Happy Tuesday that feels like a Monday until you realize that Friday is closer than you think. I hope you are filled up from a holiday of delicious eating with delicious people.

This week I’m going to try and focus a little bit on the cost of food– both directly in the store and market as well as the big picture costs affiliated. We’ll see how this goes.

A couple links to help you consider your body’s fuel with as much mindfulness as you do the fuel in your home or your car:

1- The Environmental Working Group has issued a guide to pesticides for shoppers to help make it easier to determine what produce needs to be an organic purchase and where you may be able to buy conventional. It can even be downloaded to your iphone.

Check it out here:

http://www.foodnews.org/walletguide.php

2- Tom Philpott (who has the best name for someone writing about food issues– i could make “Philpott” jokes all day in regards to food in the recession!) wrote a great article for Grist.com that deserves a read. . He illuminates the similarities between the financial collapse and vulnerabilities in the world’s food system. All the more reason to think about how our investments in our sustenance need to have as much thoughtful consideration as the type of socks we invest in to put under our mattresses.  (I prefer a sensible organic wool.)

http://www.grist.org/article/2009-05-22-financial-collapse-food

Happy eating!

Did you know that much of that Hazardous Material is used to make the household cleaning supplies you buy in the store?

With that in mind, below are some natural, all-purpose cleaner recipes that can be made at home, generally with ingredients that you might already have on hand!

• Baking Soda: use it on a damp sponge to clean & deodorize any surface, including in your kitchen or bathroom!
• Baking Soda: dissolve 4 tablespoons in 1 quart of warm water to make a general cleaning solution. 
• Baking Soda: make a paste with baking soda and water and use it as a general cleaner. 
• Baking Soda/Borax & Castile Soap: use a little of this mixture and a lot of water to clean your floors, or more of it and less water to clean a sink, or a tub, or a cat box, or buckets, etc. – anything that is able to be rised well once the cleaning is complete.
•  Vinegar and Salt mixed together makes a good surface cleaner.
•  Salt, water, and a bit of vinegar makes a good paste which can be used as a general cleaner.

Here’s one that is a little more complex, but can be used in a spray bottle:

• 3 tablespoons vinegar, 1/2 teaspoon washing soda, 1/2 teaspoon liquid castile soap – all mixed with 2 cups of hot water. Spray it on and wipe it clean!

Here’s some information about the products you will be using in the above cleaning recipes:

• Baking Soda was the primary cleaning agent in the restoration of the statue of liberty!  Is is scientifically known as sodium bicarbonate, and is known as a non-toxic, all-purpose cleaner, which cleans and deodorizes.
• Borax, scientifcally known as sodium borate, deodorizes and increases the effectiveness of soap.
• Castile Soap is soap made exclusively from vegetable oil (as opposed to animal fat).
• Salt is generally used as an abrasive in cleaning recipes; by itself it is not a “cleaner.”
• Vinegar (scientifically – acetic acid) removes stains and cuts through grease.  It also softens water (increasing its cleaning effectiveness).
• Washing Soda is called sodium carbonate in the science field. It is a disenfectant and also cuts through grease.  Like Borax, it increases soap’s cleaning effectiveness.

Quick Warning: Just because it is “natural” doesn’t necessarily mean that it is safe to ingest or to leave sitting around – especially for kids or pets.  Borax CAN BE TOXIC to pets and children, so be careful!  It’s probably a good idea to label the ingredients of your cleaners and keep them away from children and pets.  You should also tell any others in your household where the borax (and any products containing borax) are located and what they are to be used for.

Enjoy making your new, natural cleaners; maybe even make it in bulk and give it away (with the recipe) as gifts for the holidays!  Leave a comment telling us other natural all-purpose cleaner recipes that are not included above!

Namaste,
A. Caleb Hartley

If you’ve ever had the pleasure </sarcasm> of dealing with gnats, here’s a great way to get them under control:

First, eliminate the source – any soft (meaning rotten) fruit or vegetables will spawn an infestation of gnats.  Check your trash, and get rid of anything that might remotely attract them.  Old fruit, spots of honey or balsamic vinegar, etc.  I would even get rid of any stale bread… anything that any bug might find appetizing.

Next, find a tall, narrow glass (something you might drink iced tea or milk out of).  Put a little cider vinegar in it (enough to cover the bottom of the glass to about 1/4 of an inch deep or so). 

Now, put a few drops of detergent in it (dish soap will work fine for this part). 

Stir it up, and set a funnel on the top of the glass, narrow part down inside the glass.

Gnats will be attracted to the cider vinegar, and will crawl down the funnel into the glass.  Once there, they are unable to get back out and will ultimately end up in the vinegar.  The detergent holds them there once they land, and they ultimately “drown” in the vinegar.

I was pretty skeptical about this solution initially, but I thought I’d try it. Other than a little bit of vinegar smell wafting through the room sometimes, I was pleasantly surprised at how well it worked!  We set it up, left the house for a little while (maybe 30 minutes or so), and when we came back, there were gnats all over the glass – on the inside!  At least 50 of them, with many already dead in the vinegar!

I highly suggest using this tactic – it’s much better than buying a can of (ineffective) chemicals and leaving a coating of poisonous residue all over your house!

Enter Diatomaceous Earth. Sounds like dirt or dust, but in actuality is a fossil (another name for it is “Fossil Shell Flour”).  It’s made up of microscopic little shells of diatoms, a one-celled type of algae. 

These fossilized shells have tiny little points, which puncture an insect’s exoskeleton and dry them up, killing them.  In this way, Diatomaceous Earth is a mechanical insecticide, not a chemical one.  Because of this, insects cannot become immune or resistant to Diatomaceous Earth. On the downside, Diatomaceous Earth will kill all insects – even good ones – so it should be used carefully!

Diatomaceous Earth has little to no health effects to humans or pets as long as it has not been treated for use in such things as swimming pools – look for “Amorphous Freshwater Diatomaceous Earth” and a “silica-content” of less than 1.5% to ensure that it is safe to use on pets or around people or farm animals.

In fact, Diatomaceous Earth is used in some livestock feed to kill any bugs that might eat or ruin the feed before it can be fed to the animals.  Diatomaceous Earth is so safe, the livestock just eats it with the food!  It actually can kill worms or parasites that live inside animals as well as the pests that bother them on the outside!

For more information about Diatomaceous Earth, or to buy some to try yourself, click the following links:

Dirt Works
Internet-Grocer
Amazon.com – GreenSense
Freshwater Organics
Perma-Guard

Namaste,
A. Caleb Hartley