Most amazing raw brocoli salad

Hi all,

I´ve recently found this recipe of raw brocoli salad that is most amazing and tasty
give it a try!
The ingredients are: brocoli, garlic, lemon juice, cumin seeds, coriander and salt.

Brocoli is a great veggie full of healthy properties such as anti-cancer benefits.

http://allthingsnice.typepad.com/tastebuddies/2008/06/raw-broccoli-sa.html

Enjoy it as much as I am doing it
Happy New Year
love
Barbara

Community Garden possibility in Kentlands, Gaithersburg MD

PRESENTATION OF A POSSIBLE COMMUNITY GARDEN in the KENTLANDS
I and a few others have started up a GO GREEN group within our community here in Gaithersburg, MD. The purpose of this group is to educate ourselves about all environmental issues that touch our lives. We are currently looking at the possibility of starting a community garden where people can start growing their own veggies.

If any of you have experience in this kind of gardening, would love to hear from you.
Below is a brief article I wrote up for the local Town Crier paper to get people to come to listen to the proposed project.

The Go GREEN group has changed its summer family program in August to listen to an idea for a community garden in the Kentlands, presented by DPZ Architectural firm designers.

The August GO GREEN tree planting activity is rescheduled for September.

DPZ Architectural designers Ruthzaly Weich and Andrew Moneyheffer will present a design for a community garden that has been drawn out for the current green grass area that sits lies between the DPZ firm and the Carriage House, next to the Arts Barn.

The two young designers came up with the idea for a community garden while in the process of designing current and future new urbanism communities that incorporate community gardens in their layout.

“Gardens where you can grow your own vegetables are becoming more and more popular. There are so many rewards to growing your own food,” says Ruthzaly.

Community gardens historically in the US developed and evolved where people wanted to grow their own vegetables or flowers and were committed to taking care of the land and space. World War II saw the rise of the “Victory Garden”, community vegetable gardens designed by people to feed themselves and the troops.

The Kentlands was designed with various open spaces that are currently either green grass areas or have woodchips in them. These areas could also be considered for future community garden areas if there is interest in such projects.

The proposed community garden design envisions a common sitting area, nine raised beds for access by people of all ages. The aisles would accommodate wheel chairs and there would also be a tool shed. Rain barrels and a composting area are also part of the
suggested garden design.

Someone from a local community garden will also be at the GO GREEN meeting to discuss how their community garden is allotted and run, so as to educate those interested in actually maintaining a plot as to how the garden can work. Another suggestion to be discussed is the possibility of having one plot designated as an educational children’s garden.

For more information on community gardens visit: www.communitygarden.org

Questions: Call Alex Stavitsky-Zeineddin GO GREEN 240-246-1645

The permaculture garden

There´s been a recent transport drivers strike in Spain that kept for several days the whole country in standby. Day number 2 of the strike, and there was hardly any fruits and veggies in the supermarkets. The media sort of scared the population with the idea of a possible food shortage and scared people filled up their tanks and also their pushing trails. It was interesting to watch what does modern spaniards consider "vital" in terms of food provisions for surviving the strike: many gathered tons and tons of fashionable yogurts and fatning items...Elder people tended to watch this collective hysteria with a smile in their silent faces, knowing and remembering perhaps that in times of true crisis, no yogurt will assist you but more of the basic lentils, chickpeas, rice, and other dried and long lasting food.

Anyhow, besides this crisis, I´ve bought myself this book to learn more about gardening and growing our own veggies in a healthy and respectful way:




So far we are enjoying a lot the simplicity of the techniques shown in the book. I specially enjoyed the idea of growing our own potatoes using as a container a series of car wheels one on top of the other one, in order not to occupy too much space in the garden and be able to grow more potatoes in the different levels created by the wheels...and ecological and recycling brilliant idea.

Cleaning Green, Saving Green

I’ve been making my own cleaning supplies for the past five months. I started this journey to limit my family’s exposure to chemicals and to save money.

Many things have worked well. Some have not.

My sources were two books I borrowed from a friend: “It’s Easy Being Green, A Handbook for Earth-Friendly Living,” by Crissy Trask and “Green Clean, The Environmentally Sound Guide to Cleaning Your Home,” by Linda Mason Hunter and Mikki Halpin.

The basic ingredients are: vinegar, water, baking soda, washing soda, Borax, scented oil and vanilla/almond extract.

Basic supplies include (all from the Dollar Store): spray bottles, permanent marker, large flour container, cut up microfiber rags, and glass parmesan cheese containers (holes on top).

I give these items top ratings: toilet cleaner, glass cleaner, laundry detergent and bath cleaner. I’ve saved the most money making my own laundry detergent (one part borax/one part washing soda stored in a sealable flour container). I’d previously been buying hypoallergenic no dye detergent.

What I’m not too thrilled about are bleach alternatives for my counter. Salt, lemon, baking soda, vinegar, and hot water haven’t worked. The bleach alternative I purchased from a health food store is better than my concoctions, but it can’t compare to the clean I got with bleach. My lungs are a lot happier though.

The homemade dishwashing detergent sometimes gets stuck in the dispenser. It also tends to make the glass cloudy. Nothing I can’t live with, but I am still tinkering with the recipe. (My husband is a harsher critic.)

My switch to cleaning green wasn’t a difficult one. Once I tracked down the basic ingredients, bought them in bulk and gathered the containers to store them in, it was easy.

Why not give it a try one cleaner at a time? You can even use your old cleaning bottles for your new cleaners – just rinse them out first.

Here’s a few to get you started in the bathroom:

1. Mirror/Window cleaner: 1/3 part vinegar, 2/3 water, add vanilla extract or almond extract to scent it (do not use an oil based extract like peppermint) Mix and add to a spray bottle
2. Toilet Cleaner 1 part vinegar, 1 part water, add oil based scent (peppermint extract, rose oil) Mix and add to spray bottle, spray toilet and clean with toilet brush. Spray all around toilet and wipe clean.
3. Bath cleaner: baking soda put into a parmesan cheese holder. Sprinkle baking soda on damp tub, spray with window cleaner from above (note chemical reaction of vinegar and baking soda), scrub with brush or microfiber rag. Repeat as necessary.

Window and Toilet cleaner can also be used on the sink and/or tile floor

Reduce and Reuse in Lunches

Using less and reusing are themes I’ve tried to weave into our everyday lives.

I use cloth bags for grocery and shopping trips, reusable water bottles that don’t leach plastic into the water on our hikes and put food in containers to limit wax paper bag use (no plastic).

Today I received a lunch system organizer (www.laptoplunches.com) that fits into our insulated lunchboxes. It came with a book, “The Laptop Lunch User’s Guide,” by Amy Hemmert and Tammy Pelstring. The book addresses reducing trash generated by school children.

According to Hemmert and Pelstring, each elementary age child bringing disposable lunches to school is responsible for 67 pounds of trash during the school year.

I have taken on the challenge to reduce our output even more -- two kids at a time.

Tonight I made their first lunches with the new containers. I can cut down on carbs by serving the protein in a variety of ways – rolling the organic deli meat with rice cheese inside for one son. Or cutting cheese sticks and sausages into bite sized pieces served on a toothpick. I found some great ideas in the blog, www.lunchnugget.com, where lunches have aesthetic appeal take on an art form.

This system makes things simple. Fresh fruit, meat and vegetables are easily housed here with the occasional cookie or chips. I just need to have healthy options available.

Though they don’t always work.

At the pool today one of my son’s friend had a package of mini donuts. My son was drooling for a taste. I had a banana in my bag, which he refused. He knew he had an option though and if he were truly hungry, he’d have gobbled that banana up.

I am considering purchasing McDonald’s Happy Meal toys separately to occasionally put into these lunches. Despite all of my efforts to explain how unhealthy fast food is for them, I can’t compete with a Speed Racer Mach 5 toy car.

sweetners, silent killers

We´ve had a case at home of a relative completely affected by Aspartame intake...to the point of almost paralysis and nervous syst breakdown...One of the main supermarkets in Spain is selling pure Aspartame by kilos!

Just came across this info, although the main source of info we got at the time was from other sources.
http://www.healthandyoga.com/html/news/harder_killer.html
http://www.mercola.com/article/aspartame/index.htm
http://www.rense.com/general70/excito.htm

Homemade Superfood

Hi all, you may find this article interesting. Its all about homemade sprouts with some recipes on how to grow sunflowers for instance and some nasty hints about how the iraqi farmers are forced by their new Constitution to purchase Monsanto GMO seeds. (!!!)

http://www.naturalnews.com/023226.html

Best wishes from sunny Spain

Barbara