Posts Tagged ‘beer’
This Week’s Stories: Textile and Coffee Waste, Sustainable Beer and Taking Action
Here is some of my work published this week:
Coffee Waste or Product Potential? – This story was featured in the print edition of Fresh Cup but is also up online. “Wast is simply resources in the wrong place,” says Daniel Crockett of Bio-Bean. I love that sentiment, because it challenges us to rethink what we assume is, or isn’t, something with potential.
10 Fashion Brands Innovating with Textile Waste – Speaking of waste, I also wrote a piece on textile waste. Did you know that in just 20 years, our textile waste has doubled? Today the average American discards around 70 pounds of textiles per year, the majority of it ending up in landfills. Fortunately, there are some innovators out there attempting to do something with it.
Patagonia is Making a Sustainable Kernza Beer – Patagonia, long known for its apparel, is moving into the food space. I love their efforts in working to build a better food system, and the new Long Ale beer is just another example.
Food, Agriculture and Environmental Organizations and Independent Media Outlets You Can Give To – If you’re looking for places to support this holiday season (and places whose work is very needed in the current political climate), I put together a roundup of some food and environment related organizations and media outlets over on Foodie Underground. There’s also an essay about caring (which includes a recipe for pumpkin oatmeal pudding) if you’re interested.
And finally, these weren’t written by me, but I was happy to have Hello, Bicycle mentioned in this list of presents for women cycling fans, as well as this mention of Fika: The Art of the Swedish Coffee Break in Condeé Nast Traveller.
Image: Domestic Stencilworks
Coffee and Beer: A Match Made in Heaven?
While coffee and beer might not be the first two flavors you would pair, people in the craft coffee and craft beer worlds are busy bottling their passions together.
“While brewers can reach wonderful flavor combinations with the sprawling available varieties of hops, specialty malts and yeast, some flavors simply require reaching beyond Reinheitsgebot (the Bavarian purity law that requires beer be made only from traditional ingredients),” says Les Stewart, coffee lover and head brewer at Trophy Brewing in Raleigh, North Carolina. “It means kind of breaking the rules, and doing it with such a willing partner in crime as coffee just makes a lot of sense.”
Read the rest of my article about coffee and beer on The Kitchn.
Image: Fil.Al
Food Waste: Creative Solutions to a Big Problem
Did you know that about 40% of the food produced in the US goes uneaten? Food waste is a serious issue.
I was happy to contribute a piece to one of my favorite food sites Civil Eats on the topic, profiling different businesses and organizations that are putting food waste to use in interesting ways. My favorite? A company using beer grains to make granola bars and another making brownies out of leftover grapes from the winemaking process:
4. If you’ve ever brewed your own beer, you know that it takes a lot of grain. And what happens to that grain once the beer is done? Some brewers compost with it, some (of the very committed) bake with it, but most often it gets thrown out. That’s why Dan Kurzrock and Jordan Schwartz launched Regrained, a business that makes granola bars out of spent malted barley. According to the pair, “only 10 percent of the ingredients used to brew end up in your glass.”
5. In winemaking, all the leftover stuff that comes after the grapes have been crushed is called pomace. More often than not, it’s destined for the compost or the dump. But Whole Vine Products takes a different route, using this byproduct in baked goods. In fact, they work with a local mill to turn the pomace into a gluten-free flour. They also make culinary oils from the grape seeds. Anyone care for a Cabernet brownie?
Read the full article and learn about the other projects, including making jam from food waste, here.
Image: Regrained
