http://www.flickr.com/photos/48089670@N00/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Green Thanksgiving - Follow Our Three L's

Buy produce with LESS packaging… Reduce waste before the food even hits the table!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/coollibrarian/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Buying bulk foods uses LESS packaging

Checkout this fabulous guide to using bulk foods for your Thanksgiving feast brought to you DiscoverBulk.com;
Using Bulk Foods for Thanksgiving

Save your Turkey and eat the LEFTOVERS! Come up with inventive ways to eat all of that leftover Turkey.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kudzuplanet/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Using all of those LEFTOVERS is super green

The BHG Guide to Using Leftover Turkey

Buy fruit and vegetables from LOCAL producers – find your nearest farmers market and try to buy all of your required fruit and veggies there to support local farms.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/weaselmcfee/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Buy LOCAL produce from farmers markets

Search for a Farmers Market near you

So there you have it, that was our run down of the three L’s for a green Thanksgiving celebration. Let us know if you have any extra tips for an eco friendly Thanksgiving holiday…

Photo by: Momster

Its almost Halloween and along with the season comes the carving of the pumpkin.  The pumpkin carving ritual isn’t complete until you have cleaned out all those seeds. Here is a great idea, recycle and reuse them, by roasting them in the oven. Roasted pumpkin seeds are packed with nutrition and low in carbs. For 1/4 cup, it is about 5 grams of carbs and 2 grams of fiber. They have a nutty flavor and are packed with protein. You can salt them or better yet flavor them with your favorite sweet or savory spice. The smell and crunch of roasted pumpkin seeds will add  new dimensions to the carving experience!! Of course when possible, by an organically grown pumpkin for organic roasted seeds!

Here are the directions to roast those seeds!

Ingredients:

Photo by: kzimmer

• Pumpkin or squash seeds
• If you want to add salt or seasonings, you’ll need a bit of oil so it will stick

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 350 F.

1) Clean the pulp off the pumpkin seeds, and dry with paper towels.

2) If desired, toss with a little olive or other oil. You only need enough to barely coat, otherwise, they will be greasy. Add salt and any kind of seasoning you want – garlic powder, Cajun seasoning, dried chili powder, or whatever sounds good to you!

3) Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper and spread the seeds out in one layer.

Bake for 3-5 minutes, until seeds just start to color and are fragrant. Sometimes I use a longer but safer method of using a lower temperature. If you roast the seeds at 250 degrees F., you don’t have to watch them as carefully. It takes about 45 -60 minutes.

By the way, did you know the origin of carving pumpkins? The story of the Jack o’Lantern comes from Irish folklore. Jack was a crafty farmer who tricked the Devil into climbing a tall tree. When the Devil reached the highest branch, Jack carved a large cross in the trunk, making it impossible for the Devil to climb down. In exchange for help getting out of the tree, the Devil promised never to tempt Jack with evil again. When Jack died, he was turned away from Heaven for his sins and turned away from Hell because of his trickery. Condemned to wander the Earth without rest, Jack carved out one of his turnips, took an ember from the devil, and used it for a lantern to light his way. He became known as “Jack of the Lantern.”

Our Guide to No Gas Beans...

Let me start this post by explaining that our household is 50% vegetarian, my wife loves to eat lots of veggies and that means when I’m at home my diet is mainly fruit and vegetables. One of our favorite dishes is slow cooked Lima Beans and it’s definitely our favorite on a cool Sunday afternoon. Many people get discouraged from eating beans due to their unfortunate gassy side effects. Yes, lets come right out and say it, beans give you gas! The main reason that beans cause flatulence comes from the gases that they produce once inside the stomach.

Before we share the news of the new “super bean’ here are some useful hints and tips for reducing the gassy effects of beans in your recipes;

If you are using dried beans you should never cook them in the same water that they soaked in. After a long soak the soaking water will contain lots of indigestible sugars and should be discarded. Soaking the beans is important because it begins to dissolve the starches that cause stomach aches.

Soak the Beans but Discard the Water

Most recipes call for soaking the beans overnight but we’ve found the best way is to put them in cold water and bring to a boil, whilst the water is boiling skim off any foam or scum that forms on the surface of the water. This foam contains more of the indigestible sugars mentioned in tip#1! (Note: If soaked too long, they may ferment, which affects their flavor and makes them difficult to digest.)

Boil and skim off any foam

After bringing your beans to a boil and skimming off the foam turn off the heat and let them soak for 1 to 2 hours, after the 1 to hours have passed drain the beans and discard the water.

The soaked and drained beans

Common bean cooking times

NOTE: Don’t add salt or anything acidic like vinegar or tomato juice during the final cooking. These ingredients will only slow down the cooking of the beans and should only be added at the last minute for flavoring.

If you follow the above guidelines your cooked beans should leave you almost completely gas free! But our final note is a new type of “Super Bean” which is truly a “No Gas Bean”;

The manteca bean was discovered by Dr. Colin Leakey in the country of Chile. It is a small yellow bean which can be put into recipes and is completely flatulence free. It is very easy to digest and is now being grown in Cambridgeshire, England and the Channel Islands. You can find this new no gas bean if you look for manteca beans or Jersey yellow beans. Keep a watch out for these new gas free beans at your local farmers markets or natural food stores and enjoy your new flatulence free bean recipes!

If you have any tips for our readers about cooking with beans, please leave a comment…

Ingredients

8 large button or open-cap organic mushrooms
4 tablespoons wholemeal organic breadcrumbs
4 organic spring onions
1 small red chili
1 large organic tomato
1 clove of fresh organic garlic
2 tablespoons of lemon juice
4 tablespoons of grated mozzarella cheese
2 strips streaky organic bacon
1 sprig of fresh coriander

Stuffed Mushrooms Recipe

image by formalfallacy @ Dublin (Victor)

Method

Remove the stalks from the mushrooms and chop the stalks finely. Grill the bacon for about five minutes until just before it starts to crisp. Prepare the spring onions, tomato and the chili by chopping finely. Add the chopped mushroom stalks, spring onions, chili and bacon to the breadcrumb mixture and combine the flavours. Spoon the mixture onto the mushroom caps, piling up and pressing into shape with a spoon, so the mounds hold together. Crush the garlic and combine with the olive oil and lemon juice. Drizzle the olive oil dressing over the top of the mounds. Sprinkle the cheese on top. Place the completed mushrooms on a tray, grill for ten minutes or until the cheese starts to turn a light brown colour. Garnish with fresh parsley or coriander.

Let them cool for about five minutes.

Well, what more can I say other than have a great September, enjoy your mushrooms this month. I anticipate a huge increase in Fairy rings.  I’m sure the fairies will be celebrating all month, I know I will.  I’m going to start with a few of these stuffed mushrooms, then I’ll move on to my mushroom burger. Let me know about any great mushroom recipes you have.

Check out this video from Youtube on how to make simple stuffed mushrooms;




Stahlbush Island Farms is a Real Family Farm.  they were founded by Bill and Karla Chambers in Oregon’s Willamette Valley in 1985, planting and harvesting just 2 crops. In 1998, Stahlbush Island Farms launched the sustainably grown frozen fruits and vegetables in the distinctive brown paper package that I purchased and in 2003, they begin selling a brand of organic pumpkin products called Farmer’s Market.

I have also tried the Cauliflower and it was just as good. I will continue to buy their products. To purchase a great tasting product that is produced by a farm that is concerned about the sustainability and health of the entire farm environment; the soil, water, air, plants, animals and people is exactly what I am looking for! Visit  http://www.stahlbush.com/ to learn more about this family farm.
Here is the recipe I used for the Butternut Squash, This will feed 2 to 4 people.

Pan Roasted Butternut Squash

Ingredients