Third time’s the charm
Well, now I feel I’m starting to stumble. Better late than never right? During the bootcamp week I didn’t have time for a blog post and last Friday I ended up spending the time on a big ol’ spreadsheet or “food matrix” as it has been christened.
Snapshot below:
This is one of the more successful sections as you can see! Dry goods are probably the first place to start if you’re looking to transition to unpackaged goods. I basically did a deepdive into every item of food in the house and listed how we used to buy them, what they’re currently packaged in and whether we’ve found the ideal alternative. For some items as you can see, I haven’t found the ideal alternative. Once we’ve changed how we purchase the item it can be ticked off the list. The colour coding was a bit of fun to make it more visual and feel like we’re transitioning to a greener future basically! Red, amber and green traffic lights as the inspiration. I managed to teach myself about conditional formatting in the process as well which made me feel very accomplished. Now whenever I type ‘soft plastic’ in, the sheet knows to turn the cell red, for some items (not shown here) I have them in amber, eg fully recyclable rigid plastic or cardboard, and then for the best options it’s green, green, green, good to go! I set this up in google sheets so that Elyse and I can both access and edit it on the go. It should be a great shopping reference tool and I might expand the columns as well to include the best locations and prices for oft-purchased items.
A lot of what became apparent in this record was that (and I knew this already) I love buying food! I am a bargain hunter, a hoarder, a fanatic for anything new and exciting and shiny and vegan. If you were to ask me whether I wanted to visit a brand new department store or a supermarket I would always choose the supermarket. I have always had the underlying guilt/worry over packaging and waste but would often just be too excited about trying the new vegan thing and would try and put the non-recyclable packaging out of my mind, justifying that I am doing my bit in other ways. And so now I’m in a limbo. We have transitioned almost all our shopping to low-waste alternatives but we’ve got loads of food to use up in the cupboards. This all leads me to the frustration of the transition period. Our bin weighing experience is off to a slow start because of all everything that needs to be used up first. (and also because our building management has still not arranged a brown bin….) It is interesting to see the figures and to really get to grips with our waste. I’m frustrated because I haven’t seen an immediate improvement, if anything the bin gets heavier each week. But it’s only been 3 weeks. I have to remind myself there will be a bit of delay before the effects are evident.
My impatience and my all or nothing attitude definitely stem from my perfectionist streak. I’m not sure how to quell that in me. In terms of the supermarket shopping that I once loved, but I’m completely turned off by all the packaging, all the corporate irresponsibility and the scale of the problem. In the same way that I couldn’t be just a part-time vegan (I won’t even get into that ethical paradox), I can’t just do this part way. I suppose I do value the idea that we as consumers can vote with our shopping basket. I’m making choices every time I purchase food, supporting small businesses and supporting the kind of future that I want to be a part of. I have to believe that each small choice we make matters in the big picture. Otherwise how can I even begin to tackle it? I can’t change everything, but I can change something.
In lots of ways this journey is turning out to be more effort than I could have imagined. Along with shunning nearly all packaged food we’ve had to change our meal planning and embrace lots more home cooking. Luckily I have a wife who caught a serious baking bug during lockdown 😄 & there’s nothing else to do for entertainment right now except batch baking…!
Here’s a snapshot of just a few of the things we’ve been enjoying over the last few weeks. I had a bit of fun/frustration learning to use Adobe Spark to make this collage. I will try to include some more pictures in upcoming posts so it’s a bit less wordy.
We have also been exploring some new options for food shopping. Our local zero waste shop (Small Changes in Drumcondra) is great for the staples but there are a few items not available there. We just placed an online order with The Source in Rathmines. I haven’t had a chance to visit in person yet (It’s 6km away!) but they have an amazing range, nearly everything you could think of, and all in bulk! They only deliver the dry goods range and in paper bags which is fine for now. Once we’re out of lockdown we’ll be able to take our own containers and pick up liquid items like coconut oil, soya sauce, even kombucha! Much excite. The downside is having to drive there which I’m really trying to cut down on, (it feels so hypocritical, but one thing at a time!) we do always group journeys together though as well as getting as much as we can fit our tiny car.
Anyway, that’s probably enough of my ramblings for now.
Until next time,
Minimal Fin
