Where things stand re. single use plastics

Here we are at the end of February. Has our single-use plastic consumption declined? Yeah, but...

We've only been at this for two months, but we're concluding that a life without single-use plastic is pretty darned near impossible in the U.S. without massively adjusting what we eat. Is it possible to eat 100% locally sourced foods? Probably. Are we going to try hard enough to do that? Jury's still out on that. No coffee, no chocolate, no lemons, no pears, no sugar, no lots of stuff. Maybe we can dedicate a week or two to trying this later this spring, to see how it goes...

We've made some changes that we like:

* We're much better about remembering to bring bags with us to shop at the Farmers' Market and the food co-op, and going without bags if we forget them, knowing our backpacks can handle loose radicchio, kohlrabi, and other seasonal veggies until we get them home.

* We're much better about re-using plastic bags that we might not have re-used previously, because by trying to forego plastic bags, we're realizing what a luxury a good plastic bag is.

* We're re-using glass jars to store bulk foods, and enjoying the ease of use, the visual appeal, and (hopefully) the reduction in off-gassing from plastic containers into food for long-term storage. We now use plastic mainly for storing leftovers.

* We're eating more locally-grown, seasonal foods--easy to do as spring ramps up, probably harder to do once we hit fall.

* We're eating more vegan meals. Locally, there's no way to get lactose-free milk in glass bottles, and there's no way to get dairy-free milk substitutes that aren't in plasticized containers. Going milk-free has also been abetted by a video that social media thrust at me, showing an adult cow clearly upset as a calf is being carted off in a trailer. Who knows what the cow and calf are thinking, but they're clearly thinking. As you can't get milk from cows without cows birthing calves, I'm trying to go without for now. Eggs then follow, logically. I've been a vegetarian since 1986, so it's beyond time that I try going this extra step. 

We've found some recipes worth remembering: this apple cinnamon cake (the recipe calls it "bread"--yeah, right), subbing 1/2 c. applesauce for the eggs, and 1/4 c. vegan butter substitute for the 1/2 c. butter (since applesauce is also a butter substitute). And chickpeas with broccolini (saute a good amount of sliced garlic, 2 crushed small bright red hot peppers from the stash your sister-in-law brought you from Mexico, smoked paprika, and fennel seeds in EVOO, add 1 can drained chickpeas, stir for a bit, then add a bunch of broccolini and saute until wilted. So so good. Save the chickpea water--a.k.a. aquafaba--to make coconut macaroons; these are less cloyingly sweet than the non-vegan variety.

As for making homemade vanilla extract, the most inefficient adventure imaginable to reduce single-use plastics... What was I thinking? The local bulk-foods store, Part & Parcel, was out of vanilla beans, with no anticipated back-in-stock date, so I ordered beans online. Of course they came vacuum-wrapped in huge sheets of plastic, as must all bulk vanilla beans in the U.S. Doh. But I have 24 beans soaking in a good 4 cups of vodka; shake shakety shake shake. The extract should be ready for use in about 6 months.

Durham Farmers' Market plastic-free scouting

On Saturday, we walked to the Durham Farmers' Market to scout out veggies not prewrapped in plastic, and we ended up signing up for a year with The ReCollective. The ReCollective collects "hard-to-recycle items (the stuff that can’t go in your curbside bin) that would otherwise be landfill-bound right from your doorstep and ensure they are reused or recycled in transparent and responsible ways." This includes sheet plastics, plastic wrappers, and plastic wrapping materials*--so even if we can't eliminate these from our food purchases, at least we can direct them more intentionally toward re-use and recycling. We'd heard about this business from friends who subscribe, and appreciated the opportunity on Saturday to ask questions in person. 

We then stopped by the fabulous BoxCarr Handmade Cheese stand. Their cream cheeses come in plastic containers that we can re-use; their gooey brie-like cheese are wrapped in plasticized paper; and their hard cheeses are vaccum-wrapped in plastic. I mentioned my goal of reducing my single-use plastic footprint, and asked whether they could ever wrap some of their hard cheeses in plasticized paper for us if we pre-ordered. They were very friendly about it and said they'd do it--but after chatting about it, it was clear the main impact would be more work for them with minimal environmental impact, so we probably won't end up asking them for that. The main takeaway: given the effort that goes into making a living producing cheese on a small scale, plastic wraps are essential for preventing spoilage.

We know alternatives are possible. Cheese vendors at German markets, for example, bring large rounds of cheeses to market, cut pieces to order, and wrap them in paper for each individual customer, rather than selling pre-packaged cheese. Perhaps we can find this process at Whole Foods or Harris Teeter.

*Stefan has insisted on collecting these plastics for years, even though our city recycling service won't accept them. In theory, we can drop them off at grocery stores; in practice, we store them in large plastic trash bags in our pantry or car trunk, for months and months, before remembering to drop them off at a store. Once they're dropped off, we suspect they're simply incinerated rather than recycled. The ReCollective is more specific about where they direct the materials they collect.

Plastic wrap

While we were living in Germany last fall, we recycled almost everything. After four months, we had accumulated a mere cubic foot or so of actual trash--non-recyclable stuff headed for the landfill.

Back in the U.S., we've nostalgically been collecting all of our plastic wrap. Plastic wrap is ubiquitous. Newspapers, grocery store foods, mail-order books, metal screws, the gaps between lids and containers, subscription magazines, computer components, paper towels, safety goggles, factory clay, dry-cleaned clothes, printer paper, new pottery kilns, pet fish, you name it: it comes in polyethylene bags or wrap.

Durham's recycling program does not take polyethylene thinner than a milk jug, so once we have a full [plastic] trash bag of plastic wrap (it doesn't take long), we drive it around in the car for a few weeks before sneaking it into the Good PR Plastic-Wrap Recycling Bin at Whole Foods. Whole Foods also has a Reality Trash Bin with a pictogram of plastic wrap as landfill material, so I suspect it all goes to the dump in the end, alas.