The kitchen is the one room in your home that produces the most waste – and has the greatest potential for eco-friendly choices. An eco-conscious kitchen is one that reduces waste, reuses materials, and embraces a balanced relationship with the ecosystem. If you’re looking for ways to make your kitchen greener and more in tune with nature, you’re not alone. Thousands are looking to decrease their carbon footprint and delight in smaller and smaller non-biodegradable bags of trash leaving the home.
Here at Arch City Granite & Marble, we love eco-conscious kitchens like sustainably quarried countertops, BPA-free cabinetry, and sourcing local materials, and of course green cooking practices. Once you’ve built the perfect kitchen for your natural flow as a home chef, you can step up your green kitchen design with a few cleverly eco-conscious choices throughout your routine.
Food Conservation and Waste-Free Kitchens
You can make use of your kitchen scraps and reduce food waste with clever recipes, composting, and bulk storage.
1. Make Stone Soup and Kitchen-Sink Casserole
In the old fables, they call it stone soup or nail soup. In the military, they call it “kitchen sink” soup or casserole because you put everything in except the kitchen sink. As it turns out, you can make a pretty good meal out of the scraps in your fridge, the produce drawer, and the back of your pantry. Combine your meat trimmings and spare vegetables in broth for some incredible soup. Fold it into rice or breadcrumbs for a casserole, or into lentils or a thick gravy for a more stew-like meal.
No matter how you cook it, you can reduce kitchen waste considerably by gleaning the edible trimmings into an all-in-one recipe that might just become a family favorite.
2. Buy and Store in Elegant Bulk Canisters
Buy your dry goods in bulk and store them as kitchen decoration in glass or clear plastic canisters. This saves money, reduces packaging, and reduces the carbon footprint for a bulk order. It’s also very comforting to see giant canisters of pasta, flour, beans, sugar, cinnamon sticks, and other essentials just waiting for that rainy day cooking marathon.
3. Compost or Donate Your Kitchen Scraps to a Local Garden
Composting is a wonderfully eco-conscious way to use your kitchen scraps that don’t go into the soup. Anyone can start a compost pile, box, or barrel. But if you don’t have the space – or a yard – you can also collect and donate your kitchen scraps to a local garden to use for communal compost instead.
Saving Fresh Water Use in the Kitchen
Reduce your use of freshwater from the tap by making better use of your sink instead. A deep farmhouse sink can hold a pitcher or fill to soak dishes. With an aerating faucet, you increase the effectiveness of your water by decreasing the flow.
4. Water Your Plants with Pasta Water
Did you know that pasta water is full of nutrients that plants love? Just like a little sugar in the flower vase makes the roses keep blooming, a little starch in the pasta water is like plant food. Save that valuable pot of water by pouring it over your potted plants and flower beds outside.
5. Soak Dishes in the Wash Water
When you wash your hands or rinse a dish, fill the sink at the same time. The soap you use to wash with can go into the wash water and every dash of hot water is good for the soaking dishes.
6. Use Your Hot-Tap Running Water
When you run the water hot in your sink, collect the cold-to-warm water that you run and put it to use. Boil eggs in it. Water your plants with it. Refill your water filter or humidifier with it. Why let a few gallons run down the drain every time you need hot tap water?
Increase Energy Efficiency
Kitchens are the second most power-hungry room after your utility closet containing the HVAC and water heater. The fridge is the second or third biggest power-eater in most homes, and an older oven can also eat the wattage when on. We also keep a half-dozen appliances plugged into the modern kitchen from the coffee maker to the dishwasher. Increasing kitchen energy efficiency can make a real difference.
7. Replace or Tune-Up Old Appliances
Old fridges and ovens can be extremely power-hungry. Have your appliances cleaned and tuned up – or replace them with energy-efficient new models.
8. Use Cold-Batteries in Your Fridge
Did you know that refrigerators can’t stay cold when empty? That’s because all the food is supposed to get cold and then re-radiate the cold to other items. Just like packing your frozen items together in a grocery bag, “cold batteries” can increase the energy efficiency of your fridge. A cold-battery can be any large, cold mass – usually a jug of water, but you can also use milk and other potable liquids.
9. Fight Phantom Load
Phantom load is the electricity your appliances use when they are switched off. Smart and smaller appliances like the coffee maker, toaster oven, and air fryer are bigger culprits. They often remain on “standby” when not in use, which does use power. You can fight phantom load by unplugging appliances, or using a power strip to switch them off-circuit.
Decrease Your Disposables
Disposables are the bane of any eco-conscious kitchen. The last thing you want is endless plastic bottles, but that’s also the only practical way to get many of your supplies. So we strive to decrease disposables and recycle anything we can.
10. Make Recycling Easy at Home
Recycling can be easy or hard – so make it easy. Put the recycling bin near where empty soda or condiment bottles occur. You might stash a crushed can bin below the sink for a quick flow. Figure out what works for your household with the smoothest transition from empty bottles to full recycle bin.
11. Embrace the Dish Towel
Paper towels are handy, but two-dozen dish towels are just as convenient if you have a washer/dryer at home – and a lot less wasteful. Dish towels dry your hands, clean up spills, layer into hot pads, and can be folded neatly onto the shelf. You can wash them with the towels on extra hot and enjoy a much more waste-free kitchen routine.
12. Reusable Individual Serving Containers
Finally, replace the convenience of single-serving disposables with single-serving reusable. Instead of applesauce cups, buy applesauce in bulk and keep small Tupperware cups for your lunch each day. Keep a self-filtering water bottle to carry instead of grabbing a vending machine disposable on the go. A little planning ahead in the kitchen can go a long way in reducing disposables away from home.
Enjoying an eco-conscious kitchen is all about making thoughtful changes that count. If you are planning to renovate your kitchen, be sure to invest in energy-efficient appliances, a water-efficient faucet, and a beautiful stone countertop that will last over a hundred years with proper care. Ready to transform your kitchen, or just looking for more inspiring home kitchen tips? Contact us today.