6 Reasons Canning is Part of a Sustainable Lifestyle

Spring canning season is right around the corner. I asked my friend Jenny, a canning pro from thedomesticwildflower.com, to chat about what makes canning a sustainable choice. 

Canning reduces both food and packaging waste. It gives you control over your diet. It frees you from reliance on commercially produced foods, and it is far more delicious than anything you could buy in a store.

sustainably eat out of season:

Canning preserves food to be enjoyed when it's out of season. Typically, eating out of season involves food grown many, many miles away, even in another hemisphere which isn't very sustainable.

Eating tomatoes in the winter or citrus in the summer is not in line with the natural growing season here. Canning allows you to enjoy summery tasting strawberries even while it's snowing, without the guilt of flying it half way around the world. 

related: 15 ways to save money on real food

tools that are meant to be reused: 

Mason jars are made from sturdy glass. They're designed to be submerged over and over in boiling water. 

Mason jars are either regular mouthed or wide mouthed. No matter your jar, one of those lids will fit. My greatest complaint with plastic tupperware is the lack of interchangeable lids.

It bears mentioning that jars are infinitely useful beyond canning. I use them for drinking any and all beverages, in my lunch box, storing bulk goods like coffee beans and sugar, and household items like crayons.

related: 13 unexpected uses for a mason jar. 

developing a healthy relationship with food: 

Canning teaches you to save fresh produce for later. It brings you several steps closer to the farm where it was raised, if not to the very berry patch, farm stand, or orchard.

Many informed, conscious people have no idea what produce is in-season. They don't know when or where it was cultivated. They don't know how far away it was grown, how much fuel it took to get to the market or the upwaste stream involved.

If you buy a can of peaches, even the politically correct "organic" kind, you don't know the farming practices. How much of the peach was wasted when cut from the pit or peeled? Were the remains composted? 

When you can your own food you have control over those answers.  

greater accountability: 

Food you preserve is less likely to be wasted. Purchased jam could easily be tossed in the trash with a serving or two left inside. But, homemade jam? That you made yourself? Never!

Not only are homemade products tastier, infinitely healthier, and endlessly customizable to your tastes and dietary preferences - it involves a personal investment. Having that connection and spending quality time with your food, brings more value to the product. 

shelf stability: 

Canned food is shelf stable for up to a year. It doesn’t require any refrigeration, special vacuum sealed bags, or freezer space. 

related: My Five Rules for Personal Sustainability

practicing mindfulness: 

Canning is a mindful activity. If you take the time to preserve a batch of tomato sauce, you will reflect upon the quantity of tomato sauce you ate and enjoyed the previous year. You’ll consider where you sourced the tomatoes. What ways you’d like to improve upon the recipe. What is the best jar size? What is the best technique to use? How often should you can?

Thinking and developing a real connection with your food is so utterly different from buying your food in the grocery store pre-made. Be mindful of how your food got to your plate. 

BONUS - it makes a great gift: 

No need to tie a jar of preserves up with unnecessary wrapping paper; it looks beautiful just as it is. Canning is a lost art that takes time and effort to execute. It tastes wonderful, is healthful and free from mystery ingredients. 

Pro tip: a glug of white vinegar in the processing water makes the canning jars extra shiny for gifting.

Jenny's blog has been a great resource for my canning experiments this year. If you are interested in learning more about canning she has a free beginners course available! And, a great introductory blog post here. 

I know that I've said this every year I've had this blog, but this year I'm going to plant a garden. I'm going to do it in real life, and not just in my mind. I do eventually dream of a day where I can live out my homesteading dreams. I'm going to can so much delicious food with all of these 100s of mason jars I have lying around. 

Have you canned food before? Do you have homesteading goals for this year? 

How to Maintain a Healthy Safety Razor

Leaving my safety razor in the shower finally caught up with me. Alas, rust has taken hold of it. I had a friend who told me, when her safety razor rusted she recycled it and bought a new one. Looking at my newly rusted safety razor, I really did not want to buy a new one.

This goes so much deeper than zero waste. Recycling isn’t the answer but rather a band-aid, and beyond that… I just can’t fathom buying a new safety razor.

One of the main appeals of zero waste, to me, is only having to buy something one time.

I have always been very conscious about budget. I want to buy something once and never have to buy it ever again. Zero waste is as much about the environment as it is about my bottom line.

It’s just a little rust, but for some reason, it evoked a deadly fear of tetanus.

I don’t know why my parents liked to frighten me as a child. Maybe they weren’t trying to frighten me, but rather inform me. No matter their intentions, I had a horrible fear of death by tetanus.

First, your mouth would slowly stop working until you couldn’t eat or say anything, then you’d silently starve to death. Of course, this is wildly inaccurate, just how I felt as a child. Plus, I haven’t had my tetanus booster to make matters worse...

So, this rust problem. It must be solved ASAP... before I accidentally gave myself tetanus. With a quick search of google, I came up with numerous ways to give your safety razor a good cleaning.

Before you recycle or throw anything away, always ask yourself if there’s something you haven’t tried! I would much rather ruin my razor in an attempt to save it, than just toss it without ever trying.  

Let’s talk about how you should care for your safety razor. 

For more information on how to use a safety razor, please see this post here.

don’t leave it in the shower or tub:

Duh. When the metal is constantly damp it’s easy for rust to form. Once there’s a tiny speck of rust it will quickly spread.                      

dry it after each use:

To avoid this dry your safety razor after every use. While you towel off, towel off your razor too. Dry the body and the blade.

store some place dry:

Whether it be a cabinet or by the sink, try and keep the razor some place dry. Also make sure you’re storing it someplace sturdy. The only time I’ve really been cut by my razor is when reaching for it and it fell. In its descent towards the ground, it took a lot of skin with it.

Even if you’re very diligent in your razor care, you can still slip up. Leave the razor in the shower on accident one too many times and rust starts to form. No fear! There are some really quick and simple solutions. I used two different methods to clean up my safety razor.

method one:

Castile soap, warm water, and an old toothbrush.

Who says that you have to compost the toothbrush as soon as it’s no longer fit to clean teeth? (remember that question we’re supposed to ask ourselves?) Old toothbrushes work great to scrub all sorts of small spaces. Especially handy to get into the nooks and crannies of a safety razor.

Run the razor under warm water. Squirt some liquid soap onto the toothbrush and scrub away. I got great results with my fillaree dish soap, but any liquid castile soap would do. The rust on my razor was pretty persistent, so I needed to do something a little more heavy duty.

method two:

Soak the razor in a mixture of half warm water and half white vinegar. Add 2-3 tablespoons of baking soda. It will get super fizzy and start attacking the rust. Let it soak for an hour or two, but don’t let it soak too long.

Grab a rag and most of the rust will wipe away. For hard to get to places, use the toothbrush.

The thing about rust, is that ALL of it has to be gone. If any is left, it will come back almost instantly. Make sure to be thorough. Better to clean it once very thoroughly than to keep having to do it.

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Do you have any tips for safety razor care? Have you recovered from a rusty razor?

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The 5 R's of Zero Waste

I am very excited to announce that I've finished working on a brief 14 page eBook all about the five R's of zero waste. 

I've mentioned them in passing and have short descriptions on my About the Lingo page, but I really wanted to go in depth about what they mean and how you can implement them. 

I flirted with the idea of doing a blog post series, but thought it would be much more digestible in an eBook format. I'm pretty excited about this little project I've been working on. I really hope that you'll check the book out. 

It's not a super long book, but it puts it in a great format for each R. It's a great place to start for beginners and a lot of the principles I talk about have their own blog posts like composting, easy swaps, and saying no. 

To get a copy of the eBook head on over to my Subscribe page and enter your email address. After you enter your email address, you'll receive an email asking if you really want to subscribe. Once you agree, that you really meant it, you'll receive a thank you email.

In the thank you email there will be a link to download the eBook.

If you are already subscribed to my weekly newsletter, go ahead and respond to the weekly email I send out. Ask, if you can get a copy and I'll directly email it to you. 

Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Rot, Recycle

My favorite R is tied between reduce and reuse. What's your favorite R on the zero waste food chain? 

I like reduce because I feel like it's the most zen, but on the other hand reuse has got those vintage vibes. I think vintage zen might perfectly describe my aesthetic. ;) 

I would love to get your thoughts on the little eBook, so please let me know what you think.