Earth Day Eating

Earth Day was this week, and in addition to organizing a group of kick-ass teenagers at an interfaith recycling drive this weekend, I've been thinking about how to practice earth-friendly eating. (Step one: blog more often, slacker). We seldom think about the impact of our eating habits on anything but our own bodies, but this week I'll be posting about how the way we eat affects the world.

There's a great post on Design*Sponge (a site I love to drool over) about "earth day eating, every day." Ashley put together a great list of ways to be earth conscious in your own kitchen.

Some that I'm already doing include:
*Composting kitchen scraps
*Keeping a kitchen garden
*Canning & Preserving
*Making my own dairy products
*Recycling all paper, plastic, glass, and aluminum products
*Repurposing used glass bottles
*Supporting CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture)
*Patronizing farmer's markets
*Carrying my own shopping bags to the market
*Reusing plastic food bags
*Seeking out locally grown and processed foods
*Buying/eating foods in season
*Running the dishwasher only when full
*Using homemade and/or non-toxic cleaning supplies
*Seriously minimizing the use of paper towels
*Storing foods in glass, ceramic, or metal containers instead of plastic

She had some suggestions that I'd love to do when I have more space--like keeping bees and chickens. She also had some suggestions I haven't been doing, but should--like bringing my own containers to the market for meat and fish and buying biodegradable trash bags.

These are pretty simple practices that someone like me can implement while working (more than) full time and living in a tiny city apartment. For those of you who have a little land or maybe a kitchen that fits more than one person in it at time (seriously, my kitchen is that small), think about what kind of impact your food habits can make!