This afternoon I listened to a radio host interview a doctor about … what else … H1N1.

The slant to his interview was “Are children at risk of contracting H1N1 when they go trick or treating?”

The host asked the doctor questions like: “Can H1N1 be transmitted through candy.” “Are children at risk by touching a door knob that a bunch of other kids have touched?”

And my personal favourite question: “Could a ‘bad guy’ use Halloween candy to deliberately spread H1N1?”

I think the doctor was as frustrated as I was with the way the interview was going and he gave a calm and courteous, but firm “No” answer to all these questions.

I wish the media would stop.

If the media really wanted to do service to the public they would talk about how eating a whole bunch of sugar laced with food colouring, preservatives, and artificial stuff wreaks havoc on a child’s immune system.

And not only does all that crap food almost instantly deflate immune function, but researchers now say that repeated high spikes in blood sugar greatly contributes to one’s risk for developing Type 2 Diabetes.

Oh ya … don’t forget the damage that sugar can do to your child’s beautiful second set of newly forming teeth!

If you really want to protect your children this Halloween, limit the amount of candy they eat to one treat per day for a just a day or two, then quietly throw the rest in the garbage.

Want to know more? See “What’s so bad about junk food.”

The 1st Annual Buy-No-Food-In-Plastic Day has come and gone and I’ve heard some great stories from friends and family about how their plastic awareness was ignited.

The best story comes from someone I won’t name … She tells me she was having lunch with a coworker at a food court and enthusiastically talking about it being the 1st Annual Buy-No-Food-In-Plastic Day. As she was speaking she suddenly noticed that her food court food had been served in Styrofoam containers … oops …

When she sheepishly told me the story I cheered! Hooray! That tells me that the 1st Annual Buy-No-Food-In-Plastic Day succeeded in raising both her and her coworker’s plastic-awareness. Plastic is so integrated into daily life that we hardly even notice.

They then discussed how they could have easily brought down reusable plates and cutlery from the office kitchen.

Maybe next week they will.

It doesn’t matter if you succeeded in going 24 hours without purchasing plastic or not. What matters is that you became a little more plastic-aware.

Congratulations!

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Today is my birthday and you can wish me well by participating in the first annual Buy-No-Food-In-Plastic day. All you have to do is pay attention to how the food you purchase is packaged. And when you have a choice, choose food products that are self-packaged or in non-plastic containers.

Before a problem can be solved, we must first be aware that there is a problem. Do you remember when Big Mac’s and Quarter Pounders were served up in cancer-causing polystyrene aka Styrofoam? 

More than 20 years ago McDonald’s assistant vice president was quoted in the New York Times: ”We use foam packaging for the same reasons that schools, hospitals and other restaurants do. It keeps our products hot, it keeps them fresh, its portable and it’s a safe and sanitary way to serve our product.” (http://www.nytimes.com/1987/11/11/nyregion/mcdonald-s-is-urged-to-alter-packaging.html Accessed: July 16, 2009).

Today, McDonald’s no longer uses foam packaging for its sandwiches and the change in packaging hasn’t seemed to hurt their business. Their sandwiches are still delivered hot, fresh, safe and sanitary … in benign paper-based wrapping.

Change can happen. It starts with awareness.

Its fairly rare to see food in Styrofoam packaging these days. But the packaging of choice is still predominately other types of plastic. Plastic keeps food fresh. Its portable. Its sanitary. It’s a wonder product. But is it safe? The evidence is mounting that it is not; not for lab rats, not for babies, not for adults, not for fish; not for water, not for landfills.

Today is the day to raise your plastic awareness. Can you go the whole day without purchasing food wrapped in plastic?

It’s a difficult challenge, but its not impossible.

Well here I am, half way through my PFF experiment. (PFF = Plastic-Free-Food … way easier to type than “30-Day-No-Food-Purchased-In-Plastic”.)

Eating PFF is not easy and as I reflect on the past 15 days I realize that I have had some wins and some slip ups.

For instance, I didn’t think I had to give up my daily whole milk latte habit. After all I was bringing my own cup to the coffee shop. But today I watched as the barista poured the milk for my latte out of a plastic jug. Crap! Ok technically I didn’t purchase the milk in the plastic jug … or did I?

Then there are the herbs I bought in China town yesterday that were all sealed in plastic bags. I was buying the herbs for my business, so I didn’t think I was compromising the experiment. And I wasn’t … well not until I tore into the bag of Goji berries for a snack. I was well into my third fist full of the berries before I noticed the plastic bag in my hand.

One day on the weekend I was at the big box grocery deli and wanted a quick, high protein snack. I scanned the deli case and spied unwrapped sausage rolls. I told the clerk I wanted one, but I didn’t want the plastic take out tub that they use. I suggested that she simply wrap it in a paper towel. She said she could put it in a plastic bag instead. I told her “No! I don’t want plastic!”

I didn’t mean to yell … I apologized and tried to explain about my PFF experiment … but I’m pretty sure she rolled her eyes at me as she handed me the paper wrapped roll. I shrugged my shoulders and proceeded to pull off all the crappy white flour pastry and then ate just the meat part. It wasn’t very good.

So I stopped at the organic store on the way home and picked up a few handfuls of fresh cherries, using one of my cloth bags instead of a plastic bag. The clerk in that store gave me a 5 cent bag discount. The cherries were delicious.

This Friday, July 17th is your turn to experiment with PFF purchases. Write in and let me know your experiences.

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Since there are so many new readers this week, I thought I’d give you a quick catch-up on what’s going on at LowCrapDiet.com and then we’ll talk about ketchup.

Low Crap Diet is about cutting ‘crap food’ out of our diet … improve our health; improve the health of the earth.

Lately I’ve been cranky about plastic and other throw away packaging. In fact I became so frustrated with all the low crap food in high crap packaging that I decided to try a 30 day buy-no-food-in-plastic experiment. Feeling a little lonely in my experiment, I invited you to join me by declaring Friday, July 17, 2009 to be the first annual “Buy No Food in Plastic” day. (Better start getting organized … Friday is only two days away.)

Now that you are all caught up, here’s the promised ‘ketchup’ bit.

I’ve always wondered why “returnable glass bottles” didn’t catch on for more products. It’s a brilliantly sustainable system. When I purchase milk in a glass bottle, I pay a ‘deposit’ on the bottle as incentive to bring it back to the store so it can be refilled. When I return the bottle the deposit is refunded. It works for milk and pop and there is no reason it couldn’t work for other consumable products.

I’d like to see the following products in returnable glass bottles:
- yogurt
- feta cheese
- olives
- cooking oil
- vinegar
- mayonnaise
- nut butters
- stewed tomatoes
- bar-b-que sauce
- spices
- honey
- juice
- ice cream
- ketchup

I think you get the picture and you can probably add other products that you regularly purchase.

The ability to purchase ketchup in a refillable glass bottle would remove a huge amount of ketchup’s crap-factor.

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Did you know that:
- plastic is collecting in the ocean
- the plastic in the ocean breaks down into tiny colourful bits
- fish and birds eat those colourful bits thinking they are eating food
- you can be part of the solution.

Raise your “plastic-awareness”. On Friday July 17 purchase only plastic-free-food.

Click here for a poster that you can forward to your friends.

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A marketing guru blogger guy named Seth came onto my radar a few months ago when I was setting up Low Crap Diet.

Recently Seth wrote about his birthday wish, asking people to “… start a project, launch an idea …” … create a “Make a difference day.”

Today Seth’s post challenged me to go farther: “Go ahead, do something impossible.”

I like challenges.

I am in the midst of an impossible challenge.

I have a birthday coming up.

I want to make a difference.

In fact, I know you want to make a difference too, so I’m answering Seth’s birthday wish with a birthday wish of my own.

On Friday July 17, my birthday, I invite you to take part in the first annual No-Food-Purchased-In-Plastic Day

The purpose of No-Food-Purchased-In-Plastic Day is to raise our ‘plastic-awareness’, especially in the area of food packaging.

Did you know that:
- plastic never goes away.
- not all plastic is recyclable.
- not all recyclable plastic is recycled.
- plastic leaches toxins into our bodies, our water, our air, and our earth creating havoc in ways we are only just beginning to understand.

My 30 day experiment is teaching me that it is difficult to avoid food with plastic packaging. But I am learning that it is possible to drastically cut down on how much plastic garbage I generate. 

Here’s just a few ideas of how you can participate:

1. Pay attention to how your favourite foods are packaged. (Do you really need your sandwich wrapped if you are going to eat it right away?)
2. When you do purchase food wrapped in plastic, be sure to reuse or recycle the packaging.
3. Bring your own knife, fork and coffee cup (BYOKFCC)
4. Bring your own reusable bags (BYORB)
5. Whenever possible purchase plastic-free-food (PFF)

Can you go 24 hours purchasing only plastic-free-food? Leave a comment and let me know your ideas and thoughts.

Stay tuned for more details … and Happy Birthday Seth!

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Plastic is making me cranky. Its everywhere, not just wrapped around our food. I’m sitting on a vinyl chair, typing on a plastic keyboard, using a plastic mouse. I could reach out and touch plastic speakers, stapler, phone, ipod, printer, cables and cords, a lamp, picture frame, cell phone, camera … the word “ubiquitous” comes to mind.

I went shopping yesterday and purchased mostly fruits and veggies, along with a few other staples. I was feeling pretty proud that I had spent $75 and not one ounce of plastic had found its way into my cloth bags … or so I thought.

Turns out a cardboard label was attached to the pineapple with a plastic thing; the kind of plastic thing that you normally find on clothing. And there wasn’t just one. Seems an over zealous clerk found it necessary to use four of these things to attach two cardboard labels. (I wonder if this was done by a machine or if the labeling was done by a human.) I did not even notice the plastic until I had chopped the top off the pineapple and was about to put the leaves in the compost.

My second faux pas happened in the dairy section. Did you know that ‘cardboard’ milk cartons are actually plastic? The ’paperboard’ is sandwiched between two layers of Polyethylene. You can read all about it on the Elopak Packaging website.

I bought cream and milk in cardboard containers under the assumption that cardboard containers were lined with wax, not plastic. Guess I should have done more thorough research before I jumped to that conclusion. All the more reason to seek out a store that carries milk in glass bottles … well … except for that plastic lid.

What happened to the little cardboard disk that used to seal glass milk bottles?

Yup – I’m cranky and I still have three weeks left in my experiment.

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1. It is 100% non-biodegradable.
2. Once created, plastic will never go away.
3. It leaches toxins into food, water and air.
4. It is collecting in our oceans and on our shores.
5. It breaks down into tiny bits that get eaten by fish. If you eat fish you may be eating tiny bits of plastic.
6. Not all plastic is recyclable and not all recyclable plastic is recycled.
7. Chemicals used in plastic disrupt hormones.
8. Chemicals used in plastic cause cancer.
9. It interferes with physical development in babies and children.
10. It is everywhere.

Its crazy that we spend thousands of dollars to eradicate dandelions from our parks, yet simply accept that plastic is a necessary evil.

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My purchases today were simple: 2 avocados and a large ripe tomato.

No plastic involved! Yeah!

I was curious about the produce sticker with the PLU number on it. The stickers on the avocados seem to be made of paper because I was easily able to rip it. I started searching through my fridge for other produce stickers and found one on those oranges that I bought the other day. That sticker was definitely plastic because it didn’t rip, it stretched as you can see in the picture below.

I did a little research on the stickers and discovered that the glue part that attaches the sticker to the produce has to be ‘food grade’ … whatever that means … because it seems to me that the definition of “food grade’ keeps changing.

I did learn some interesting things about the PLU number on those little labels. Apparently a four digit number means the produce was conventionally grown. If the number starts with ‘9′ the produce is organic. If the number starts with ’8′ the produce is genetically modified. You can read more on the International Federation for Produce Standards website.