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Zero Waste Week – the perfect chance to watch your waste

Each time I clear my fridge and throw out food that should have been eaten I tell myself that I’m going to keep a waste diary, that way I can try to pinpoint where I’m going wrong. There are no excuses now…

Next week is National Zero Waste Week and I’ve pledged not to waste a single gram of food. You can join me. Visit the My Zero Waste website run by our friend Mrs Green and make a pledge to cut your waste a little or a lot.

National Zero Waste WeekI’d love to say that I’m an expert at not wasting food but I’m not. I have a few challenges that usually tip me over the edge – or rather lead to me tipping a bit of food in the bin. I don’t throw a lot of food away but I certainly want to get the numbers down to nil. This is my chance.

Every day 260,000 packs of cheese are thrown away in Britain, along with…


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Posted on 3 September 2010

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How many bikes can you fit into one car parking space?

Keeping you posted

At the time of writing…we’ve had 261 bike pledged!! It’s going up steadily every day, and the bike is moving along on the pledge page nicely. We want to collect another 390 by October 2nd.Abel & Cole's Wheelie Big Bike Drop

All falling into place

Pedal-powered party is it? Oh yes. We’re powering the amps for our 2 bands and the movie from Re~Cycle with 8 bikes…for all ages, and another bike to power a blender to make fresh smoothies. The way our chef Paul does to use up our ‘past its peak’ fruit and veg.

Chat to some bike experts, bring your bike to join in some cycling games with Biker’s Delight, and join the potato printing and apple bobbing. Chef is also making plenty of his top organic burgers, chickpea burgers and salads, and we’ll have plenty of our organic beers…all being sold to raise money to get the bike container to Ghana.

Join us 11am-3pm at A&C HQ, Waterside Way, London, SW17

Have you got a bike you wouldn’t miss?

Fill in the form here if you do. It’s pretty important, as we need to plan when we can fill a container. If it looks like we’re getting more or less, we’ll revert to plan B, C… you know.

Rally the troops

If you know others who might like to join the party, we can send you some posters to help spread the word. The more the merrier.

How to find us on Saturday 25th September

It’s very easy to find us, whether by bike, foot, bus or car…and we’ll signpost the way from our nearest train station Haydons Road and the underground Colliers Wood. There’s also regular buses from Wimbledon train station.

Know any facts about bikes or cycling?

We’ve been chatting about bike-related facts and figures, like…

  • 20 bicycles can be parked in the same space as one car!
  • the longest tandem was almost 67 feet long and seated 35 riders!
  • approximately 105 million bicycles are made every year

Do you know any others?

Posted on 2 September 2010

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Bags packed, fridge cleared (now, where’s that passport!)

I’m heading to Ireland tonight and will be there for a few days. Being a bit unorganised (and greedy), I didn’t set a holiday for my box order this week. On Monday, I received a scrummy box of veg – leafy topped carrots, leeks, broccoli and loads of other healthy things. I didn’t want to let all this lovely veg to go to waste.Surrounded by wonderful veg

So, to help shift some of it (and some of the veg from the week before) my son Rory and I had juice and kebabs for dinner last night. It was great. Between the two of us, we ate/drank about 8 carrots, 1 ½ beetroots, a fennel, a leek, ½ a pattipan squash, a good bit of broccoli, a punnet of cherry tomatoes, an enormous Portobello mushroom, a few apricots and an apple.

The juice was a mix of carrots, fennel, apple and beetroot.

For the kebabs, I cut fennel, leek, pattipan, mushroom and apricots into 2-3cm hunks. Popped them into a bowl with some olive oil and spice (I used the Tandoori rub recipe from a few weeks ago). Skewered them with some diced pork and cooked for 10 minutes in the oven on the grill setting.

I felt bloody marvellous this morning.

Now, my bags are packed. My fridge is pretty much clear. All we need to do is find my husband’s missing passport!

If you need any veg shifting tips, do drop me a note: foodie@abelandcole.co.uk

Rachel

Posted on 26 August 2010

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Tees for honey bees…

Or rather…t-shirts for you, but all in the name of honey bees:

Due to popular demand…we’re making Big Buzz t-shirts available for you to order.

The t-shirts us Abel & Cole-ers wore at The Big Buzz in June went down a storm. Nothing to do with the hippy happy models, it was the informative facts about bees that caught attention. Graham was trying to top up wine glasses when he was asked by a guest if they could take a picture of his back and then post the snap on Twitter. And he wasn’t the only one – we all have very famous backs now!

Organic farming = Healthy beesWe’ve found it fascinating learning about honey bees, and we loved putting bee facts on the t-shirts, to help to spread the news at Big Buzz.

Ever since that evening we’ve had calls from you asking if we’re going to sell them…and the answer is yes-indeedy. So the news can carry on spreading!

It’s a one off special kind of thing, as we’re not professional t-shirt people, but we’ll order you the size you want with a choice out of 4 facts on the back of a lovely organic, Fairtrade cotton t-shirt.

Please email or call us to order your t-shirt by no later than 6pm on Tuesday 7th September. We’ll then order them, and send them to you by 23rd September.

T-shirts are £14.99, £3 of which will go straight to the West Wales Bee Breeding Program… (to add to the £700 we’ve already raised through sales of Steve’s Salisbury Plain Honey).
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Posted on 18 August 2010

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Have you pledged a bike?

Yay if you have! We’ll be in touch shortly to let you know where your nearest collection point is, or find an alternative means of taking your kind donation.

Do spread the word about the bike drop if you can. The more the merrier. We need 650 to fill one container, as some will be broken down into useable parts if the bike as a whole is past its peak. But every bike donated will be sent to Africa by Re~Cycle, and given out via partner charities.

N.B. Any bikes resembling this may not be of use to anyone, anymore…

Not bikes as old and rusty as this, please
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Posted on 13 August 2010

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