Milk!

On Thursday morning I woke up and found the milkman had delivered 3 pints of milk to my doorstep, in glass bottles. Happiness! I'll never be caught short of milk again!!

There's a bit of plastic at the top- but given we have some of the most intelligent seagulls around who love to attack anything edible on our doorstep, I have to say I'm quite glad of that.

We get ours from Mcqueen's dairy, but Pete's Farm Shop also delivers non-homogenised milk in glass bottles from local dairy farms (as well as other local produce, mostly plastic free from the looks of it on his website), and so does Wisemans.

Plastic free junk food!

Now on this blog one probably expects the plastic free packaged food to be super healthy. I'm afraid we're all human, so how excited was I to discover Greggs wraps it's bakes and sausage rolls in paper. And the cycle ride uphill is enough to burn the calories. Hooray!

Marchmont...Plastic-free haven!

I just spent my lunch break looking round shops in Marchmont for plastic-free options (obsessed, me?!).      In 30 minutes, I'd found pretty much everything you need to live plastic free.

People of Marchmont... why on earth do you use plastic at all?

For those of you who are interested, here are the highlights:

There are fruit and vegetable shops everywhere.  The majority are on Argyle Place / Sciennes Road, but there is one up on Marchmont Road also. I think they have almost every vegetable they you could ever want - including some soft berries in a non-plastic tub.  Unfortunately their bargain deals often come plastic wrapped (at the moment they have two kilos of aubergine for 49 pence for example, or about 12 kiwi fruit for 45 pence) ... but I'm sure you could work something out with the owners.

Haddows has fresh bread (not plastic-wrapped), as well as other things like apple pie, cheeses etc.

There is one of the best fishmongers in Edinburgh:  Eddie's Seafood Market.  As well as having an amazing selection of fresh fish (and urchins etc), they smoke their own fish.  While it comes normally in plastic, they are quite happy to provide it without plastic as well.   I know a couple of plastic-free challengers were struggling to find plastic-free smoked fish, so I hope this helps!  They also weigh the fish on paper, so no worries there.

There is also another fishmonger (Sheila's) next to a butchers (Michael Field).  So that should cover plastic-free meat and fish, although I didn't check to see if they measure on plastic or not.  There are a few other delicatessen / grocery shops here which are sure to have other good plastic free products - I found some rice in a cotton bag, for example.

For those of you with a sweet tooth - Candy Cupcake has old fashioned pick n' mix in paper bags.  That sorts out the issue of afternoon snacks in the office (although, as a colleague pointed out when I returned triumphantly waving my paper bag of sweets - the sweets themselves are sure to have some kind of plastic in there somewhere, they are not the most natural looking!  They do taste good however, and as well as bringing back memories of childhood, satisfied my need for unhealthy sugar).

The New Leaf on Argyle Place does Ecover refills.

Victor Hugo on Melville Terrace is a delicatessen, so it has a range of cheeses and meats, but it also has some delicious sounding vinegars and oils with which you can fill your own bottle.

Happy plastic-free shopping!

Euthymol

Congrats for finding the Euthymol toothpaste but my Grandad used this years ago and it tasted *** awful!

little lids for dedicated recyclers

Well now, having quite the chat with a Lush sales assistant, as I bought my shampers, soap (and god knows what else), she mentioned that they recycle the plastic lids that the council refuses to take (from milk cartons etc) so anyone dedicated to separating these too, now you know where (who remembers the days of recycling foil milk bottle tops for Blue Peter?!)

Rain or no rain, plastic free it shall be!

Today was one of those days that you'd rather go to your local corner shop instead of cycling 2 miles up to Broughton Street. Despite the pouring rain I hopped on my bike to get coffee beans at Artisan Roast first, filling up an Illy container with Ethiopian dark roast beans. I love that place!

And 100 metres up the street I popped into Real Foods to get the loo paper with compostable wrapping.   This was one of the items we worried about, but sorted! For £2.07 for 4 rolls almost a similar price as normal loo paper (mmm, I should do adverts for them).

And another great find at Tesco. Although not 100% plastic free I found a toothpaste with an old fashion metal tube (in fact, the branding itself looks very nostalgic as well!). It's called Euthymol. Not sure what it tastes like yet, but worth the try for £1.60 a tube!

Find me a soap with...

…Shea Butter and Sea Minerals, and I’ll switch from shower gel to soap.   This came after I challenged a friend trying to put ‘shower gel’ as his exception to the no plastic rule.

Don’t get me wrong.  We often have shower gel in our house – but it just seems to last about a quarter of the time that a soap bar lasts, and leaves piles and piles of bottles in our recycling.   And its so easily avoided – you can find soap with no plastic even in supermarkets – so I think it’s a waste of one of his three exceptions to name shower gel.  He’ll regret it. 

Ok, I said.  Give  me a couple of days and I’ll find you one.  The list of necessities in this soap then expanded to include ‘with unicorn horn’ and ‘tears of a squirrel’ – but I’ll just ignore those two and believe my friend will switch from plastic bottled shower gel to soap (and join the plastic challenge) if I find the right combination of ingredients in a soap bar.  

As this declaration followed on a lengthy exaltation of how ginger shampoo made his hair flow in the wind (all one inch of it), I have a feeling my customer may be tricky to please… but let’s give it a go.  Here are a few locally available soap options which might do the trick (although finding sea minerals is a bit tough – I’m not sure the Firth of Forth has any minerals you’d want to put in a soap bar...):

Edinburgh Natural Skincare Company: They use East Lothian Beeswax, local honey, organic virgin shea butter, organic virgin cocoa butter, organic virgin avocado butter, hemp oil, coconut oil, olive oil, eco-sustainable palm oil and sweet almond oil. None of their products contain animal fats, artificial fragrance oils (they use essential oils) or colourings.   They come with no packaging too, so that is another plus.  Their soaps have obscure sounding names:

Gentlemans

Hunters

Forest Musk

St Clements (sweet orange, lemongrass, lime and honey)

Luxury number 1 (mmm.  I’m hoping the key ingredient of this is not the ‘number one’ I remember from childhood, as opposed to ‘number two’ which would be even nastier...)

Lavender

 So that’s a score on the Shea butter front!   The  Sea Minerals are still missing though – unless something sea-themed is hiding in one of the gentleman / hunter or luxury bars?  And surely the lack of sea minerals is more than compensated by the number of virgins in the ingredient list?

Sold around town at the farmers markets:  Stockbridge and Grassmarket on Sundays.

Suma:  These come with no packaging at all and are designed to be as good for the environment as possible - so surely they are extra virtuous?  And I’m sure a few of these flavours equal ‘unicorn horn’ in terms of strangeness…

Almond Soap

Avocado and Cucumber Soap

Cinnamon and Sandalwood Soap

Desert Aloe Vera Soap

Elderflower and Apple Soap

Coco Palm Soap

Nutmeg and Vanilla Soap

Tea Tree Soap

Wild Raspberry Soap

White Lavender Soap

Grapefuit and Aloe Vera Soap

Rose and Geranium Soap

Hemp Oil and Vitamin E Soap

Various types of Suma soaps are sold around Edinburgh (for example in Earthy Foods, Real Foods, the supermarket place next to Nadia Fruit Market on Argyle Street in Marchmont (Najco Foods Ltd?)

   

Miss Ballantyne:  Miss Ballantyne's soaps are handmade in Scotland with the finest organic ingredients. Her soaps are packaged in cardboard and paper, and are sold around town in different shops – Curiouser and Curiouser on Broughton Street for sure (I’m not sure about other shops), and at various markets:

"Mother's Ruin", scented with juniper and citrus. The perfect pick me up! (apparently)

“Gentleman’s Brothel Bar” - For every (un) discerning gentlemen this is a subtly scented earthy bar

"Four Thieves", with herbs and botanicals. Legend has it that this combination protected the "four thieves" from infection during the plague years. It is scented with citrus and lavender, a refreshing way to start your day!

“Lemon and Ginger”:  An invigorating combination of essential Lemon oil and ginger. Leaves you smelling delicious!

"Honey and Oatmeal" lightly exfoliating for that smooth feeling

"Gardener's Scrubby" Organic Soap contains poppy seeds to help remove garden dirt and lavender oil which soothes bites and scratches.

No sea minerals or shea butter (her soaps are from cold pressed olive oil) – but I couldn’t resist including them, as who wouldn’t want to be protected from the Plague whilst washing?  And the gardener’s one would help you heal from any scratches incurred while trying to squeeze tears out of that squirrel.

For more regular soaps – Supermarkets and chemists all seem to have some plastic-free soaps in their range for more affordable prices than the local  soaps mentioned above:  Dove (about 50p, but only plastic free if you buy them in single units) and Pears (59p) to mention a couple, as well as some hardcore coal-tar fragranced soaps (eg. Wrights Traditional Soap – 85p) for those of you really wanting to go for an austerity month.

So for my fussy friend?    If he’ll only settle for Sea Minerals and Shea Butter – its going to have to be an online order – but they do exist I'm sure!   I’ll sign him up for a plastic free month before this week is out....

Sneaky Plastic Wrapper...

...I hate you.

We've been searching for dried pasta with no plastic in the packaging.   So far, I've only found lasagne sheets... and to be honest, that's just not all that exciting.  I know there are fresh pasta options around town that I can probably get without them being shrouded in plastic - but if it's fresh, it has a shelf life - and it's not the all purpose, last minute, "I forgot to buy anything for supper so what can I make out of what's in my cupboard" staple that I know and love.

I've developed a new-found intolerance for the completely stupid plastic windows in the cardboard boxes that package a lot of pasta.  Why do we need to see it?  I believe the pictures on the front!


So I was excited when my husband arrived home with some paper-wrapped spaghetti from Morrisons.  He had the proud look of a hunter gatherer who has found what we need to survive the upcoming month.







We cracked open a beer (thankfully still sold in glass bottles... I'm not sure I'd survive a month beer-free) - and ripped open the package - only to find a SNEAKY PLASTIC WRAPPER inside.  Grrrrrrrrr!


I have a feeling this is going to be a recurring theme for the month.

If anyone finds some plastic free, dried pasta out there... let me know!  And maybe post comments for any other sneaky plastic wrappers you find to avoid us all making the same mistakes?!