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Food and Drink

You don't have to be abrasive

 

The other day I saw a slogan on a reusable bag that's stuck in my head: technology owes ecology an apology.

While the urge to green North Americans was at high tide about a year ago, thanks to media campaigns, books and neighbourly nudges, that slogan made me wonder how many people have actually changed their habits and products by way of apology to Mother Nature.

I'm happy to see more and more local and organic or chemical-free, produce and meats at grocery stores, complete with little signs telling you whose farm or ranch the product is from. But I'm not sure we've made many inroads on the cleaning side of our wee domestic Canadian lives.

The terms "green" or "eco-" anything are feeling a bit worn out, but the fact remains that technology has inundated us with thousands of chemicals in our environment that we're barely aware of - 80,000 of them in North America, says the CancerSmart 3.0 Consumer Guide , and less than 10 per cent have been fully tested for their health and environmental effects.

I mean, what can you say about those Mr. Clean or Scotch 3M "magic" erasers that clean by way of the formaldehyde in them? I say leave your kids' magic marker marks on the wall.

As for plug-in air fresheners - don't even get me started on those ridiculous things. Just remember as you "freshen" your home that they can also produce formaldehyde under certain conditions.

And in another for-instance, Unilever Canada puts into its White Bright Sunlight Laundry Detergent and Sunlight Ultra Laundry detergent trisodium nitrilotriactetate (NTA), listed by the International Agency for Research on Cancer as a possible human carcinogen also known to remobilize heavy metals in the waste stream.

But there are alternatives.

My favourite tale regarding same harkens back to a good party and some subsequent yellow stains on the carpet left by white wine that had happily sloshed out of someone's glass.

Had it been red, I would have noticed and washed it out, but that's the problem with colourless booze. If you get it on something, you usually don't notice until the alcohol starts yellowing, and by then it's too late.

At least that's what the rug guy told me when he used some chemical concoction, god knows what, to try and remove the stains years later. But whatever it was he daubed on actually made them worse, turning the stains dark brown and sticky even after he "professionally" cleaned the carpet.

To the rescue, Reena Nerbas. I've written before about this amazing woman from rural Manitoba who gets tons of media coverage because of her ability to parlay science with common sense to come up with cleaning solutions made from everyday stuff - ones that meet or beat the "professionals" and most commercial products and don't risk your good health or the environment. She now has a third book called Household Solutions 3 with Green Alternatives that you can buy on-line.

Thanks to Reena and her famous carpet cleaning method - too long to write out here, but it's in her book Household Solutions 1 with Substitutions and involves simple hydrogen peroxide, vinegar and plastic wrap - I got out the original wine stains and the brownish gunk the "professional" and his chemical cleaner left.

Forget Drano. Ugh. How many fish and aquatic systems does that help destroy? Reena's got a way to clear drains with vinegar and baking soda that works like a hot damn.

I've gotten fruit stains out of white things simply by pouring a kettle full of boiling water over them from a height. And you can use ketchup instead of chemical cleaners to polish copper.

In addition to the home cleaning remedies, you can buy good ready-mades, too, and, really, it's not expensive when you calculate the true cost along the whole supply chain.

Nature Clean, based in Ontario, makes a great line of alternative cleaning solutions. Their dishwasher gel is 95.5 per cent natural (note the carefully rendered .5 per cent) for only $8.99 for nearly two litres. It's unscented, hypoallergenic, chlorine-free and phosphate-free. (Phosphorous remains one of the major causes of destruction in lakes and rivers.)

Nature Clean's glass cleaner, made without ammonia (it relies on witch hazel) is very effective at $3.99 for nearly a litre. You can even get a Nature Clean toilet bowl clean without the usual harsh chemicals, and I always use their dish soap - again, no phosphates and no added scent.

With their nice, neutral laundry soap you can be comfortable your clothes are both clean and carcinogen-free. At 30 loads for $8.99, that's only 30 cents a load and you won't have to make an apology to ecology every time you use it.

 

• • •

FREE FOOD FOR ALL

The UN has been warning us all for decades that it will be the poorest who will be hit the hardest by climate change.

The world has just come through the hottest year on record, the hottest six months on record and the hottest April, May and June on record, with records set in numerous countries, including Russia (111 degrees) and an all-time Asian record set in Pakistan of nearly 130 degrees.

We also know that warmer air holds more moisture, so no surprise that the world's atmosphere now holds 5 per cent more moisture now than it did 40 years ago.

If you've been meaning to donate to one NGO or another doing good work in the wake of the devastating floods in Pakistan, but haven't gotten around to it, take this as a gentle reminder. Virtually the entire nation is or has been under water and some 21 million people have been impacted including about 500,000 pregnant women.

The deadline has been extended by our federal government to Oct. 2 to match whatever you give.

Whether you've donated or not, you can have some fun and donate (more?) by playing FreeRice at http://freerice.com .

This site, run by the UN World Food Program in conjunction with Harvard University, has been around a while, but it's doing a Pakistan-specific campaign right now. Advertisers and sponsors help pay for the non-profit site and you get to play a variety of challenges for free on a variety of topics (the art link is addicting).

For every right answer you add 10 grains of free rice to someone's empty bowl. Someone's bowl in Pakistan.

 

Glenda Bartosh is an award-winning freelance writer who's just run through 130 gorgeous paintings on FreeRice.