5 Ways to Go Green in Your Kitchen

While "Eat your greens!" tends to be a phrase more commonly heard in the kitchen, "Let's go green!" is starting to resound in more and more cook's havens today. The green movement, in fact, has much to offer in this area of every day life, and kitchens are a great place to start "acting green" in your own family. Here are several practical and affordable options for leading a more environmentally friendly lifestyle in your own home kitchen today.

1. Replace those paper towels. A common item in just about every kitchen in America today, paper towels really don't help our earth out--even if they do keep our kitchens clean. Made from bleached virgin tree pulp, paper towels are usually thrown out after a single use; for such an un-environmentally friendly manufacturing process, these little towels generate a lot of waste. An alternative and much greener option to paper towels is found in "BirdE towels." Made from unbleached cotton, these towels from a popular Etsy seller are able to be washed and reused again and again-thoroughly eliminating the average kitchen's use for paper towels. Fast drying and very absorbent, these BirdE towels also make great alternatives to paper napkins. While some may argue that having to wash these towels is non-green since the process could utilize harmful chemicals, this argument can be largely refuted simply by only using green detergent.

2. Get green soap. Available through many different companies, green dish soap is a great way to make your kitchen practices more environmentally friendly. While these dish soaps may seem a bit more pricy than your average non-green dish soap, the most frequent comment on these soaps is that "a little goes a long way." Generally made from chlorine-, phosphate-, and nitrate- free formulas, green dish soaps are tough on grease and easy on the environment. Additionally, many of these green dish soap options are bottled in containers that are made primarily of post-consumer recycled plastic. While there are definitely many different brands of self-declared eco-friendly dish soap, Seventh Generation, Dishmate, and Dr. Bronner's are some of the better known brands.

3. Start a compost pile. As much fun as it is to grind up orange peels in the kitchen disposal, compost piles are really a great way to go green and create some rich potting soil at the same time. While this may not be the greatest option for some people (such as apartment dwellers), this is a great way to put those food scraps to good use for anyone with a yard or garden. This compost can be collected in a bin separate from your regular garbage can and should be emptied/put into an outdoor compost pit once a day in order to reduce the chance of possible foul odors.

4. Use a green cleaner. While kitchens should be kept very clean in order to keep families in optimal health, many kitchen cleaners are made with chemicals that are potentially harmful to the environment. Method's "Antibac" kitchen cleaner is a great green alternative to these kitchen cleaners, and Method even provides consumers with a breakdown of how and why Antibac's ingredients are green.

5. Munch on organic goods. Delicious and nutritious, organic produce is often available through local farmers and is usually free of the strong chemicals sprayed on some larger commercial farms. Many towns have distributors of certified organic produce grown locally, and these services are great for anyone who doesn't have the time to research organics themselves.