Upgrades:  Real Food Recipe Renditions:  Learn how to make your favorite recipes without the processed convenience food ingredients.
46. Healthy Upgrades: Make it from Scratch: A challenge to make one boxed thing from scratch.
47. Eat Fewer Grains:  In the midst of such research controversy on the health benefits or dangers of grains, let’s try to eat one grain-less meal each day this week, just to raise our consciousness of how many grains we consume.
48. Soak Your Grains:  To increase digestibility, some  research suggests proper preparation of grains is to soak them.
49. Bake Homemade Bread or Grind Your Own Wheat: If you want the healthiest bread, you might want to try it at home.  Even healthier?  Freshly ground flour (even though I don’t do this yet!).
50. Make a Sourdough Starter: Research shows that sourdough is the healthiest way to prepare grains.  Capture your own yeast for free!
51. Sprout Something:  Sprouting increases nutrients in seeds and legumes.  All you need is a colander.
52. Get the Antibacterial Soap Out: Part of the Spring Cleaning: Get the Junk Out! Carnival, here is a challenge to rid your home of antibacterial soaps and bleach.
53. Learn About Celiac Disease and Gluten Intolerance:  Often under- and mis-diagnosed, allergies and sensitivities to wheat deserve a little attention.
54. Clean out the Plastics Cupboard: Four different levels of commitment for getting rid of some of your plastic food storage containers.
55. Use Less Refined Sugar:  Simple ways to cut down and cut out on an unnecessary (but delicious) calorie.
56. Seek Out and Avoid Parabens: A cancer-causing preservative in beauty products, parabens are no good.  Find natural alternatives.
57. Find Those MSGs:  There are over 20 names MSG can hide under.  Do you know what’s in your pantry?
58. Where Does Your Meat Come From?: Do some research and learn about various farming methods and sources.
59. Take an Organic Step: Either buy something new organic or move toward organic gardening.
60. Organize Something:  From your email inbox to paper clutter, your menu planning and your recipes, everyone can organize something better.
61. Know What you Spend, Spend What you Earn: 15 ways to reduce your food spending and cut the budget, while finding money elsewhere to put toward food.

Most Monday Missions are connected to a Food for Thought, an information post to prepare your brain for the practical mission.  Here are those posts:

1. Antibacterial Soap
   Supermarkets’ waste of food
2. America’s Food Waste
3. Energy Use in the Kitchen
4. Menu Planning
5. Plastic Safety
   Hand Sanitizers in the Home
   Health Benefits of Super Foods:
6. Chicken Stock/Broth
7. Beans/Legumes
8. Yogurt
9. Eggs
10. Tomatoes
11. Cruciferous Vegetables
12. Garlic and Onions
    Peppers
13. Super Fruits
14. Monounsaturated Fats: Avocado, Peanut Butter and Olive Oil
    Olive Oil Primer
15. Omega-3s:  Salmon and Flax
    How to Use and Store Flax
    How to Buy Safe Salmon
    
16. Oatmeal and Sunflower Seeds
    How to Read a Bread Bag for Whole Grains
17. Orange Veggies
18. walnuts and almonds (and other nuts and seeds)
19. turkey, We Use Too Many Plastic Bags
20. Spinach, the Ultimate Super Food
21. (in Monday Mission post)
22. Cinnamon, Dark Chocolate and Honey
23. Why Analyze Aluminum?
24. Hazards of Aluminum
25. Energy Cost in the Kitchen
26. Analyzing Aluminum in Vaccines
27. Why is Bleach Bad for Me?
28. Easy Salad Making Tips
29. How Fat Works in the Body
30. The Facts (?) on Saturated Fat
31. What’s the Moo on Dairy Fat?
32. Is Polyunsaturated Fat Healthy?
33. Canola Oil, A Unique Omega-3:  Thumbs Up or Thumbs Down?
34. Coconut Oil Information on Both Sides
35. Lard and Tallow are Healthy Fats!
36. Baseline Fats:  What Fat to Use for What Purpose
37. Soaking Whole Grains
38. Decreasing Disposables in December
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45. How to Reverse Engineer a Recipe for Real Food Quality
46. Eat Fewer Grains…or Just Fix ‘Em?
47. The Nutritional Value of Whole Grains
48. Is Soaking Grains Traditional? (historical and Biblical references to grains)
49. Phytase is higher in freshly ground grain
50. Health Benefits of Sourdough Preparation
51. Health Benefits of Sprouting
52. Why Antibacterial Soap and Triclosan is bad for you (BONUS: from a biologist – The Biology of Antibiotic Resistance)
53. Thoughts on Gluten from a Gluten-Free blogger
54. Fake Plastic Fish’s Take on Why All Plastics Should get out of your Kitchen
55. 5 Reasons Sugar is Bad for you
56. Mindful Momma’s Parabens Background
57. Top 10 Food Additives to Avoid and Why
58. Grassfed Meat: Is it Really Healthier?
59. Pesticides in our Gardens, No Way!
60. Easy Steps to Reducing Clutter in your Home
61. How to Reduce Debt and Stick to  a Budget

Mind the Microwave in May

• The Challenge
• The Invitation
• Research Notes, part one: Breastmilk
• 10 Tips for Avoiding the Microwave
• Time Management/Fewer Dishes Tips
• 13 Surprising Benefits of a Microwave Free Life
• Research Notes, part two: Radiation Danger

Analyzing Aluminum in August

• The Introduction
• Use less aluminum foil
  Baked Potatoes without Aluminum Foil
• Analyzing Aluminum Cookware and Bakeware
• Food for Thought:  Why Analyze Aluminum? (Research on Dangers)
• Analyzing Aluminum in Antiperspirants:  Hazard or Hoax?
• My Deodorant Story
• Monday Mission:  Switch your Baking Powder to Aluminum-Free
• Vaccine Notes

A Fat Full Fall

• The Introduction
• How Fat is Metabolized by the Body
• Are Saturated Fats Healthy or Evil?
• Tips for the Switch to Real Butter
• Butter vs. Margarine vs. “Healthy” Spreads
• My Family’s Journey to Full Fat Dairy
• Powdered Milk and Oxidized Cholesterol
• Polyunsaturated Fats – Are they Healthy?
• Evils of industrial fats – soybean and corn oil
• 6 Ways to Reduce your Omega-6 Intake
• Canola Oil: Friend or Foe?
• Fats you Don’t Always Hear About: Coconut Oil, Ghee
  • Health Benefits of Coconut Oil
  • Coconut Oil FAQs and How to Use
  • How to Make Ghee