Stepping Into Your Eco Kitchen Journey
A beginners guide that will help you take your first steps into transitioning your kitchen into an Eco Kitchen! Start reducing your ecological footprint today by focusing on the room that produces the most waste; the kitchen.
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Taking The First Step
Millions of tonnes of plastic is thrown out yearly and ends up filling our landfills, waterways and oceans. Many of us have fallen into a pattern of quick consumption using single‑use plastic for our own convenience. It may make our lives easier, but it makes it much more difficult for the natural environment to thrive. However, with already existing solutions and this guide, we can change our daily habits to support a more sustainable future. Take this first step, and let’s make a change for ourselves and future generations.
Analyzing Old Habits
When trying to change anything in your life, you first need to take some time to reflect on your current lifestyle habits and make yourself aware of the current situation. A good place to start is by noting everything you throwaway in your kitchen trash bin and what you place in the recycling. This allows you to understand the types of items you are throwing out most often, if there is anything you could be recycling instead and will also make you aware of how much waste is piles up per day.
Recycling ‑ The Right Way
A really easy and free way to reduce waste is by ensuring your household recycling process is inline with your local recycling organizations. Check with your local community recycling program to get an update list of what is acceptable in the compost, and recycling bins. Generally, if a recyclable material has food or other residues on it, it will not be recycled and oftentimes, the entire bin is thrown away because of the containments. This is why it is so important for us to do our part to clean and organize the recycled materials and place them in the correct bins. You can also up‑cycle any glass jars for food or other storage!
Buying & Storing Food
A lot of our waste comes from transporting and storing food. This is tougher to avoid because a lot of the options for certain foods or brands are only offered wrapped in plastic, but here are a few tips that will help you begin to minimize it!
1) Shop Local ‑ if you have local bakeries, farmers markets, retailers, ect. they will oftentimes allow you to bring your own container or packaging. (Ask before hand)
2) Buy in Bulk ‑ buying in bulk reduces packaging and potentially saves you money because instead of having to purchase a bunch of single packages multiple times, there is one larger package that last’s for longer.
3) BYOC ‑ the best way to do ‘zero‑waste’ groceries is to bring your own container, tare, fill, and weigh the items you’d like to purchase! Unfortunately, this is less common right now with Covid‑19 protocols in place, however, check with local grocery stores or near by eco‑friendly shops.
Introducing Sustainable Solutions
When it comes to reducing your waste in the kitchen, there are a few essentials that will help you eliminate unnecessary plastics.
♼ Plant‑based scrub brushes and loofah sponges are a sustainable alternative for plastic kitchen brushes and synthetic kitchen sponges.
♼ Reusable silicone bags are a sustainable alternative for single‑use plastic zip bags.
♼ Stretchy silicone lids replace single‑use plastic wrap or other plastic films.
♼ Cotton produce bags are a reusable alternative for single‑use plastic produce bags.
Reusable Alternatives
Single‑use plastics are used to store, move, and keep our food and water “clean”. But these plastics break down into undetected micro‑plastics and so we unknowingly eat and drink plastic containing harmful substances. The BPA’s and other toxic chemicals found in plastic are damaging to human health and research has shown it to be the cause of a number of related health concerns. You are better off using glass, silicone, paper or cotton to store and handle food. Microplastics are also a huge threat and health concern for our wildlife and marine life. Scientists have discovered many deceased animals with plastics tangled in their organs and many more have been found in life threatening conditions because of the harms of single‑use plastic.
Natural Plant‑Based Alternatives
Utilizing products like these 100% plant‑based dish scrubs will help prevent unnecessary plastic that would otherwise end up harming eco‑systems and wildlife. Being completely biodegradable, these are truly zero‑waste products. Once you’ve got your full‑use from the sponge & brush, you can either place them in compost bin or even burry in your backyard to decompose naturally!
One Stop Shop
Eco Kitchen has put together the perfect starter kit to make it easy to switch over to a more sustainable life style, starting in the kitchen where most waste in the household comes from. This comprises of all the essential eco‑friendly products that minimize a household’s ecological footprint. We know trying to purchase items individually can be costly and time consuming, so we’ve made simple a solutions for you!
Plastic‑free Shipping + Gives Back to The Earth
The Eco Kitchen Starter Kit is packaged and shipped to your door with love, and without plastic. There are so many benefits to starting your own Eco Kitchen. It’s about time we take the future into our own hands and make some changes that build momentum for a green future! Check out the current deals for it today with the link of my bio!
Remember Why
Why are you doing this? Make this change because you care about your own, and families future. You want to limit ingesting micro‑plastics and other toxic chemicals that are unhealthy for humans such as BPA. Make this change because you know how devastating the damage that our plastics are causing our natural environment, wildlife and ecology. Make this change because you care about the quality of life, or even just the life of future generations. Keep in mind why you chose to make this change, and how important it is to continue on with this new clean way of living. And most importantly, be proud of yourself for actively making little choices that result in a large positive changes.