In October we turn pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month!

We want to join the fight against Breast Cancer by raising awareness and creating an easy way for our members to donate through our website.

To donate, just add this item (as many quantities as you would like) to your bin until October 31st and we will place a pink ribbon inside your bin on your next order!
If you are in Victoria please add this item
If you are in the Fraser Valley please add this item
If you are in Calgary please add this item
If you live in the Sea to Sky corridor please add this item

About Breast Cancer: 

Breast cancer is a complex disease that will affect 1 in 9 Canadian women during their lifetime.
According to the latest statistics, it is estimated that 24,400 women and 210 men in Canada will be diagnosed with breast cancer, and that 5,000 women and 60 men will die from the disease in 2014.

As a national leader in breast cancer funding, the Foundation has allocated over $248 million towards breast cancer research, health promotion, advocacy, education and awareness programs since 1986.

Our donor dollars are put to work by investing in the brightest and best minds in breast cancer research and community health programs that are leading groundbreaking work across the breast cancer spectrum.

With your support, the Foundation will continue investing in the brightest and best minds in breast cancer research. We will continue advocating for greater education, improving treatment options, access to screening and empowering Canadians affected by breast cancer. With your support, we will create a future without breast cancer.

Souce:  

http://www.cbcf.org/bc/Pages/default.aspx 

Sesame-Maple Roasted Tofu

Adapted from Eating Well

 

Ingredients:

14oz Extra-Firm Tofu
1 Medium Red Onion, sliced
2 tsp sunflower oil or other neutral cooking oil
2 tsp sesame oil
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground pepper
2 Tbsp tahini
2 Tbsp soy sauce
4 tsp maple syrup
2 tsp apple cider vinegar
1 Tbsp sesame seeds
1 Large or 2 Small Zucchini

Directions:

Preheat Oven to 450 F.

Rinse and pat dry the tofu, then cut into cubes.

Toss tofu, onion, canola oil, sesame oil, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Spread on a large baking sheet and roast until the tofu is lightly golden on top and the onions are browing in spots.

About 15 to 20 minutes.

In a small dish, whisk together the tahini, soy sauce, maple syrup, and vinegar until combined. Quarter and dice your zucchini. Remove the tofu from the oven, add the zucchini pieces and drizzle with the sauce. Stir to combine. Sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Return to the oven and continue roasting until zucchini turns golden and tender.

About 10 to 12 minutes more.

** The original recipe calls for Snap Peas or Green Beans, but since the Zucchini plants are exploding, we decided to go with those instead. I love baked Zucchini! **

Did you know... Unavailable Items, Credits, and Billing.

We've had a few people ask these questions over the past couple of weeks, so I thought I'd share in case other members have been wondering and haven't asked yet.

So, Why is an item unavailable?

Sometimes a supplier or manufacturer runs out of a product and we don't find out until our order arrives at the warehouse. For example, I place an order on either Wednesday or Thursday for the following week's deliveries and then the order arrives on Monday without some of the items I ordered.

So why not mark it as Out of Stock on the website?

We can only mark it out of stock if no one has added it to their bin for that week. I discovered this past Tuesday, for example, that Eden will no longer be manufacturing their Bottled Crushed Tomatoes. Since quite a few people had already ordered it for this week, I was unable to remove it from the website until after 9am Thursday when everyone's orders are locked into the system.

If I were to mark an item as Out of Stock or Not Available, then it would automatically disappear from your order leaving us without any way to tell who had ordered it and no way to tell you that it was unavailable. Instead we leave it up on the website and make sure to give you a note in your bin, then credit it back to your account and mark it out of stock on the next closest Thursday.

We are constantly discussing potential website upgrades with our programmers and one of the items on our list is implementing a better system which will allow us to update stock inventory daily instead of once per week.

When do you credit it to my account?

If our warehouse doesn't have it in stock, we don't give up there! We try twice more to get a product for you. Around mid-morning our warehouse assistant will make a quick stop at our local suppliers to see if we can get any individual units of missing items. Any items we were unable to get from them, we write down on a list for our drivers. The drivers then stop at stores along their route to see if they can find anything. Sometimes items are unavailable at every location because the manufacturer is having difficulties, so we have to leave a note in your bin.

Our office closes at 4pm, long before our drivers come back to the warehouse to drop off any picked up bins, bottles, and cryo-paks. To make sure we credit everything back, the drivers write down anyone who had unavailable items on their route paperwork. The next morning, we check through the paperwork and credit back the unavailable items, plus any bottles and cold-pak returns.

Can I see these Credits for myself?

Absolutely! Anytime you want to double check your credits, you can do so right on your account. Once you have logged on and are looking at your dashboard, look to the list of links on your left. You want to click on the one that says "Your Billing" (pictured below).



Once you have clicked on "Your Billing", you should be able to see your payment information. Scroll down the page and underneath will be your list of Credits and Charges with the most recent on top.

We will do our best to get items credited back to your account within 24 hours of your delivery, so if you do not see an item listed that was unavailable, please let us know! Our drivers do their best to make sure everything is written down for us, but they may occasionally miss something.

As always, please let us know if you have any questions!

Spicy Sauteed Celery

Adapted from Yummly

One of our Amazing Members had asked for an easy to make Celery Recipe! This is great for those days when you don't have much time and need to whip something up for a quick and healthy snack on the go!

Ingredients:


- 1 tbsp unsalted butter
- 2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
- 1 large bunch celery, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
- 1/4 teaspoon red-pepper flakes (Can substitute for regular black or cayenne pepper)
- Coarse Salt (Can substitute for regular salt)






Directions: 


In a large skillet, melt butter over medium.
Add garlic and cook, stirring, until lightly browned, about 2 minutes.
Add celery and cook, stirring occasionally, until crisp-tender, 6 minutes.
Add red-pepper flakes and season with salt.

Notes:  This recipe is fairly basic and very easy to make.  This allows you to search your fridge for any leftover meats/veggies or rice you may have to cook with it!  Be creative!

Fluffy Buttermilk Biscuits

Okay, so last week you made butter and now you have extra fresh buttermilk. Time to make some biscuits!

 

Adapted from Gouda Monster

Ingredients:

6 Tbsp COLD butter, unsalted
2 1/4 cups flour
(cake flour recommended - lower gluten content for a fluffier biscuit)
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
Salt (1/2 tsp if serving with gravy, 1 tsp if eating plain)
1 cup buttermilk

Notes:
If using All purpose flour, reduce flour to 2 cups and whisk in 2 Tbsp cornstarch

Directions: 
First, Preheat your oven to 500F.

In a food processor pulse together everything except the buttermilk until a bit crumbly. Make sure small pieces of butter remain. Transfer to the freezer and butter a round baking pan. When the oven is hot put your flour mixture back on to the food processor. Pour in the buttermilk and pulse until just combined. Do not overmix! The dough should be loose and shaggy. Pour the dough out onto a floured surface and with a very light touch press it into a rough rectangle shape. Fold it over itself twice and then gently press it out again so it’s about an inch thick.

Using a biscuit cutter begin to cut out your biscuits. Depending on how much you pressed out your dough, you will get 5 or 6 big biscuits with a 3″ cutter. You could press your dough out a little bit more, use a 2″ inch cutter, and probably manage to squeeze out 10-12 biscuits if you prefer. ~ Be careful using drinking glasses to cut the dough, the duller edge tends to seal the side of the biscuit more and it rises less.

Put the buttered pan in the oven until the butter gets hot (not too long or it will smoke). Remove it and place your cut biscuits inside. The edges will probably touch and that’s ok.

Bake in the oven for 12-14 minutes or until golden brown on top. Wait until they cool enough that you don't burn your fingers, slather on some butter, jam, or gravy and enjoy!

Conversations with Growing City

I absolutely love watching Dragon's Den, especially when there are amazing new innovations or services that have the potential to make major changes. Back in January of 2013, a company called Growing City made their sales pitch to the dragons. Green Earth Organics member and Growing City employee, Genevieve, agreed to speak with us about this fast growing company and the impact they've had on improving our planet.

Can you tell me a little about what Growing City does?

Of course! Growing City is an Organics and Recycling service provider. In a nutshell, we provide offices, restaurants, hotels, cafés as well as commercial and residential buildings organics and recycling collection services.

How has Growing City evolved since we saw you on Dragon’s Den?

Oh boy! Well, for one, I was hired as the first full-time sales manager in order to manage the influx of requests we got from that first appearance on the show. After that, we were able to hire 2 more staff members for our operations side of things, one driver and one operations manager. And, at the beginning of this year we also added a new vehicle to our fleet. So needless to say, things are going great!

So, break it down for me. What happens to the organic waste after you pick it up?

After we collect your organics, our driving team brings the materials to one of [your city's] approved organics processing facilities. We’ve been working with Enviro-Smart Organics and they’re great! At the facility, our load gets weighed and then dumped into a pile in order to start the composting process. The materials get turned every once in a while and, after a few months, you have nutrient rich soil which is distributed... to farmers who will grow more fruits and vegetables to go into your client’s bins. We literally come back full-circle, so neat!

What is the best way for the average person to get started?

Growing City is currently only just in the Metro Vancouver area, but the company is looking for partners in Alberta and the rest of Canada as well, so that soon everyone can take advantage of composting whether at home or at work.

Absolute best way is to contact us. There are a few ways you can do that:

Send us a request online: http://www.growingcity.com/get-started-free-quote-today

Call us: 1-855-WE-COMPO (932-6676)

Send us an email: info@growingcity.ca

Tweet to us: @GrowingCity

Send us a note on Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/yourGrowingCity 

Following is for Metro Vancouver Members:

Does Growing City have any suggestions to help people living in cities or buildings without a compost service?

Yes of course! The City of Vancouver has extended collection to apartment buildings that already have city provided waste hauling services so, if you’re one of those, send them a note to get your green bin. If your building is not eligible for then, that’s where we come in.

Just contact us through the channels noted above, whether or not you’re on strata council, we can help you get them on board!

Metro Vancouver has a ban on organics at their landfills coming into effect January in 2015. How do you think this will affect residents of Vancouver and their neighbors?

From the last meeting we had with Metro Vancouver, this is what will happen in January 2015:

The accepted threshold for organics in a load of garbage will be 5%

The garbage haulers who go over this 5% threshold will be fined 50% of their regular tipping fee (108$ /metric tonne at the moment)

Metro Vancouver will begin giving out fines as of June 2015

Since it will be difficult for haulers to determine which clients are contaminating their loads, the thought is that the fines will be redistributed among all of their clients, unless it can be shown that an organics program is already in place. 

So although this ban will not impact residents directly, the costs will end up coming back to them indirectly. We say, better safe than sorry, call us today so we can get you to start recycling your food scraps.