August 13, 2020

by drplasticpicker

I skipped yesterday’s Hopeful Wednesday post. I hope that as part of our blog readership that you don’t mind. I think we were all feeling hopeful and didn’t need my Hopeful Wednesday post. Senator Kamala Harris was selected as the Vice Presidential Nominee for the Democratic Party. There was finally a sense of lightness yesterday. I had the day “off.” Of course I still did virtual middle management work, but I watched her acceptance speech yesterday. I cried. It was a historic moment for Black Americans, Asian Americans and for me most importantly women. It’s a historic moment for climate activists. Senator Kamala Harris supports the Green New Deal. There is still a climate crisis but yesterday I felt a bit lighter cleaning at the beach.

There will still be so much work to be done. There is plastic pollution spilling into the ocean. There are carbon emissions that we need to curb. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Climate Change and Health State Climate Advocates meet every month. Yesterday we shared our actions. Each action is impactful. We can’t depend on national leadership to do it all. But knowing that we have a decent chance to have some climate leadership in the White House, did make me a bit less frantic.

I baked vegan muffins yesterday and our daughter made homemade pizza. We took a long walk in the evening. It’s our new thing that we do together. She likes to have her mind wander a bit, and sometimes we walk and we are mostly quiet. But we did chat about all the things that we are able to make at home now. All these things create less trash for us, has more fiber/nutrition in general, and saves us money. And we have goals for new home-made food projects in the kitchen.

Hard Wired Plastic-Free Food Projects.

1. Vegan Muffins. I have made three batches now. I used to buy the prepackaged muffin mixes but they are not vegan and there is no way to buy even muffin mix without palm oil. I have made three batches of vegan muffins and they’ve all been really good. I’ve made two batches of vegan carrot muffins, and yesterday made my first batch of vegan flaxseed/cornmeal mufffins. I actually developed the recipe for myself which is a first. I’m going to list it here, but I’m still perfecting it! (2/3 cup on flax meal, 1/2 cup corn meal, 1/2 cup of vegan butter or vegetable oil, 1/2 cup of nondairy milk, brown sugar, top with chocolate chips, 350 degrees in oven until golden brown).
2. Home Made French Fries: We have made our second large batch of home-made french fries, for a total of probably seven meals worth. It’s so easy and fun. We can now season our fries with less salt and all the different wonderful seasonings that we already have in our fridge including paprika, curry, and cumin.
3. Baked Potatoes: I was making the batch of home-made french fries this weekend with just half the bag of potatoes, and it seemed like a lot. For some reason I thought to myself, why don’t I just bake them? So I washed them and used tin foil and threw them in the oven at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. There was already a pizza in the oven. They turned out delicious and keep in the fridge for a week. We ate a few fresh, and I left them in the fridge. Between one work lunch and the kids eating in for their own lunch, the baked potatoes are gone! This will definitely be on our rotation now. I saved the aluminum foil and we reuse again. Eventually it can be recycled.
4. Home-made Pizza Dough: We have had the third home-made pizza and I don’t think I can go back to the boxed one. It is so delicious. Our daughter is going to teach me to make the pizza dough. She makes it in batches of four, and we ate two the first night. The 3rd pizza we had yesterday and it was delicious and fresh! Having organic mozarella made a difference as well. We have one more that we will probably eat at some point during the weekend.
5. Home-made Bagels: Her big project for today is to make home-made bagels. She prepped yesterday so I’m anxiously waiting for the result. She has the week off of virtual school, so is taking this time to cook things.

All of the above projects have been so fun, and now I find relaxing to do. We chatted yesterday and the new home-made food and less plastic projects that we want to meander through.

Plastic-Free Food Project Goals

1. Home-made Pesto Sauce
2. Home-made Pasta Sauce
3. Boiled Plantains with Coconut Milk Sauce/Roasted Peanuts (this is a traditional Vietnamese simple dish that I want to replicate)
4. Home-made Peanut Butter
5. Vietnamese Spring Rolls/Sauce: I’ve done this before but I want to do it a few times so it becomes easy and second nature. Really healthy meal that the kids like already, and is an easy pescatarian dish that my daughter can eat. She is pescatarian for environmental reasons and I want to support this.