No 'Poo

I recently joined several groups on Cafemom about homemaking, self sustainability, and so on.  A common thread on all of them is going no 'poo, i.e. ditching the shampoo bottle.

A few months ago, I was looking at shampoo bars as a way of cutting down on the amount of packaging coming into the house.  Well, I'm still going to be getting the bars because I have two adult males in the house, one of whom will refuse straight out and the other of whom will most likely roll his eyes and tease me about it for a few weeks.  And then give it a try himself.

I have had the worst dandruff since I was a teenager.  The sort of dandruff that does not go away no matter what I do.  And strangely enough, it's the sort of dandruff that actually seems to get worse with regular frequent washings.  In reading the afore mentioned threads, it seems that many people who think they have dandruff are having an allergic reaction to chemicals in shampoo.  The cure, of course, is to ditch the bottle (or bar, although the bars tend to have fewer harsh chemicals in them).

One of the things I learned early about curly hair is to wash it as infrequently as possible.  Apparently, this is the hardest thing for people making the switch.  Using the following formula, hair should only need to be washed about once a week.  The way shampoos are constructed, they basically train your scalp to "need" washing every day or two.  So the "detox" often makes people go mad, nearly, because hair gets greasy, seemingly faster than usual.  But after about a month, it gets so much better.

So the formula is:  1/2 T baking soda dissolved into a cup of water.  1/2 T vinegar (white or apple cider) mixed into a second cup of water.  Get your hair wet.  Pour over the baking soda solution.  Rinse.  Pour over the vinegar solution.  Rinse again.  Hair can be rinsed in clear water as often as needed in between washings.  My hair is soft, shiny, the plaques of dandruff on my scalp are already (!) gone, and I don't have any of the itching that normally accompanies washing my hair.  This only needs to be done about once a week.

Clean Green

I've pretty much stopped buying chemical based cleaners.  I'm working through the remains of what I've got on hand but that's it.  Instead, I'm mostly using baking soda, kosher salt, vinegar, and borax.

My basic cleaner is vinegar and water.  I mix it up by the quart - 4 cups of water, 1 cup of vinegar.  It cleans, well, just about everything.  I use it on glass, chrome, mirrors, counters, the stove - everything.  

To conquer soap scum, add 1/2 C kosher salt to the basic cleaner and mix to dissolve.  Or spray on straight vinegar, let sit for a few minutes, and scrub clean.  Or scrub with baking soda or kosher salt in hand, then clean with the basic cleaner.  Some people have good results putting kosher salt on a cut lemon and scrubbing.  Which works best seems to depend on how hard or soft your water is.  Some experimenting may be in order.  Keep in mind none of these will clean as quickly, with as little elbow grease as, say Scrubbing Bubbles.  But they're A LOT better for the environment.

For the floor, dishes, and in the dishwasher, I use a mixture of 1 C borax, 1 C baking soda, and 1/4 C citric acid.  Essential oils can be added for scent too but I'm not using any at the moment.  About 2 T per wash cycle.

To clean out the dishwasher, I put baking soda in the detergent cup and fill the rinse cup (where Jet Dry or something similar would normally go) with vinegar.  Heck, I use vinegar for the rinse all the time.

Oh, and non-gel toothpaste polishes silver beautifully.

Fat Soluble

Fat is good.  Natural fats produced by animals and plants are good and necessary.  They soften skin, they make hair shiny, and they signal fullness to our brains.  Now, another important reason to make sure fats are included in meals:

Vegetables have fat soluble nutrients in them.  This means fats are needed for the body to make use of certain nutrients.  If you don't have fat, you don't get the full benefit of these veggies.  So it's easy to say that in order to reduce calories, we'll cut out the butter or olive oil or salad dressing on our veggies.  However, this fact about fat soluble nutrients shows how it is possible for a person to be the slender picture of health and malnourished, missing out on many important nutrients for want of a little fat.  

Now, obviously, you can't go overboard, especially with saturated animal fats.  But dressing your salad or veggies with olive oil, oil and vinegar, or a modest serving of butter won't kill you.  In the long run, you'll do your body good.

Worth While

Yes, it really is worth while to run around obsessively turning off/unplugging appliances not currently in use.  A recent study showed that the average family could trim 20% from their monthly electric bill by turning off lights when not in use and unplugging out of use small appliances.  Basically, anything with a "vampire light" that glows when the appliance is not being used is still sucking energy.  If you unplug, no energy, electric usage goes down.  So stop making excuses and just do it!  If you have lots of small appliances, put things on power strips.  That way, you have just a few switches to flip instead of lots of cords to pull.  

The Boy With a Drum

There once was a boy 

With a little toy drum . . . . .

They all marched along 

With a rat a tat tat

The boy with his drum 

And the big friendly cat

And the horse and the cow

And the mouse and the dog

And the duck and the chicken

And the pig and the frog . . . . 

I've been reciting this story/poem to Yeled whenever he has trouble settling down to sleep.  The story is charming and sweet and has a irresistible rhythm that never fails to put Yeled sleep.  It struck me, a few nights ago, reciting for about the 200th time in as many weeks, that the story mirrors closely the ideas of self sufficiency and responsible small scale farming.  My Complete Book of Self Sufficiency that I quoted a few days ago repeatedly makes the point that nature abhors monoculture.  He talks about having small numbers of many different animals, rotating a variety of crops, and growing different crops together or several different types of trees.  He recommends having cows, a horse, sheep, goats, a couple species of poultry, and pigs.  Well, pigs are out of question for us but we want to have a little of everything else.

Given the publishing date on my copy of The Boy With a Drum, I doubt the author was simply writing a charming story introducing g children.  The more times I recite the thing, the more convinced I am that the author is mirroring the experience of small farmers everywhere, raising a variety of animals and crops that suite the land.

The more times one plants the same crop on the same piece of land, the more likely that crop is to eventually fall prey to disease.  Rotation and variety are the keys to not only keeping the land healthy but ensuring that crops and animals remain disease free.  The focus of modern commercial farms on just one or two market-oriented animals or crops is one of the primary reason why our farm land is struggling.  I want to grow and raise lots of different things to rehab the land and keep it healthy.

More Kitchen Short-cuts

*** Correction ***  I made up a batch of instant flavored coffee last night and realized that my previously posted recipe proportions were wildly inaccurate.  Use 1 C instant coffee, 1/2 C powdered milk, 1/2 C sugar, and approximately 1 T of any dry spices/flavorings you desire.  Please note this will not be as sweet as commercial instant flavored coffee.  If you want a sweeter mix, increase the sugar by 1/4 C increments until you get the sweetness you prefer.

Cream of Chicken Dry Mix - 2 C powdered milk, 3/4 C cornstarch, 1/4 chicken dry bouillon, 1/2 t. dry thyme, 1/2 t dry basil, 1/4 t pepper.

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and store in an airtight container.

To substitute for one can of condensed soup, stir together 1/3 C dry mix and 1 cup of water (or milk for extra richness) in a sauce pan.  Cook and stir until thickened.

This dry mix is the equivalent to nine cans of condensed soup.

Add dry celery for cream of celery, dried mushrooms for cream of mushrooms, or fresh broccoli during the cooking for cream of broccoli.

The Complete Book of Self-Sufficiency

I've been reading this book, written by John Seymour and published by Corgi Books in the U.K.  Following are excerpts from the first chapter, titled The Way to Self Sufficiency.

"Now self-sufficiency is not "going back" . . . it is going forward to a new and better sort of life . . .a life that brings challenge and the use of daily initiative back to work, and variety, and occasional great success and occasional abysmal failure.  It means the acceptance of complete responsibility for what you do or what you do not do."

"it is the striving for a higher standard of living, for food which is fresh and organically grown and good, for the good life in pleasant surrounds, for the health of body and peace of mind which come with hard varied work in the open air, and for the satisfaction that comes from doing difficult and intricate jobs well and successfully."

"we will one day have to derive our sustenance from what the land, unaided by oil-derived chemicals, can produce.  We may not wish in the future to maintain a standard of living that depends entirely on elaborate and expensive equipment and machinery but we will always want to maintain a high standard of living in the things that really matter - good food, clothing, shelter, health, happiness, and fun with other people.  The land can support us, and it can do it without huge applications of artificial chemicals and manures and the use of expensive machinery.  But everyone who owns a piece of land should husband that land as wisely, knowledgeably, and intensively as possible.  The so-called "self-supporter" sitting among a riot of docks and thistles talking philosophy ought to go back to town.  He is not doing any good at all, and is occupying land which should be occupied by somebody who can really use it."

"Man should be a husbandman, not an exploiter.  This planet is not exclusively for our own use.  To destroy every form of life except such forms as are obviously directly of use to us is immoral, and ultimately quite possibly, will contribute to our own destruction."

"Man was not meant to be a one job animal.  We do not thrive as parts of a machine.  We are intended by nature to be diverse, to do diverse things, to have many skills."