The Do’s and Don’ts of kitchen sustainability

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

Originally written for Quench magazine

With hard hitting programs such as David Attenborough’s recently released ‘A life on our planet’, climate change and its impending doom has been successfully brought to the forefront of our minds. It is understandably hard to live a completely eco-friendly life when it is so easy to remain uneducated and unaware, but, as the new generation, it’s so important to lead the way and live a sustainable lifestyle. Of course, not all of us have the means or ability to make a big and noticeable change, but it’s the little things and mass awareness that can have the best long-lasting effect. We need to pave the road for a sustainable way of living with the hopes of a bright, stable and permanent future so that the new generations can live the lives they deserve. I know that it seems difficult and expensive to get started on your sustainable living, so I’ve comprised a budget friendly and easy do and don’t list of how to act in and around your kitchen in order to stay sustainable. Every little helps!

Do…

· Recycle! – It seems like an obvious one, but it never fails to amaze me how little green recycling bags have been put out on bin day. If you are still feeling confused about what you’re supposed to recycle, have a look on your local council website and you will be provided with a full list of what is meant to go in those green bags. It might be worth putting a list on your fridge to remind those who you live with. You could also benefit from popping a recycling bin in your bathroom to avoid all those cardboard toilet rolls going in general waste. It’s important to remind your housemates to recycle but remember to ask nicely!

· Share essentials – I am constantly buying a bag of potatoes that is way to big for my consumption and there is always one or two left that go rotten or mouldy. It’s the same for things such as bread and carrots. I’m not a big eater and I have found that sharing these food items is much more economical and sustainable.

· Meal plan – Far too often do people buy ingredients with no real plan of when they’re going to use them and the sell by date comes and goes. One way to resolve this food waste is to plan your meals at the beginning of the week and buy your ingredients accordingly. Equally, I often find that I buy an ingredient for a meal and then what I don’t use ends up going off and being thrown away. By meal planning, you can work out what to do with the rest of the ingredients without them going off!

· Swap meat for veggies – meat production is a massive strain on the environment for many reasons and the best thing we can do is reduce our consumption. You don’t need to go full vegan or even full veggie, just try and have meat free days 3-4 times a week. If everyone did this it would lower popular demand and reduce the need to farm and deforest massive chunks of land.

Don’t…

· Forget your bags! – Anyone else guilty of that huge pile of plastic supermarket bags in your kitchen? You get to the supermarket after forgetting to bring a bag, you reluctantly buy a new one and bring it home, promising to remember next time. But do you remember next time…? It’s super important as the amount of plastic waste that is building up across the world and in the ocean is something that needs to be urgently stopped.

· Buy ready meals – The steps that the ready meal takes from production to your kitchen table are horrific. Due to the fact that it’s precooked, there’s no way of inspecting the quality of any of the meat and veg. The meat is most likely mass produced in an unethical environment and the veg is very unlikely to being organic. Equally it comes packaged in mountains of unnecessary plastic which just ends up being thrown into the ocean. If you make your own meals, you can monitor how much plastic it’s packaged in and make sure the ingredients are ethically sourced.

· Use cling film – Keeping along the theme of plastic waste, cling film is among the worst of the single use plastics to come out of the kitchen. With so many different options to replace cling film such as silicone stretch lids, beeswax wraps and reusable sandwich bags, there really is no excuse to stick with the single use option. Have a shop around and thoroughly research all your options before you succumb to societal norms and purchase your next roll of clingfilm.

· Think you can’t make a difference – Too many people fall for the trap that their kitchen habits won’t make a positive change. The important thing to remember is that if we all manage to stay sustainable, we can change the norm and encourage a new generation of sustainability. Unity in the masses is the only option!