Make it a Green Thanksgiving

With Thanksgiving around the corner, here are a few easy tips for a great green holiday that are also useful all year round.

Repurpose Stale Bread & Bread Heels
Collect these in an airtight container in the freezer for making holiday stuffing, croutons for a salad, or bread crumbs to top a vegetable gratin. (Crispy breadcrumbs and a little cheese might be just the trick to turn your kids on to more kinds of veggies.)

photo from slashfood.com

Reuse Cooking Water
Use the same pot of boiling water to blanch veggies, cook pasta, then use the water to soak beans or grains, incorporate it into soups, or (if unsalted) to water the garden.

Fill Up the Oven
Utilize the oven when its hot. While roasting a bird or baking a lasagna, co-roast on another rack for meals later in the week (like sweet peppers and onions for a sandwich, or cubes of butternut squash bound for a quinoa salad).

Invest in Glass/Ceramic Containers
Airtight glass containers are freezable and microwavable. Note that most brands state they are not oven-safe when you read the fine print. (Although we don't recommend it, some daring folks have baked, frozen and microwaved mini mac 'n cheese, lasagna, and fruit crisps at 350 F successfully.)

We do recommend ceramic containers from Good Cook that are dishwasher, freezer, microwave and oven safe (and come with a lid for storage only). What a great way to package leftovers for your guests to take home!

Make Stock 
Should no one at your Thanksgiving meal already have plans for what's left of the turkey, make stock. Put the carcass in a pot with a carrot, a halved onion and a rib of celery and a few springs of thyme, cover with cool water and bring to a simmer. After 2 hours, you'll have several quarts of stock to freeze and use in soups or risotto for many meals to come.


References: Whole Living Magazine, July/August 2010