Hi! I hope you’ve all been well!
Yes, I have returned! Much like a mouldy block of cheese that has just been uncovered in the back of the fridge making you wince in disappointment and disgust - I too have unexpectedly materialised and entered into your lives without invitation.
Comparing myself to rancid dairy felt like a bold, pithy introduction and also a clever way to tee myself up to discuss the topic of food waste. But my confidence is wavering and this is beginning to feel like something that should have been filed under “Ideas That Didn’t Make the Final Cut.” Anyway how are you doing?
I’m quite busy at the moment with work and also with baking treats that my friends and family have expressly asked me to stop delivering to them. But as you well know, moderation has never been my strong suit. And 52 chocolate chip cookies feels like a normal amount to make and not “uncomfortably excessive and concerning.” (Quote not mine. Emphasis author’s own).
But there are more important things to discuss than my acute lack of portion control - Earth Day is nearly upon us!
EARTH DAY
What is Earth Day exactly, you ask? Well my child, Earth Day is a special time when we come together to gently panic about the impending annihilation of the planet, and greedy life-sucking corporations come together to tactlessly offer discounts in what is perhaps the most cringeworthy display of greenwashing we’ll see all year.
Happy Earth Day! Use code EarthDay25 for 25% off a pair of shoes made with 1% recycled materials that will inevitably end up in your local landfill because WE believe in designing products with literally NO durability so that YOU can buy more, sooner, and we can generate profit, FOREVER.
Glib jokes aside, it is a day worth reflecting on. Every 22nd of April, millions of people across the globe mobilise to demand justice for our broken planet and urge for its protection. I was only recently made aware of its history and it’s an interesting one: the first ever Earth Day was started by a US Senator in 1970, who had the idea of creating a “national teach-in on the environment.” As the initial target demographic was college students, April 22nd was selected because it sat between Spring Break and exam season. In the end, 20 million Americans took to the streets to demonstrate - 10% of the country’s population at the time - and it resulted in some pretty significant implications for US policy and environmental law. It’s since grown and become an international phenomenon with a reported billion+ people marking the holiday.
What will you be doing this Earth Day? Other than trying to extinguish the flames that have been ravaging my soul since spotting this headline,
I will be thinking about the ways we grow, eat, buy and dispose of food and how this contributes to the climate crisis. According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), animal agriculture accounts for roughly 14.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Cattle is the heaviest hitter of them all, making up about 65% of the livestock sector’s emissions. To help put that into perspective: every hour, an area of rainforest the size of 100 football pitches is cut down to create room for grazing cattle (if you’re a sadist on the hunt for more eye-wateringly painful statistics, further info can be found here). But that’s just food production - we haven’t even got to waste yet (also, yes. I am a super fun person to be around ask anyone except my family, friends and all of my colleagues). Did you know that ⅓ of all food produced globally is lost or wasted? That’s not only a waste of the food itself, but also a waste of the precious resources that went into making it. And what impact does this have across the board? Well, wasted food alone contributes a whopping 8-10% of total greenhouse gas emissions.
Now, this might come as a surprise to you, but today’s newsletter is not in fact an attempt to rob you of all joy and lose subscribers by the hundreds.
The point I’m trying to make is that the science is indisputable and overwhelmingly clear: our current practices and habits around food cannot continue as normal if we want this home of ours to survive. What we’re doing right now ain’t working, plain and simple.
So, this Earth Day I’m asking you, dear reader (big Lady Whistledown energy), to set new goals for the year ahead. As someone who has categorically failed to honour their New Year’s resolutions for the past decade (I start flagging around the Jan 7th mark), I’m not suggesting any extreme or sudden lifestyle make over. But I do think that every one of us can introduce a few small changes into our lives. And while at first it might feel like an inconvenience or even a compromise, know that you’re doing this in service of something bigger than you, (certainly) bigger than me, bigger than all of us, really. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
Vegetables Are Needy for Attention, Just Like You and Me: try having at least one entirely plant-based day a week. I know that might seem like a big leap if you’re not used to it, but there are endless veggie and vegan options out there and I promise it’s far easier and much more delicious than you think (not to mention it’s good for the planet). And when you do eat meat, try to consider sources other than beef, as it produces the most greenhouse gas emissions by a long shot. If you don’t know where to begin, I’d say Meat Free Mondays is a great resource to explore. They also have a cool calculator on their website to help you estimate the impact your change is having. So, if this Earth Day you decide to commit to one meat-free day a week for an entire year, you could save 789.25 BATHTUBS OF WATER!! As they note, “the average meat eater requires 16 Olympic swimming pools of water to produce the meat that they will eat in their life.” So let’s make that pool a little smaller.
Recycle like You Mean It, Hunny: many people are composting their food scraps these days, but if you’re not, check to see if your local municipality/council offers food waste collection! If this is old news to you, I’d recommend checking your council’s website to refresh your memory about what can be composted and recycled. You might be surprised about things you are or aren’t (!) throwing in there (I was shocked to learn that in my East London borough, if a pizza box is stained with grease it CAN’T be recycled - check to see if it’s the same in your neighbourhood)! Something I’m constantly reminding my flatmates of is to rinse the food residue from recyclables before they throw them away. Some peanut butter left in the container? A spoonful of hummus at the bottom of the tub? This needs to be cleaned before you toss it, or else it risks contaminating the rest of the contents of the bin and all of it could end up diverted to landfill! A quick rinse can make a big difference.
Be a “Great Cook,” Just Like You Lied About in Your Dating Profile: at the end of each week, pull out every item in your fridge and lay it out on the counter. Challenge yourself to make a meal with what you have instead of going out to pick up more groceries. You know how they say the most sustainable clothes are the ones already in your closet? The same is true for food. Check your fridge, check your cupboards. Pretend you’re a contestant on one of those cooking shows where they give you a random assortment of ingredients and you have to make a meal out of it. If someone can create a culinary masterpiece out of a jar of baby food and a single artichoke, you can probably work with the half bag of wilted spinach in your fridge and that kilo of dried beans you panic-bought in March 2020.
Well, I hope these tips help get things going! If you have any other ideas for commitments you want to make this Earth Day, drop me a line or let me know in the comments below! If I don’t get mercilessly ghosted by you and there end up being enough responses, maybe I can compile a list and share them in my next newsletter!
RECS
Keeping the recs short and sweet this time!
Black Cake - I just finished reading Charmaine Wilkerson’s Black Cake, an absorbing piece of fiction cutting across generations and geographies. It tells the story of a woman’s escape from a nameless Caribbean island in the 1960s, and how her journey would go on to impact one fractured Californian family today. I can’t say more without giving it away, so just go on and read it - I need you to!
The Experiment - I’ve mentioned this fabulous podcast from The Atlantic in a previous newsletter, but they recently released a three-part mini series all about Spam (you read that correctly) that manages to be fun, silly, heavy and thought-provoking all at the same time. It taps into themes of identity, family, colonialism, memory, labour struggles and everything in between. A fascinating listen.
Fast Fashion's Dirty Little Secret (Hint: It's Oil) - Since I made so many jabs about Earth Day promo codes, this very accessible but hugely informative episode from the podcast How to Save a Planet all about fast fashion is an absolute must listen this week!
Anything for Selena - Nick Quah is my North Star star of podcast critics and I would give him my future firstborn child if he asked me. Last year he heralded Anything for Selena as one of the best podcasts of 2021 and like a fool I didn’t listen to it until now. It is - as you might have guessed - a show about the the famous singer Selena Quintanilla. Offered in both Spanish and English, it’s a truly brilliant piece of work that uses Selena’s life as a prism through which to ask broader questions of Latino belonging and identity in a fragmented country. One of the best shows I’ve listened to in ages.
Such a Fun Age and two other entirely unrelated books - I got choked up reading Elizabeth Strout’s My Name is Lucy Barton, caught a serious case of The Catcher in The Rye flashbacks reading Gianfranco Calligarich’s Last Summer in the City, and then berated myself for taking so long to finally read Kiley Reid’s Such a Fun Age, which is a witty and poignant novel looking at race, privilege and class in modern-day America.
Heavyweight - I’ve also mentioned this podcast before; it’s a hilarious and tender show that aims to settle unresolved moments in people's pasts, from childhood bullies to former professors. This two-part story (episode 1 Barbara Shutt and episode 2 Barbara Wilson) is is an ABSOLUTE JAW-DROPPER and you must listen now, make haste!
Wild Boys - This one is bizarre, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. The podcast Chameleon has returned with a third season,Wild Boys, telling the very true, very weird story of two young, gaunt-looking brothers who emerged from the Canadian wilderness and happened upon a sleepy town in British Columbia. They claimed they were raised in the “bush” and eventually garnered enormous support from locals. Their story captured the hearts of people across the country, but the cracks in their tale soon began to show (and things managed to get even weirder, which I didn’t think was possible).
Rosemary Focaccia - I recently posted about this rosemary focaccia on my Instagram, remarking that I physically cannot stop making it and I require intervention. As it were, no one felt the need to address my state of peril but many people did request the recipe, so here it is! It’s originally from the bakery Bread Ahead (best doughnuts in London don’t argue with me) and it is super simple and completely plant-based, a perfect way to kick things off if you’re jumpin’ on the Meatless Monday train!
Well, I see that I have several missed calls on my phone (probably the legal teams from every company I have lambasted for their tasteless Earth Day greenwashing) so I better run. I know today’s newsletter was a marathon, and I’m so grateful if you made it this far, even if you did have to stop midway to take a stretch break or stress-smoke a cigarette (which is a common reaction people have when in my presence). Anyway! Rinse your recyclables, get creative with the food you’ve got, and go drown that rosemary focaccia in a litre of olive oil ‘cause life is short and you deserve it.
Sending love,
Arielle