Natural Fruit Fly Traps

Have you noticed that fruit flies tend to be more plentiful in the summer months? Here's a quick vinegar based trap to get rid of them. 

Take a piece of paper and twist it into a cone until there is only a very tiny opening. Tape the cone so it won't come apart.

Then, take a tall glass jar and pour in about an inch of apple cider vinegar. Add a few drops of dish soap. Tape the cone into place inside the jar and seal with more tape.

Flies will be attracted to the vinegar and crawl through the holes, then get trapped inside. Switch out your trap every couple days until you are no longer catching flies.

Glass Jar Butter

One thing I remember fondly is making homemade butter with nothing more than a glass jar and a marble. It is a lot of fun and great for arm muscles! (or to tire out the kids)

Adapted from Memory

Ingredients:

Whipping Cream
Glass Marble
Glass Jar
Enthusiastic Shaker

Optional:

1/2 tsp Salt for every 6 cups of cream
Water
Blender

Expiration:
2 days w/o optional step
1 week w/ optional step

Directions: 

Carefully clean and dry your glass jar and marble, then fill to about 3/4 with whipping cream. The closer your cream is to room temperature, the better. Room temp. cream means less shaking overall.

Add the marble and seal the jar. Shake. A lot. (For smaller kids, use something closer to a baby food sized jar)

After about 5 minutes of shaking, you should already see the thickening starting. This is the butter starting to separate from the buttermilk. Continue shaking for about another 5-8 minutes until there is a very obvious separation between the thin liquid buttermilk and the butter solid.

Strain the butter. (Save the buttermilk for baking!)

Optional:
To keep your butter longer, rinse with ice water and add to a blender. Add about the same amount of ice water as butter and blend at low speed, then drain the water. Repeat until the water is no longer cloudy when draining. This removes any remaining buttermilk and keeps it from spoiling.

At this point you can mix in your salt. The measurement is an approximation, so add slowly until you get the taste you want. Wrap your butter in wax paper and store in the fridge, ready to use.

"Lizard Island: Observation" by Budding Biologist

I was recently given the opportunity to demo a new game created by a new and upcoming company called Budding Biologists. A team of two moms, Dr. Kristine (Kris) Callis-Duehl and Katy Castronovo, who were appalled by the accuracy of the books and games that were available for their kids.

The two women have already written several successful children's books, such as Am I an Insect? and Where do I live?. Both books feature illustrations drawn by Katy which are designed to be as accurate as possible to the living creature. They want to create educational materials for kids that not only match up with core standards, but also look and feel just as fun as any other book or game.

Lizard Island: Observation is the first game of three that gradually introduces children, ranging from kindergarten age to fifth grade, into thinking and playing like scientists. The graphic design of the world you play in is incredibly realistic and the tools are easy to learn and fun to use, especially when a lizard is on the run and you are trying to tilt the screen just right to snap a picture.

One technique the game uses to get kids thinking teaches basic permutations for tagging each lizard when you catch it. You are only given three colours to work with and, as more and more lizards show up each level, you need to get creative in creating as many new combinations as possible so no lizard has the same tag as another.

The two sequels are designed to build on the knowledge gained from playing the first game, while increasing the range of topics covered.

Lizard Island: Hypothesis changes your point of view from playing as the scientist, whose goal is to study and collect data on the different lizard, but as one of the very lizards you were previously studying. Now, your goal becomes survival by learning how lizards find food, water, and shelter, while also hiding from any predators that are hanging around.

The third game in the series will be called Lizard Island: Experiment, which takes players a step further by combining what they learned from both previous games and teaching them how to build a stable ecosystems while creating their very own Lizard Island. Little scientists will get to choose which plants to grow in different areas of their island and also choose which animals will live there, then see how their ecosystem thrives.

Lizard Island is a great way to boost your child’s knowledge of biology at an earlier age or supplement a science program. Just be warned, you may soon have to hunt down a lab coat and magnifying glass for your “budding biologist.”

Farewell to our dear Melissa

As you can likely surmise, our most senior employee (besides the head honcho himself) has been offered an amazing career opportunity and will be leaving us after over ten years of impeccable service. We will do our best to minimize the impact of her loss as we shuffle positions around and seek some new faces for our ever growing company.

Please bare with us through this transition and, as always, don't hesitate to contact us if you have any questions or concerns. Thank you!

Roasted Patty Pan Squash & Herb Chickpeas

Adapted from Chocolate and Zucchini

Ingredients:

2 cups canned chickpeas
750 g or 1 2/3 lbs of Patty Pan Squash
Olive Oil
Salt
Cilantro
Fresh Mint
1 Lemon
Black Pepper
Optional:
Chili Pepper

Directions: 

Drain and rinse the chickpeas, then set aside in a bowl.

Preheat the oven to 200°Celcius (400°F).

Cut the stems and roots off of your Patty Pan Squash and cut each of them into 8 sections.

Spread them out into a baking dish and drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle some salt, then toss them to coat the squash pieces. Roast for 30 minutes or until golden brown.

Let cool.

While the squash is roasting, juice and peel your lemon. Then combine the lemon juice, strips of lemon peel, black pepper, chili pepper, cilantro, mint, and a drizzle of olive oil into a blender. Pulse until fairly smooth. (You can also set aside some of the cilantro and mint to dice by hand and sprinkle on top as garnish)

Add the dressing to the chickpeas, mix well, and let them chill in the fridge until your squash is cool.

Once the squash is cool enough to eat, arrange the pieces on plates and top with the chickpeas. If you set aside some herbs for garnish, sprinkle them on and eat!

Organic Panic! An Original TV Series

"Is your food killing you? Is your makeup toxic? Are your clothes destroying the planet? Or, is "organic" just a scam?" Airing September 1st at 2:30 ET, on the digital channel ONE, starts a five part original TV series that will pit an organic "Believer" against an organic "Skeptic" in every episode in an effort to show which is better. There will be interviews with experts on both sides of the debate, plus a closer look into the organic industry to expose myths and misleading information that has developed over the years. From Cosmetics to Food to Fashion to your Home, the show tours all aspects of organic living. Check out Organic Panic for your local listing.

About Cacao Nibs

Entire encyclopedias could be written about the different varieties and methods of preparing chocolate. One product of the chocolate industry has been gaining notoriety lately among chefs at fancy restaurants and slowly appearing in stores as well. Cocoa Nibs!

Cacao Beans before Roasting

Chocolate is made from cacao beans, which are first cleaned, then dried and roasted. While roasting, the beans crack and the kernels start separating from their shells. The little bits of cracked kernel are called Cocoa Nibs.  These little Nibs are the essence of the cacao bean and contain all the cacao solids and cacao butter that eventually becomes delicious candy bars.

Once completely separated from their shells, the Nibs are ground or crushed to liquefy the cacao butter and produce a thick paste that is often called chocolate liquor or chocolate liquid. The paste is pressed to remove the liquefied cacao butter and the powdery disk left behind is pulverized and turned into cacao powder. From this point, it is up to each manufacturer to decide what percentage of each to use, what flavourings to add, and how much sugar and milk.

Cacao Nibs

 The question is, why are all these extra ingredients added to something that is already one of the best dietary sources of magnesium, calcium, iron, copper, zinc, and potassium? In fact, when we crave chocolate, it usually means that our bodies are low on magnesium.  This is likely also why women crave chocolate during parts of their menstrual cycle, since not enough Magnesium in your diet is known to increase PMS symptoms.

Cacao Nibs have all the good parts of eating chocolate, plus additional fiber and without the added sugar. Theobromine for a healthy energy boost that is gentler on the body than caffeine. Tryptophan, aka “the stuff that makes everyone a chocoholic,” is known to quell anxiety and improve your mood. Chromium, a mineral that stabilizes blood sugar and reduces your appetite, and is extremely high in Flavanols, which are anti-oxidants that help make blood platelets less “sticky” and reduce the chances of clots, heart attacks, and strokes.

Eaten by themselves, Cacao Nibs are very similar to the macadamia nut. They are crunchy, but have a very smooth texture and feel cool to the tongue thanks to the cacao butter. If you’re a fan of dark chocolate, then you need to give these a try. Not a fan of eating them plain? They have been mixed into cookie dough and ice cream, sprinkled into salads, added to jams and marmalades, roasted on top of duck or lamb, and blended into smoothies. Pretty much anything where you would normally add chocolate, plus a lot of savory dishes that you would never have thought you could add chocolate.

As always, let us know if this would be something you’re interested in trying for yourself!

Big Business Combats Climate Change

Big Business may be slow to listen, but they certainly understand cost vs benefit. With new regulations rolling in that will start making companies pay for their carbon usage, some fairly big names have started taking steps towards mitigating their carbon footprint. Mars Inc. (better known as M&Ms) has recently started developing a wind farm to power their manufacturing in Texas and PepsiCo, IBM, Microsoft, Nestlé, Kellogg Company, Starbucks, and others are falling in behind. Apple is already using 100% renewable energy at every one of their data centers.

Creamy Avocado Pasta Sauce

Adapted from "Oh She Glows"

I adore avocados in any way, shape, or form, so when I came across this amazing recipe, I just knew I had to share it with everyone. This recipe is completely Vegan and is very addicting (as anything with avocado, garlic, and lemon should be!). It was created for regular flour pasta, but the creator also recommends grabbing some veggies and using a spiralizer to make veggie pasta for a light summer dish.

Ingredients:

1 medium ripe avocado
1/2 lemon, juiced and zest to garnish
1-3 cloves garlic, depending on preference
1/2 tsp salt
2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Fresh ground pepper, to taste

Optional:
1/4 cup fresh basil


Directions:

Peel your avocado and remove the pit.

Combine your olive oil, garlic, and lemon juice in a food processor until smooth.

Add the avocado, salt, and basil and process until smooth again.

Done!

Add as a sauce to pasta or veggie pasta, use as a dip for chips, a spread for sandwiches, or basically anything where a touch of garlic and lemony avocado would be a perfect compliment.

Did you know: Farm to Table at Green Earth Organics!

Have you ever wondered how your fruits and veggies get from the farm to your table? “One, Two, Three, Door!” has been a slogan of Green Earth Organics for years and, secretly, is also one of the things we pride ourselves on. Not only is it how easy to place an order sign up, pick your fruits and veggies, submit your order, and have it arrive at your door. It is also exactly how many steps your produce travels before it arrives at your home or office ready to eat.

One! Your fruits and veggies are planted, cared for, and harvested at the farm.
Depending on the farm, they may clean and process everything directly or they may pack everything into produce boxes for pick up. They are then stored in a cool area until they’re picked up for the next leg of their journey. Thanks to the resurgence in family farming versus mono-farming, there are many different sizes of farms.

Photograph by Nikki

The farmers you see at local outdoor Markets, for example, are usually very small and don’t produce enough during the harvest season to use a distributor to sell large quantities. Instead they bring their harvest directly to the markets themselves and, that way, save money to reinvest in their farm. Larger farms often find themselves with extra produce once the harvest gets going, so they sell to distributors who pick it up for them and then move it all over British Columbia. Our company prefers to use distributors because asking a small farm to produce the quantities we need each week, would be very taxing for them and would defeat our purpose of supporting local food.

Two! Produce from hundreds of different farms arrive at a distribution warehouse.
If the produce has not already been cleaned and processed at the farm, then this is where all the extra leaves and bits of dirt get removed or brushed off. Once ready to sell, each piece goes into nicely labeled produce boxes and is split up into the many different orders. Green Earth Organics orders from two main organic produce distributors. Fun Fact! In order to distribute organic food, a distributor must also be certified organic, even if they do not grow any organic food themselves. We place orders with our distributors every day, based on the projected orders of you, our wonderful customers!

In fact, we get updates twice a week on what sort of produce is coming out of the various farms. This week one of our distributors let us know to keep an eye out for large quantities of canning peaches and pickling cucumbers, as well as upcoming first harvests of local pears. They also let us know if there will be any supply problems. Blueberries, for example, will see a slump due to all the rain and local apples will be expensive and harder to find due to a hail storm earlier this season.

Three! Your fruits and veggies arrive early each morning to our small warehouse ready to be packed into your bins. The bins themselves are washed every morning before packing and are then sorted by size, ready to be filled. Our two packers utilize a long counter with rows of produce both in front and behind them. Each person’s order is individually printed out and the items collected to be placed into a bin. Once your bin is ready, it is stacked with the other bins on the same route to wait for your driver.

Door! Your drivers arrive in advance of their delivery time to look over and make changes to their route. The bins are checked over for any missing items and, if an item is unavailable, your driver makes a note to stop by one of our suppliers to see if we can pick up any individual units of that item before delivering. If the supplier does not have an item available, the drivers then check local stores along their route in a last effort to find that item for you. Then the bins are carefully packed into the van and away they go, straight to your door!

"BPA-Free"

I'm sure that even if you have no idea what BPA is, you've seen this label before on plastic products and have come to the conclusion that it must be bad. This means that you have likely gravitated towards anything that says "BPA Free" just on principle. We all did the exact same thing when "No MSG" labels started coming out on food. In fact, I just checked and the water bottle I'm drinking out of says "BPA Free" right on the bottom.

So what is BPA and why is it bad for me?

BPA is the common shorthand for Bisphenol A, a type of plastic often used in can linings, baby bottles, microwavable containers, and other products. The problem is that BPA is an unstable polymer, which means it that at high temperatures, the bonds between parts of the molecule start to break and latch on to other molecules instead, they’re especially attracted to fat.

So let's reason this out. If I am melting cheese in a microwave safe container, these polymers are detaching from their previously stable solid state and are instead latching on to the fat naturally present in any type of dairy. This means that small amounts of BPA are frequently getting absorbed into our bodies through our food.

To make matters more uncomfortable, BPA has been linked, among others, with increased chances of breast and prostate cancer, cardiovascular disease, infertility, and metabolic disfunction.

The thing is, avoiding BPA is one thing, but you should also be careful with the available alternatives. Many things that once tested as safe for human use, have been more recently linked to cancer or other conditions. As most government things go, the regulations regarding these products are slow to change. Formaldehyde, which is used to preserve the deceased, and phthalates, which are considered too toxic for children, are still both on the FDA’s approved list for food packaging.

So, the hard truth is that plastic is not the safest material to store or cook food with. You can go the difficult road and avoid plastic altogether, but plastic is too convenient and wide-spread for most of us to change over completely.

If plastic cannot be avoided, here are some safer alternatives.

Polyester is one example and is the most commonly seen plastic in our clothing. It is also used for making soda bottles and other liquid containers. The most stable plastic container available, meaning slowest to degrade and leech chemicals into your water or food, is silicone. A large number of cooking utensils have taken advantage of this by making their products out of silicone.

Another option is aluminum. The drawback to this is that it requires resin or a liner between the metal and its contents, so double check what type of liner each company uses in case their liner has toxic components. Oleoresin linings are made from a naturally occurring resin and oil compound harvested from pine and firs trees. So far, most safe BPA-free cans use this or a similar type of lining.

Tritan Copolyester, used in nalgene bottles and camelbacks, is fairly new to the market and so far appears to be a safer alternative than other plastics. The uncertainty is that all safety testing has been done “in house,” so more research conducted by independents is needed.

Stainless steel is relatively good, since it is mostly inert, but there is a small amount of transfer for those who have serious nickel allergies.

Glass is the safest material for storing food, since it does not leech at all, but it is also harder to find and less convenient for carrying home than the lighter plastic options.

It is impossible to avoid everything that is bad for you, but taking the first step to inform yourself can help you make better choices.

Homemade Pectin (For Jams & Jellies)

Adapted from http://www.pickyourown.org

Ingredients:

4 cups water

2 Tbsp lemon juice

3 lbs sliced, washed tart green apples with peels and cores. Granny Smith is good, crabapples are best if you can get them. The less ripe the fruit, the better.

Directions:

Wash, but do not peel, your green apples and cut them into pieces, including the cores.

Put all the pieces into a pot and add the water and the lemon juice.

Boil the mixture until it reduces by half (about 30 to 45 minutes)

Strain it through a cheesecloth back into the pot.

Boil the juice for another 20 minutes.

Pour it into sanitized jars and seal them to store in the fridge or freezer.

You'll have to experiment a little with how much you use for recipes, since every apple contains a different amount of pectin. The riper the fruit, the lower the level of pectin.

How do you test homemade pectin amounts for Jam?

Once your Jam is ready to be canned, remove one spoonful and place an ice cube against the bottom of the spoon. If the spoonful sets to your preferred texture, then you've used enough pectin. 

If not, then reheat the jam and add a bit more sugar, another Tbsp lemon juice and more pectin. Boil for 1 more minute and test again. Try it first on a very small batch, then once you know your pectin levels, go for the bigger batches.

Gardening in August

August marks the warmest month of the year, but there are still things to plant if you want to stretch out your summer garden. Peas and spinach both will continue to thrive as the weather turns a bit cooler, so get those in the ground now. If you're planning to plant any new trees or shrubbery, this is also the best time to get them started. The warmer months allow for deeper roots to form before the chill sets in and stops their growth.

August Pre-Pay Special!

It's back! Get a great deal on organic food by paying in advance.

Prepay for your deliveries and receive a 10% bonus! Until noon on August 29th only, prepay $200 or more towards your future bins and you will receive a 10% bonus credit. For example, if you prepay for $500 worth of food, you will receive an additional $50 credit, for a total of $550 of delicious organic fruits, vegetables, and groceries.

Prepayments can be used starting immediately, so get a great deal starting with your August deliveries! They also won't expire, so prepay now for your deliveries in September and onwards!

To arrange prepayment using any method of payment, please call or email us:

Vancouver: 604-708-2345 or info@greenearthorganics.com
Calgary: 403-674-2642 or calgary@greenearthorganics.com
Fraser Valley: 604-7082345 or fraservalley@greenearthorganics.com
Sea to Sky: 604-708-2345 or seatosky@greenearthorganics.com
Victoria: 250-704-0660 or victoria@greenearthorganics.com

Details: Cannot be combined with any other offers. Prepayments must be made before noon on August 29th, 2014, and the bonus credit will be applied to the account after payment. Credits will be removed from the account if payment fails to go through. No cash value to bonus credit. If account is cancelled before all prepayments are used, bonus credit will be deducted from the account before any prepayment is refunded.

Quick & Easy Freezer Jam

Adapted from
A Girl Worth Saving



Ingredients

1 lb berries or other fruit, cubed
1 Tbsp gelatin/pectin
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/4 cup honey
1/2 tsp vanilla

Note: This recipe can also be used with frozen fruit, no changes necessary.

Directions

Throw your fruit, the sea salt, vanilla and honey into a medium sized pan and bring to a boil. 

Let the mixture cook into a low boil for roughly 45 minutes or until the mixture is reduced by half.

Leave the pan on the stove and mix in the gelatin. Stir thoroughly for 1 minute and then pour the mixture into a mason jar. Be careful not to add more than the recommended amount or to go over the 1 minute. Gelatin/pectin is very fussy and can easily turn your jam grainy if overcooked or too much is added.

Allow to cool, then seal with a lid and store in your freezer for long term storage or your fridge if you want to eat it right away.

Once opened, the jam is good for one week. 

If you don't eat jam that often, I recommend storing it in small stackable square jars so you only need to unfreeze what you're going to use and they save space in the freezer by being a square shape.

Biofuels Made From Algae?

Graph Courtesy of Biodiesel Kits

Studies have long proven that the Algae floating across our vast oceans is what provides the planet with the majority of our oxygen. Isn't it amazing then, that at least two companies are developing ways to turn algae into fuel as well.

Specific strains of algae secrete oils which can be converted into biofuels. The growth tanks can be set up anywhere there is spare land and enough sunshine to encourage growth. 

Algae grow much faster than traditional crops, and may even be able to use wastewater or ocean water during their development, rather than precious fresh water. Both Sapphire Energy in California and Algenol in Florida are nearing commercial development stage for their fuels.