Wednesday, February 20, 2008

#177 - Choppin' Brocc-o-leeeee



Yeah, just had to put that in there. For you youngins, that's from SNL, back in the day of the Church Lady, Fernando's Hideaway and The Anal-Retentive Chef (my personal favorite, although I don't see what's so funny ;-).

So this post is about, you guessed it, Choppin Broccoli. You see, my little girl LOVES broccoli. It's one of her favorite foods. I think it's because they look like little trees and she gets to do a whole Godzilla thing while she's chompin' em down. Anyhow, being the moderately decent mom that I am, I try to shove as much broccoli in her face as I can, to make up for those damn Hello Kitty "froot snax".

But, being the moderately decent, LAZY mom that I am, I buy frozen broccoli. Because I suck. But also because you never know what Daphne's vegetable preference du jour will be until it's almost du dinnertime. And I would hate to waste a head of fresh broccoli if Daphne decided to boycott the mini-trees for a week.

So this is me at the grocery store: Look at Me! I am Super Enviro-Mom with my returnable glass milk bottles, my paper-wrapped meat products and my reusable canvas grocery bags... filled with plastic bags full of pesticide-laden, frozen vegetables.

So starting today (since I used the last of the frozen broccoli last night), I will be choppin' broccoli every week and freezin it myself. And I will be singing that damn song the whole time.


Savings:

One non-recyclable plastic vegetable bag per week. 52 bags a year, nearly 1,000 bags before Daphne heads off to college. Or trade school. Or anywhere but here.


Difficulty Level: 1 out of 5

Not difficult, especially since I only have to do it once a week. I hope my CSA grows broccoli.

8 comments:

M.e. said...

confession: I would totally follow suit in every aspect...except the onion. I buy pre-chopped frozen onion and I think that the benefits outweigh the pesticides;)

But an OT: I heart my new MaxAir Kitchen Composter, Compostable bags, Biodegradable Straws, and my extralife produce preserver discs;)

just ducky said...

I totally forgot about the Choppin' Broccoli song! Maybe it was my exposure to SNL at a young age that has contributed to my family's excessive song writing...we are always making up songs (bad songs) about eating cucumbers, people who smell like elephants or songs that rhyme someone's name with every conceivable variation of word under the sun...seriously, we do this...a lot.

Oh well, I'm off to look up the "Red Hooded Sweatshirt" song now...Adam Sandler was an absolute king when he sang that song...

JessTrev said...

Question: what do you use as freezer containers? instead of tupperware and ziploc bags? i have been wondering about this lately as I have run out of plastic bags and don't want to buy more. but figure there is a good solution someone's thought of. thanks!

Green Bean said...

With ya, Burban Mom. We've given up frozen veggies - the fresh ones have so much more taste and the work isn't that much more.

Mary Elizabeth: I used to think as you with the onions. Honestly, whenever I chop an onion now, I'll do an extra one or two and stick them in a freezer bag that I use just for this purpose. I keep my freezer stocked and it's my own convenience food - plus its organic, local and waste free. :)

organicneedle said...

My kids are huge broccoli fans too. I always have a big bag in the freezer. I buy it frozen for a few reasons. One being time, don't always make it home in time to chop and steam. Second being that I can always get frozen organic broccoli, can't always get fresh organic broccoli. Because they eat it almost everyday, the organic thing is a biggie for me. There is the bag issue. On the other hand...the frozen broccoli I buy comes from MA, relatively local for winter in NYC produce, whereas the fresh organic usually comes from south of the border. (Although I wonder if that is more of a distribution center, labeling is a wee bit vague. It does say it is USA grown.) It would be fantastic if I could find a brand that comes with out the guilt of the big plastic bag.

Have you ever made the Enchanted Broccoli Forest for the kids. It is basically rice with cheese mixed together to make a sticky "ground." Then you, or the kids, take broccoli spears and stick them in like trees. we use brown basmatti rice with Gruyere, but any rice & cheese combo would do. My four year old likes to sprinkle parm over all of that and pretend it is snowing. We even sometimes make little red pepper paths through the woods.

Burbanmom said...

Mama,

I actually am STILL using the ziplock baggies that I've been rinsing out for six month now. Those freezer bags are STURDY! In addition, I also use leftover bread bags, since I still buy bread ::blushes::

However, I do use Aluminum Foil for other freezer stuff, you could try that.

OrganicNeedle,

Wow. That sounds like fun! I wish you were my mom. :-)

Anonymous said...

Well, isn't that special?! Could plastic be made by... SATAN!!!????

(That is also Saturday Night Live, Dana Carvey, Church Lady, just so you don't think I made that up...)

I don't know the facts on this, but frozen foods are often frozen at the point of harvest, with purported maximum nutrient preservation.

choppin broccoleeeeee I love broccoleeeeeee and cauliflowerrrrrr tooooooo

D'nelle said...

Leslie - the point you bring up about the "purported maximum nutrient preservation" was the reason I clicked thru my google reader to comment.

I wanted to hear y'all's opinion on this. is it one of those suburban myths trumped up by the advertising minds at Bird'sEye? or is it true?

Granted, I am being incredibly lazy by not shopping at the farmers' market lately, but my whole philosophy has taken a "lesser of two evils" bent, so I wonder, what's better nutrition-wise? frozen organic broccoli or unfrozen organic broccoli?

Any thoughts?