5 Tips for Eco-Friendly Cooking
If you want to fight climate change by reducing your carbon footprint, then your kitchen isn’t a bad place to start. From the food you are buying to how you are storing and cooking it, you can reduce your carbon footprint and save energy. Adopting an eco-friendly cooking lifestyle will allow you to contribute toward the fight against climate change and make you and your family healthier. When you choose organic vegetables and fruits, you are choosing to keep chemicals out of your body. Apart from that, most of the eco-friendly cooking habits actually help you save money. In this modern economy, a person watches every penny they spend, and this could help you save a good amount while eating healthy.
Purchase food from local farmers
If you usually shop at the supermarket, you can introduce a little change to your shopping routine. Instead of buying vegetables and fruits at the store, you should visit the local farmer and get fresh items from him. Fresh vegetables taste a lot better than the ones you can purchase at the market. By becoming a regular customer of the local farmer, you will be supporting his small business as well, which can also be quite satisfying. The food you will buy from the farmer will be cheaper, and it won’t have the carbon footprint of transportation.
Get creative with leftovers
In order to make your cooking eco-friendly, you have to ensure that no leftovers are going to waste. When we have to deal with Thanksgiving leftovers, we all know several ways to use that turkey. However, a good cook does not just use leftovers during Thanksgiving only, but all year. It does not matter what kind of leftovers you have sitting in the fridge, you can always turn it to a new dish. For example, if you are making roast chicken on Saturday, use the leftovers in your salad on Monday. You can also check this food blog to explore new recipes that can help you deal with your leftovers.
Use eco-friendly cookware
Using eco-friendly cookware won’t make you an expert cook overnight, but it will help reduce energy consumption and avoid harmful chemicals that come with different kinds of cookware. Nowadays, many companies have started to manufacture ceramic-based cookware that is non-stick and good for your health. Most conventional cookware is made from Teflon, a harmful chemical that can damage your health. Cookware with ceramic-based non-stick technology heats much quicker and saves energy. Alternatively, you can choose cookware that is made from recycled materials.
Use natural gas
If you use an electric stove, it is time to switch to natural gas-powered stoves. The majority of chefs prefer to use natural gas because it cooks the food much better and quicker. Using natural gas also reduces the carbon footprint as it burns the gas directly to produce fire. An electric stove uses electricity produced from gas, coal, or other fuel, which means the carbon footprint is bigger. Natural gas also offers more flame control, which allows the chef to cook the food in a much better way.
You don’t necessarily have to complicate things to achieve your goal of eco-friendly cooking. All you have to do is take care of thelittle things, and you will be able to save energy. If you are using a microwave oven, make sure it is not on for too long. Similarly, cook the amount of food that you need, so nothing goes to waste. These small tips can help you make a huge difference. This article was written by the guest author listed at the end of the article.
Article writen by James Parker, who leads the content marketing department at Globex Outreach. He loves helping people build their online businesses through content marketing strategies.