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Steps to help your energy bills

1.  Slay the vampires.  Sounds strange, likely, but a lot of things that are left plugged in all the time draw a lot more power than you might think.  (TVs, VCRs, etc..)  Even just plugging all of that sort of thing into a power strip and turning that off when you aren’t using them can save you (on average) $75 a year.

2.  A computer consumes (again, on average) as much energy as 3 100 watt light bulbs.  Turn it off when it isn’t in use.

3.  Vacuuming your refrigerator coils twice a year increases the appliance’s energy efficiency by quite a bit.

4.  Keep your freezer full.  A full freezer functions more efficiently and uses less power.

5.  Keep your hot water heater set at no more than 120 degrees.

6.  Train yourself to turn off lights in rooms when you leave them.  This measure alone can cut your energy bill by 5-10 percent.  (Again, this is something I’ve seen in practice.  Once we managed to make it habitual, the savings were immediately visible.)

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Hummus (Silverlilly)

I did not actually test this one, because I am not allowed to make hummus.  However, a source I trust says this is about right.

3 T olive oil
15 oz garbanzo beans (if you start from dry, they do need to be boiled before being mushed, can’t just soak them)
1/2 c tahini
2 T fresh lemon juice
1/2 tsp salt
red pepper flakes

(I’d add some garlic, too, probably roasted first)

Mash garbanzos, add tahini, oil, lemon juice, salt, and red pepper.  Drizzle with a little more olive oil before serving.

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Window (and Other) Cleaner (Care2)

1/4 c vinegar
1/2 tsp liquid soap
2 c water

Found this to work on general cleaning, too.  Not tested on stove grime yet, and it does next to nothing to mildew on textured walls or soap scum without a lot of elbow grease.  However, for most basic household uses, it is fine, and if you keep up with it, you don’t end up needing to worry about some of the more severe cleaning situations.

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Barbecued…. (Ernest Codier)

The ingredients below make a barbecue sauce originally intended for Spare-ribs, but has also been used for “country style” ribs and pork chops, and could probably cross over to other things as well:

3 T cooking oil
1/2 c coarse chopped onion
1/2 c water
1 T Worcestershire Sauce or 1 tsp Wright’s Smoke
1/4 c lemon juice
2 T brown sugar
1/4 c catsup
2 T vinegar

Saute onion in oil until soft, then add all other ingredients and simmer 20 minutes.

Cooking time depends on the meat used.  For ribs – baste and bake covered at 450 for 30 minutes, lower heat to 300, uncover, and baste.  Bake for 1 hour, turning and rebasting 3 or 4 more times.  For boned pork – cut cooking times in half, possibly more for meat under 1″ thick.

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“Welsh” Pizza (KHR)

3 Leeks
1 8 oz package mushrooms (portabella are choice)
1/2 c butter
worcestershire to taste
1 lb sausage
3 cloves garlic, chopped
english mustard, salt, pepper, thyme, rosemary, paprika to taste

Saute/Cook appropriately everything but the meats.  Couple spoons of that + 1/4 c pureed tomatos in a blender becomes the sauce.  The meats can either be presauteed in what is left from making the “sauce” or they can be cooked on the pizza crust.  Throw some cheese on top of the sauce, add other toppings, if you like, place the meat…

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Golden Apple Boston Brown Bread (Betsy Codier)

Cream together:
1/4 c butter
1/3 c honey
1/3 c light molasses

Mix together and then add to the first, alternating with 2 c buttermilk:
1 c whole wheat flour
1 c rye flour
1 c yellow cornmeal
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Stir in 2 c chopped Golden Delicious apples.

bake one hour at 350.  Cooking time on this is a little twitchy – not sure yet if that has been my ovens for the past few years or a high altitude issue.  Definitely have to check it, and the cook time, for me, has varied between the recipe stated hour and 90 minutes.

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Crispy Rice Treats (Minimalist)

Made as an experiment in healthy rice krispie treats, I apparently made the first trial a bit spicey for most palates.  However, for those who could tolerate the spice, they were declared quite tasty.

2 c crispy brown rice

1 c peanut/almond/cashew butter

1/4 c honey/maple syrup

1/2 c peanuts/almonds/cashews

1/2 c chopped dried apricots

1 T curry powder (I will be trying 1-2 tsp next time)

salt and pepper

1/2 c shredded, unsweetened coconut

Combine everything but the coconut, roll into balls, roll in coconut.

Variation:

Crispy Tahini Rice balls:  Omit nuts and coconut.  Change nut butter to tahini and apricots to dates.  Roll in sesame seeds.

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Pet Food Data

To start with – as little CORN and WHEAT as possible.  Much much more necessary for cats than dogs, but as one of the articles I’ve read put it – “When was the last time you saw a cat or dog hunt a loaf of bread?”
Possible ingredient listings:  wheat bran, wheat flour, wheat germ meal, wheat mill run, wheat shorts, middlings, wheat red dog, defatted wheat germ meal, corn bran, corn feed meal, cracked corn, ground corn, corn grits, corn flour, hominy feed, maltodextrins…  etc…
(Other grains aren’t lovely either, so if you see:  barley, grain sorghum, oats, or any kind of screenings, aspirated grain fractions….)
Generally, try to make sure grain is not in the top section of the list of components for what you are feeding your pet.  Brewer’s rice is another ingredient to stay away from if possible.  Applies for humans, too.  This is the small broken grains left over after rice has been processed.  No nutritional value, just empty calories.  If curious for a lot more data, visit www.petsfortheenvironment.org.

This next bit is fairly disgusting.  Stay away from “meat meal.”  This means meat has been rendered and dried and than added into the food.  That part doesn’t sound too awful.  However, meat meal can contain both dead zoo animals AND the corpses of euthanized pets.  For me, the concept of feeding my cats and dogs dead cats and dogs is rather enough.  However, those corpses still contain amounts of the drugs used to euthanize the animals to begin with, which means the food will as well.  Even short term testing has indicated that this is probably not a good idea, but over a lifetime the effects likely snowball.  Other things that can be included in meat meal are restaurant grease and supermarket waste.

Due to my research over time into this matter, in a perfect world, I would make the food for them myself….  not having that kind of energy, we make sure that we know what all the ingredients are, what they mean, and why they are included.

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