Ditch the chemical option

Tewshooz - it's all your fault. 😄

I posted the other day that I was not going to post on this blog anymore and got such a wonderful comment from Tewshooz that I changed my mind.

I do not have the energy - nor motivation - to create the long posts from before, but will try and keep in contact with you all via shorter, pertinent posts if I feel that I have something worthwhile to contribute.

With that said - here goes...

Every year before Christmas in preparation for festive family get togethers, my late husband, Ronnie, and I used to clean the brass and copper items that we had collected during our years together.  This "collection" included items which Ronnie had inherited from his mother.

Said cleaning involved using Brasso - a chemical rubbing compound.  And was always a mission.  It took literally hours and left us (me) with aching arms and fingers from all the rubbing.  And the process left our hands and nails filthy and imprinted with dirty Brasso residue.  As well as the surface on which we had cleaned the copper and brass items.

It was one of our "together" chores and I haven't had the will to do it since Ronnie passed away.

Until I saw a post on Facebook recently which reminded me that the brass and copper hadn't been touched in 5 years.

I was blown away.

Partially cleaned copper using toothpaste

All it took was a small squeeze of toothpaste and a plastic pot scourer.  And literally 5 minutes of my time.

I have previously successfully used cooled wood ash, but, being in short supply of wood ash at the moment, toothpaste more than adequately gets the job done.

Why has man cast aside harmless cleaning methods and adopted the use of chemicals.  All that does is benefit the corporations and their shareholders.  And harm the environment - and landfill - with waste and chemical residue.

And, unlike Brasso, this cleaning agent contains no health warnings - and no harmful chemicals are required to get the job done.  If toothpaste is good enough for my teeth (and mouth) then it is certainly OK for my hands and fingers.

Sparkling clean copper thanks to toothpaste

Can you see the difference between the clean and the "still to be cleaned copper?

You can see in the last photo that there are a number of copper items which are sorely in need of a good clean.  In honour of Ronnie I will try and sort that out before Christmas.

The copper "collection" still in need of attention

An Eco-friendly meal?

We had friends round for dinner last night, and, as always, I had to figure out what to serve that wouldn't cost the earth in electricity - either in wattage used or in money.

I think I came up with a brilliant solution.

We had a fondue!

So how was it Eco-friendly...

In the afternoon I cleaned the copper fondue set using wood ash for our fireplace - dab a damp cloth into the wood ash, rub on the surface to be cleaned and watch the dirt disappear.  Then all it takes is a rinse under a running tap, and quick dry, and the copper looks amazing!  No dirty hands full of Brasso and no chemicals needed - if only I'd known this years ago...

Garden fresh salad

The salad came, in it's entirety, from my garden - four different types of lettuce, chives, onions, tomatoes - and the bean sprouts grew in my sprouter this week.

I made all the sauces, bar one - the pureed apple to go with the pork.  We don't have an apple tree - yet :-)

We also had tahini (a sesame seed sauce - perfect with the chicken), a chilli sauce (peppers, onions, garlic, chillies, dried apricots and honey - brown the onions and then add the rest of the ingredients and cook together until semi-mushy - to go with the pork chipolata's) a mushroom sauce, bbq sauce (the last two to go with the steak) and guacamole.

I had also made a salsa with red, yellow and orange peppers, apple, onion, courgettes and sweetcorn - mixed together with a dash of lemon juice and olive oil and salt and pepper.

Finally, I made a loaf of fresh Artisan bread.

It was delicious.

Otherwise, all the preparation - mixing, chopping and puree-ing was done by hand.

I am well pleased with the resulting power usage.

I used the oven to bake the bread - for half an hour - and the stove top to heat the oil.

And I was asked for my bread recipe.  I love that - for there is nothing better than sharing knowledge with whoever asks for it.

There is surely no nicer way to spend an evening than with friends, round the dinner table, with everybody cooking their own food, in their own time.  A fondue is such a "gemütlich" (warm, congenial and friendly) way to spend an evening.