Where will it all end?

The next step of the produce decomposition in landfills is even uglier. As the microbial decomposition progresses it eventually runs out of the oxygen needed to sustain the microbes working on the decaying produce. When the environment around the produce goes anaerobic the microbes that then take over the task of decomposing the produce must employ different biological processes to derive the energy that sustains them. Those processes generates carbon dioxide, like the aerobic microbes do, but also generates methane gas. Both are green house gases, but methane, is 21 times more effective. The methane generated by the produce that has gone anaerobic, after the CO2 producing aerobic decomposition, following a 1,500 CO2 producing mile journey, including aggravating your CO2 enhanced traffic wait, is going into the atmosphere – all for the want of the Ethylene Gas Guardian.

Although the produce that is wasted may have hit the end of the road, the story has not. More on that later. But, the story that began as a fit of pique while sitting in traffic demonstrates how far reaching the impact of our most casual actions can be. Eat your produce, limit how much you throw away and put an end to this cycle of atmospheric violence! Lucky for you, the E.G.G. is there to help.

And still more carbon dioxide

Beyond the problem of the CO2 generated in the transportation of fresh produce to landfills 1,500 miles from where it was grown, is what happens when the transported produce reaches the landfill. I have seen estimates that 12% of the total weight of landfill intake is food wastes, mostly (un)fresh produce. Once the produce wastes are in the landfill it becomes food for the microbes that do that sort of thing for a living. As they digest the produce, CO2, water and humus are the primary by products of this microbiological process. There we go again, releasing CO2 instead of having a big old salad.

The humus contains a host of nutrients that serve as the basis for the regeneration of new plant life. Good, but not as good as the lettuce would have been if it had been stored with the E.G.G. – and been used for its intended purpose – your table.

More green house gas ruminations

It is commonly asserted that a piece of produce has traveled an average of 1500 miles from the field to your fork. (There are a couple of links to these discussion below) The positive side of that is that we are able to enjoy fruits and vegetables that we would not otherwise know, and to have access to our favorites during its off season. Our year round consumption of this fresh produce improves our health, but perhaps not the health of the planet. I have not been able to find a consensus estimate of what that transportation is when converted to CO2, because of the complexities in our transportation systems. Suffice it to say that transportation of produce is a significant source of CO2 emissions. One interesting statistic I saw was that it took 36 times as much fossil fuel energy to ship a head of lettuce from the Salinas Valley in California to the Senate dining room in Washington as the food energy available from the lettuce. A bogus comparison perhaps, but the message is clear.

One way to cut the CO2 from this transportation in half is for everyone to have the Ethylene Gas Guardian in their refrigerator. Proper ethylene control in the home will double the storage life of post purchase produce. It makes no sense to ship twice as much produce as needed, if half of it ends up in a land fill due to improper storage. So, the E.G.G. not only saves money, keeps your produce tastier and more nutritious, but it helps reduce our impact on the amount of CO2 created in its transportation.

I doubt that my issue with the CO2 I was generating and the frustration that was building while I was sitting in California traffic was included in any of these calculations.

http://www.leopold.iastate.edu/pubs/staff/files/food_travel072103.pdf
http://www.foodshare.net/resource/files/ACF230.pdf

The E.G.G. could reduce traffic-maybe not.

We have always considered the E.G.G. a very green product. But, I had a new perspective on the subject while on a trip to southern California a couple of weeks ago. Of the many delights of southern California, the traffic is not one. As I was sitting in the traffic “fuming” about all of the CO2 that I was being forced to emit, I saw several produce trucks crawling along beside me. The thought occurred to me that if everyone used the E.G.G. a lot of those trucks would not need to be on the road.

The USDA tells us that 57% of the fresh produce harvested is lost before it can be eaten. Of that loss, nearly half is lost in distribution and household storage. That means that half of the produce being transported in those trucks will wind up in a land fill or as compost somewhere. An E.G.G. in every refrigerator would reduce produce spoilage in the home by about half, eliminating the need to ship the produce destined to landfills, reducing the number of trucks on the road, allowing me to drive at a more energy efficient speed.

I think maybe the fumes I was breathing was effecting my thinking – or maybe not.

Advice from The Guardian.co.uk

The British government is encouraging Britons to reduce waste in the food supply. Prime Minister Gordon Brown said “if we are to get food prices down, we must also do more to deal with unnecessary demand”. In their posting on 7 July, 2008, Laura Barton and Jon Henley, feature writers for the Guardian, describe a number of ways to reduce waste and unnecessary demand. Among their suggestions is the use of the E.G.G. to reduce waste of produce. No posting has ever driven more traffic to our website. Thanks for helping the world save produce Laura and Jon!

You may read the entire posting at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jul/08/food.ethicalliving

Their produce saving advice is:

5. Be storage savvy

There are tonnes of household tips for storing foods to increase their longevity (many of them appear on the lovefoodhatewaste.com site) including topping and tailing carrots as soon as you buy them to prolong their life, keeping apples in the fridge so they last days longer than in the fruit bowl, and ensuring your olive oil is kept somewhere cool and dry to prevent the breakdown of the fatty acids. Also, invest in an EGG – “ethylene gas guardian” (4theegg.com): many fruits and vegetables give off ethylene gas as they ripen and the refrigerator traps this gas, which results in the early rotting of your produce. The EGG keeps the ethylene levels in your fridge low, meaning your vegetables last longer.

How to remove a KMnO4 stain

Although it is a very uncommon problem, occasionally we have had customers tell us that they have gotten a purple stain from the pellets in the E.G.G. packets.  Generally, the stain washes right out.  But if it still is visible, soak the stained item briefly in vinegar.

When we first received a customer support call about a stain, we did a little research, staining various items and surfaces to see what was the best removal method. Although vinegar worked on virtually everything, there were some surfaces that left a slight discoloration. We found that campden tablets removed those quite nicely. So, we laid in a supply of them to send to any customer that needed them. To date, the bottle has not been opened. But still, it is good information to have.

Is the E.G.G. really safe?

I have seen several items on the net discussing the safety of the E.G.G.. Part of the effectiveness of the E.G.G. is the fact that the ethylene is being reacted out of existence, rather than just being “adhered” to the surface of the zeolite. This reaction is with the potassium permanganate (KMnO4) that is bonded to the surface of the zeolite. The ionic charge on the zeolite attracts the ethylene to the surface then the potassium permanganate reacts with it.

By itself, potassium permanganate is a strong oxidizer and has the potential to be harmful if handled improperly. It has been pointed out that the MSDS for potassium permanganate discusses the hazards, whereas the MSDS for the E.G.G. does not.* The reason for that is the form which the potassium permanganate is in. In the E.G.G. the KMnO4 is not available for reacting with skin, eyes, lungs, etc. because it is bound up in the zeolite. The beauty of zeolite is that it has a massive internal surface area. The amount of surface area of zeolite that you can see or touch is a minuscule percentage of the total surface area of the pellet. The patented process by which the KMnO4 is bonded to the surface of the zeolites gets it onto the entire surface area, not just the visible surface area. Since the potassium permanganate is bonded to the zeolite surface and is no longer mobile, and the amount that can be contacted physically is so small it is a pretty innocuous substance.

Since ethylene is a gas, it can be drawn into the interior surfaces of the zeolite for its final disposal. The key difference is that the ethylene moves to the potassium permanganate and the potassium permanganate can not move to you.

Further confirmation of the safety of the E.G.G. is inherent in its listing by the Organic Materials Review Institute (OMRI) as safe for use in the production of organic products. If there were any danger of contaminating produce, you can bet that they would not allow its use in organic processing.

*Although MSDSs are required for industrial handling – i.e. the workers who handle the material during its production and shipping – and may contain little information of value for consumers, we have a link on the website for the E.G.G.s MSDS.

The E.G.G. loves Le Creuset

I came across an interesting conversation on the Community.QVC.com board about Le Creuset cookware. We have used Le Creuset for many years and had never thought of this. Clearly chickenbutt understands how to use the E.G.G and is using to great advantage in her Le Creuset when it is not in use. I wish I had thought of this.

chickenbutt Posts: 11,801 Registered: 1/16/06

(4 of 23) Re: Le Creuset Oval Doufeu Apr 4, 2008 4:47 PM Report Abuse

You know what else? I am one of those ‘always thinking’ type people and since I like to have some of my Le Creuset pots out, so I can look at them inbetween uses, it occurred to me one day that they would be perfect for perishable food storage. So, I usually have my tomatoes and avocadoes in one, with one of those E.G.G. things. The cast iron is so insulated that, besides staying hot when cooking (I can take a dish out of the oven and over an hour later it is still piping hot!), when you are not cooking it stays really cool in there. I also have another one that I keep other things like the bird’s banana, or a small Lock & Lock with butter in it… Works really great! I have 4 of those E.G.G. thingies, so I can have one in each drawer in the refrigerator and a couple more to use outside the refrigerator. Using them inside the cast iron pots is perfect because you can get rid of the plastic produce bags too, plus keep the food in small, cool environments. Yeah, that 13qt probably weighs a zillion pounds, but it would allow me to get rid of all my large stainless steel stock pots. I just so prefer cooking in the French cast iron. (hehe..I almost typed ‘cash’ instead of ‘cast’…seems appropriate!) I love buying stuff that will last forever and then I don’t have to worry about buying that stuff anymore. Very few things are really THAT classic that you won’t get tired of them, or wear them out, but LC really IS one of those things. – ————- “What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

Calypso Posts: 4 Registered: 12/25/05

(9 of 23) Re: Le Creuset Oval Doufeu Apr 6, 2008 12:00 PM Report Abuse

“Works really great! I have 4 of those E.G.G. thingies, so I can have one in each drawer in the refrigerator and a couple more to use outside the refrigerator. Using them inside the cast iron pots is perfect because you can get rid of the plastic produce bags too, plus keep the food in small, cool environments.” Pardon my ignorance, but what is an E.G.G. thingy? Whatever it is, it sounds great! Thanks for your help!

chickenbutt Posts: 11,801 Registered: 1/16/06

(10 of 23) Re: Le Creuset Oval Doufeu Apr 6, 2008 2:07 PM Report Abuse

Hi Calypso (love your name!) – The E.G.G. is one of those things with the packets of stuff in them that you put with your produce items to keep them fresh longer. Lori Greiner used to have them here at QVC, but I got mine directly from the vendor HERE because I wanted red ones and hers were only in blue. I just did a search here and was surprised not to find them…I guess they dumped them in lieu of all the more expensive products (the bags and plastic storage containers) with the same stuff. Anyway, I like them and I think they help IF you follow a few rules – Make sure the produce is completely DRY (this applies to any of these produce-saving type products) and in a small enclosed place. I just had some strawberries that were in one of my refrigerator crisper drawers for TEN DAYS before I cleaned and cut them up. They were just like new! You just have the packet inside the EGG thingy and place it with the produce. Each packet is good for 3 months. I also buy a green banana every couple of weeks for the bird (takes that long for him to go through one banana!) and I just wash & dry it, and keep it in a Lock & Lock container with an E.G.G. – it lasts perfectly fine for a couple of weeks. I keep at least one of them in each crisper drawer (I keep fruits in one drawer and veg in the other). I close the drawer vent so that it creates a basically closed environment and let the E.G.G. do its work. As I think I mentioned the other day, I keep another E.G.G. with my tomatoes that I store inside one of my LC French Ovens that sits atop my cutting board. Stays so nice and cool in there! And you don’t want to refrigerate your tomatoes, a I’m sure you already know. HTH! – ————- “What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

Posts: 4

Registered: 12/25/05

(13 of 23)

Re: Le Creuset Oval Doufeu

Apr 6, 2008 11:07 PM

• Report Abuse

Hi chickenbutt (love your name too!) – thanks so much for the E.G.G. website and for all the great tips. I love the idea of keeping my LC pots out – pretty to look at, and now thanks to you - usefull!

…and one more plus – less heavy lifting!

chickenbuttPosts: 11,801 Registered: 1/16/06	(14 of 23) Re: Le Creuset Oval Doufeu Apr 6, 2008 11:15 PM Report Abuse
	Hey Calypso! I hear John Denver singing whenever I see your name.Anyway, glad to help. I just love helpful hints. I’m full of ‘em. People used to tell me that I should write a book of them. Well, I’m sure that’s already been done! I might even get another paid of the E.G.G.s because it seems like sometimes I need another couple. They do help, just as long as you put your produce away nice and dry. A lot of stuff I don’t even clean until time to use them. That way I know that there isn’t any water trapped in there. When I come home from the grocery store I always lay all the product out on the counter until it is dry. I hate those spraying things in the grocery store in the produce section. Seems like they would know that the water makes the produce rot faster, but I guess they think it makes more sense to have the produce look more appealing by spraying it down. Who knows!

The reason for the eggs

 I came across a thread on Debra Lynn Dadd’s Q&A the other day that I found intersting.  http://dld123.com/q&a/index.php?cid=5885.  For those who may not know Debra Lynn Dadd, she is described as the “Queen of Green”, a topic near and dear to our hearts.  Her website is a treasure trove of green living ideas.  In the first post below, Debra discusses the E.G.G. and her preference for a “something without plastic”.

There’s another produce-saving product that works in a similar way to the green bags, but without the plastic bag. It’s call The E.G.G. (for Ethylene Gas Guardian). This one is a refillable plastic egg. You just put it in your refrigerator produce bin. That sounds easier. It needs to be refilled every three months.

I’d still like something without the plastic. I have a lead I’ll follow up on, so stay tuned!

Debra

POSTED BY DEBRA LYNN DADD :: DEBRA LYNN DADD :: WWW.DLD123.COM :: FLORIDA USA :: 02/01/2008 5:05 PM

A few days later she has a post suggesting using our product without the plastic eggs.  Of course, that is an option.  For that option you may order “The E.G.G. refills” on our website.  That product is a resealable barrier pouch containing 8 packets of the ethylene absorber.

However, we recommend the use of the eggs. The eggs provide several important functions. The main function is to protect the packets from physical damage. The egg (or packet) quickly finds its way to the bottom of the produce bins. As produce is dropped into the bin over the course of the three months that it will be in there, there is quite a bit of wear and tear on it. Without the eggs, the packets frequently break or leak pellets. When the pellets leak out of the packets they will stain the bin and produce that comes in contact with it. It is a beautiful color, but probably not what you want to see on your produce. The eggs also insure air circulation, which is critical to full effectiveness, to the ethylene absorber. The shape does not allow, for example, a lettuce leaf from covering the flat packet up, reducing air flow and ethylene absorption.

We recommend buying the E.G.G. once and then buying the refill product there after.  The eggs are sturdy enough to use for several years.

I’ve found an alternative to green bags that I like even better. They are small paper sachets (no plastic) that fit right in to your produce bin and control the ethylene gas that makes food spoil. You can also use them in a covered container on a table or countertop at room temperature. You just replace them every six months. They are much more convenient than the plastic bags.

These are used commercially to keep food and flowers fresh. You can get all the information at http://www.ethylenecontrol.com.

If you want to order some, you’ll need to call 800-200-1909, as the website isn’t set up for consumer sales (I arranged for you to be able to order them in small amounts). Tell them you saw this offer on my blog and ask for the “10 pack.” It’s only $6.25. Each pack lasts six months. So this is a great deal…and no plastic.

The owner of this company is the father of a woman who interviewed me on the radio a couple of weeks ago, in Fresno, California. You can listen to the interview at Alice 96.7 Laurie’s Interview with Debra Lynn Dadd

POSTED BY DEBRA LYNN DADD :: DEBRA LYNN DADD :: WWW.DLD123.COM :: FLORIDA USA :: 02/11/2008 1:57 PM

I would like to correct one minor point in Debra Lynn’s second post.  The material used for the packet is tyvek (polyethylene).  The advantage of tyvek in this application is that it is a one way moisture barrier.  It keeps the pellets dry even if the outer surface gets wet, preventing staining.

My favorite web post

I look around the web occasionally to see what others are saying about the E.G.G.. Recently, I came across an item that is my favorite. It is on the Chowhound.com board posed by anniemax Nov.2, 2007.

At least the EGG doesn’t try to hide what they are selling, in fact they tell you exactly what it is and how it works and why, down to the exact chemical reaction (which I admit, I glossed over), along with plenty of links to real scientifically backed research.

http://www.chowhound.com/topics/438971#3090359

anniemax has it right. We think that the more you understand how and why the E.G.G. works, the better your results will be. The website is intended to help explain the product and maximize its effectiveness when used in your home. Of course, I am disappointed that anniemax does not share my enthusiasm for chemistry. But, truth be known, neither does Betsy.

Tom