Welcome to May’s edition of Carol Taylor’s Green Kitchen …my happy place where I cook from scratch and avoid anything with hormones and chemicals in it…I also hate waste, especially now prices are rising around the world in stores PLUS energy costs are on the increase…it is also hot here so I spend as little time as I can in the kitchen unless it is absolutely necessary… I do this by planning and batch cooking…

Food waste is an enormous problem in the US: America wastes roughly 40 per cent of its food, which leads to pollution and other environmental damage, and is a waste of natural resources and a waste of money. While edible food is lost at every point along the food chain — on farms and fishing boats, during processing and distribution, in retail stores, in restaurants and more.

So, the question is, how do we reduce food waste?

The answer might seem simple: don’t let food spoil, right?

But food waste happens in a bunch of different ways: You go out to eat and don’t love the meal you ordered, leaving the majority on your plate to get scraped into the garbage. Or you pick up a bag of oranges and forget about a few in the back of the fridge, where they turn mushy. You cut off the greens of carrots or beets, or peel root vegetables, and not realizing the potential use of these nutrition-packed scraps, you toss them in the trash…

Take the last line greens and peel I wasn’t one of the many who purchased an air fryer and apparently nearly 60% of U.S. households own an air fryer…I wonder how many of them are using fruit and veg peels to make chips…

According to dieticians…Doritos Spicy Sweet Chili Chips] and we are talking only 10 chips here will provide 7 grams of total fat and 1 gram of saturated fat …that’s just the fat content for 10 chips…

and of course, you can ring the changes with any other fruit or vegetable peels…Do you make air fryer Crisps?

I haven’t been doing very much cooking in my kitchen at the moment plus if you are wondering why I have been banging on again about food waste and hormones and chemicals in our food it’s because I am scared for not only my family but yours…Cancer is on the rise and in my immediate family at the moment I have 2 daughters with breast cancer, Lauren has not finished her treatment last week she started the acid infusions and they restarted her monthly stomach implants both had been put on hold as the side effects of the many chemos they tried(due) to her bodies adverse reactions took longer than normal to complete plus her side effects were extreme…Donna has finished her treatment however during a routine follow-up scan they discovered a lesion on the wall of one of her lungs…Her second scan was on May 1st as if that wasn’t enough 2 of my sister in laws have breast cancer plus my husband’s sister, daughter’s son of 6 yrs old has been diagnosed with cancer we awaiting the results of his bone marrow…

Over the last few decades, doctors have been seeing dramatic increases in cancer in adults younger than 50…A new review of cancer registry records from 44 countries found that the incidence of early-onset cancers is rising rapidly for colorectal and 13 other types of cancers, many of which affect the digestive system, and this increase is happening across many middle- and high-income nations.

Personally, I put it down to hormones in our foods, chemicals and preservatives in our food, household cleaners, and cosmetics in fact almost everything we use on a daily basis in our homes has ingredients that are adverse to our health…That scares me and I like to think I am careful with my household purchases and have been over the years…

I can count 13 and a half sugar cubes in that one bottle of Coke Cola and likely similar amounts in any other brand of soda…

Where do you shop? Do you grow your own, do you shop locally or do you one of the big stores? This video talks you through how you can shop sustainably and help the environment and small businesses…

Episode 14: Keeping it Local: Avoiding Big Box Stores

Another tasty use for cold rice…Spicy red curry, Pork, Rice and Coconut Balls.

Gardening Hacks Corner…Bananas and eggs organic fertilizer.

I grow what I can and some plants need calcium to aid their growth like tomatoes…I came across this hack and if you have overripe bananas dig a hole and add a banana plus an egg or egg shells and fill it in then plant your calcium-loving tomato plants or other plants on top and the calcium from the banana and the egg will be slowly released into the soil..

Fact: About 5 gallons of water per day is required for one banana tree. Over the 270 days it takes to produce bananas, that tree will use over 1,300 gallons of water. Americans throw away 5 billion bananas every year! That means billions of gallons of water are thrown away too!

Thank you for joining me today as always I appreciate your visit and your comments…If you were wondering why the image of figs on the header image its because I am looking forward to eating some lovely fresh figs on my Australian Visit as they are season now it’s very rare I find fresh figs here so I am looking forward to eating some lovely fresh figs…xx