So I decided to take the veggie burger plunge and use my humble cooking “skills” to craft a mouth-watering black bean burger. But first, an eco-footnote…

It takes a LOT more resources to get a pound of hamburger meat than to make a vegetarian bean burger. GoVeg (a completely unbiased website) had this to say on the matter…

It takes 5,000 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of meat, while growing 1 pound of wheat only requires 25 gallons. A totally vegetarian diet requires only 300 gallons of water per day, while a meat-eating diet requires more than 4,000 gallons of water per day. You save more water by not eating a pound of beef than you do by not showering for an entire year.

Gadzooks! Even if those numbers are skewed some, getting meat uses a heck of a lot of water.

Alright, enough with the eco-footprint lesson. Moving on to the…

Black Bean Burger Recipe

This simple veggie burger recipe (which makes 4 servings) calls for…

• 2 peppers (jalapeño, cayenne, or banana)
• About 8 teaspoons of olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 shallots
• 2 cups of cooked, drained black beans (a 29oz. can is a just about right)
• 2/3 cup quick-cooking oats
• 2 tablespoons mayonnaise
• 1/2 teaspoon oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper

Chop up the peppers (I used homegrown cayennes and banana peppers), shallots, and garlic. Use scissors for that extra manly touch.

Sauté the chopped-up peppers, garlic, and shallots in olive oil for about 5 minutes.

Put the fried vittles in a bowl, along with the black beans, mayonnaise, oregano, and salt n’ pepa.

Heck, while you’re at it, add the oats, as well.

Mash all the ingredients together with all your might. Take out your inner rage on that mashing. Make those ingredients pay.

Refrigerate the ingredients for about half an hour. Take this time to reflect on your day.

Alright, now form patties with this bean glop. Put some olive oil in a pan and gently place those veggie burger patties in said pan.

Fry them for about 5 minutes on each side. They should look a little something like this:

Congratulations, you’ve just made homemade black bean burgers! Put the veggie burger on a bun and move it toward your mouth.

Final Thoughts

The black bean burger was good, but didn’t taste anything close to a hamburger. It’s not bad, it just doesn’t have that special cow flavor.

If you have a better recipe for veggie burgers, feel free as a bird to let me know and I’ll try it out.

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Have you ever wanted to charge your cell phone, but didn’t want to waste precious electricity that you had to pay for? Well now you can get some exercise AND charge your phone for free, because good ol’ Nokia just came out with a bike phone charger!

How do I Charge my Phone with a Bike?

The Nokia Bicycle Charger Kit is attached to your bicycle. As you pedal your bike, it powers a small generator that transfers electricity to a charger on your handlebar. Voíla, just that easy.

How Much Pedaling To Charge Cell Phone?

I’ll let Nokia answer this question; Nokia, the floor is yours:

“To begin charging, a cyclist needs to travel around six kilometers per hour (four miles per hour), and while charging times will vary depending on battery model, a 10-minute journey at 10 kilometers per hour (six miles per hour) produces around 28 minutes of talk time or 37 hours of standby time. The faster you ride, the more battery life you generate.”

That sounds pretty good to me. Plus, it only costs around $20. So if you’re down for biking and charging your cell phone at the same time, this might just be the ticket for you.

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Enjoy these digital works o’ art, AKA pictures of chickens.

300 Ramblewood Drive Chickens

404 Merwin Chickens

501 Mial

709 Ravel

Lastly, but not leastly, I give you this short video of a rooster proclaiming himself the bauss of his coop.

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Raising chickens can help you get free-range, local eggs. It cuts down on your food eco-footprint, saves you money, and gets you the freshest eggs you could ever imagine.

What is the Tour D’ Coop?

Hey, thanks for asking. It’s a tour of 20 houses with chicken coops, all inside the Raleigh beltline. If you’re interested in chickens, or just want to see some cool houses and gardens, I heartily recommend going on the tour.

When is the Tour D’ Coop?

I already said, but it’s this Saturday, May 15, from 10AM – 5PM. So be there or be square.

Where Can I Get Tickets?

You can pre-order a ticket on the !nt3r3n37, or,
early Saturday morn, getcho chicken tour tickets at one of these places:

• Steven B. Andreaus, DDS , PA
  1637 Glenwood Avenue , across from the Rialto Theater
• Ornamentea: 509 N. West Street, one block south of Peace Street
• CupAJoe: 2109-142 Avent Ferry Road, in the lower level of Mission Valley Shopping Center
• Whole Foods Market: 3540 Wade Avenue, in the Ridgewood Shopping Center
• Seaboard ACE Hardware: 802 Semart Drive, across from Logan ’s Nursery

How much a Ticket Is?

In return for a ticket, all they ask for is non-perishable food items or monetary donations. 100% goes to Urban Ministries of Wake County.

Official Site: http://hensidethebeltline.blogspot.com/

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I should have a post up later on today detailing an amazing event that’s happening this weekend in good ol’ Raleigh, so check back later if ye please.

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Earthship Video Uno

Earthship Video Dos

Earthship Video Tres

Dang, now wasn’t that informative? If you feel that your brain can handle yet MORE information about earthships, then head on over to Earthships 101.

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Welp, if not, then here’s a free way to test your water. Just CLICK ON THIS LINK and you’ll be whisked away to an Internet webpage whereupon you can order a free water test.

Just fill out the form (selecting “Order Free Water Test” under “Reason for Contact”) and you’ll be on your way to the peace of mind that only a water test can give you.

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Do you feel like great waves of eco-shame wash over you every time you go to the grocery store and realize that you’re about to use disposable paper or plastic bags instead of a reusable bag? You want to be “green” and forgo disposable bags, but the lack of style in reusable bags makes you cringe?

I don’t feel like this, but if you do care about style and going green, its-laS-tik bags may be the way to go for you, my friend. I got one in the mail a few weeks ago, and have been testing the heck out of it.

Its-laS-tik bags are strong, stretchy, and made in the good ol’ U.S. of A. I opted for the manly camouflage bag, but they also have a bunch of different patterns and colors of bags available, including bling gold.

So if you’re trying to make the jump to using reusable bags and saying goodbye to disposable ones, its-laS-tik bags could be a good start for you. And that’s all I got to say about that.

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Holy moly, it doesn’t seem that long ago that I last hosted the Carnival of the Green, but it’s been almost a year! Truly, time waits for no man. Just last week, Eco New Mexico hosted the Carnival, and next week it is moving on to good ol’ Enviroblog.

But enough talk of time and such; let’s take a look-see at this week’s Carnival of the Green submissions:

Health

Surbhi brings the ruckus with this in-depth look at natural ways to stay healthy.

The venerable Fake Plastic Fish continues her one-woman war against plastic with a shocking exposé on a nasty chewing gum ingredient: plastic. After reading that, I think I’ll steer clear of gum for awhile and maybe check out Glee gum, made from natural chicle.

Gracy Queen wins the award for best blog post title, with her piece on vegan food choices entitled, I Can’t Has Cheezburger. I, myself, am not a vegan, but if you’re gonna be, here’s some good tips on what to eat.

Jourdan asks if being “green” makes you feel stressed out, and breaks it down to the basics to show that you can make some small, simple changes to be greener.

Climate Change

Dr. Kneidel exposes the plight of the noble trees, brought about by recent climate change.

Green Linguistics

Colin Doyle is trying to export a linguistic gem from Australia; calling fossil fuel energy “black energy“. It might make it a lil’ easier to have talks about green vs. black energy.

Beverly decides to make a New Year’s resolution to “grab a tiger by the tail” and go green. However, she then delves into what exactly this mysterious saying means.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

The aptly named Mrs. Green contributes 11 ideas on how to reuse coffee grounds. I’ll be using some of her tips, since I do enjoy the occasional coffee.

Stuff With A Purpose has some good tips on how to reuse plastic bags. The best thing to do is avoid them altogether, but barring that, he has some good ways to reuse them.

A shorty named Renee that I met one day has some good tips for how to compost during these frigid winter months. Since my current compost bin is overflowing, I plan on using some of her advice to figure out what to do.

Do It Yourself

Emily Moser, of the strangely named Becoming A Radiologist website, has listed some good resources for making some homemade soap.

Around the House

Brenda Pike got herself a Kill-A-Watt (I got one of these a year ago and it’s great!) and ran around her house measuring how much electricity various appliances used. Very interesting, and it convinced me to fully turn off my Wii instead of putting it into standby with the Wiimote.

Stacey Doyle decides to look at some easy ways to live in a more eco-friendly way.

Case examines the pros and cons of compact fluorescent light bulbs, including examining just how green these CFLs are.

Mark Donovan show us some easy yet effective ways to reduce your home’s ecological footprint while also saving money. Sounds like my kind of post, if you know what I mean.

Pure Natural Diva has some general tips on how to go green for today’s on-the-go diva.

Transportation

Vihar tells the world of how St. Louis has opted for a tiny tax increase to help fund its public transportation system. Kudos to Vihar for breaking this story.

Phew! Welp, that about does it for this week’s Carnival of the Green. Hopefully we all laughed a little, cried a little, and, just maybe, learned a little. I leave you with the Top 5 EcoJoes Posts of 2009:

• How to Make Homemade Cat Litter from Newspaper
• Homemade Granola Recipe
• How to Clean Up Litter in Under Five Minutes
• How to Make Homemade Paper
• Art from Litter: Glass Creatures

Happy Carnival!

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“What’s the big deal about a programmable thermostat, anyhoo?”, I hear you ask. Well, I’ll let the good ol’ U.S. Department o’ Energy tell you:

[During winter], by turning your thermostat back 10°–15° for 8 hours, you can save about 5%–15% a year on your heating bill—a savings of as much as 1% for each degree if the setback period is eight hours long.

Gadzooks. If your average power bill is $70 a month during the 4 coldest months of the year, a programmable thermostat can save you between $14 and $42 during those 4 months! Not to mention the painless energy savings.

But it doesn’t only conserve energy and save money during the winter, oh no. During those hot months, you can set the temperature higher while you’re gone, and have it cool down more when you’re actually at your house. Voíla, even more energy and monetary savings!

Read instructions carefully when installing a programmable thermostat

Me and some friends tried to install my thermostat on one of the coldest days of the year. We wired everything up perfectly, but the heat wouldn’t come on. A day later, my friendly neighborhood electrician fixed the problem by reading the manual and figuring out that you had to tell the programmable thermostat that we had a heat pump. Dang, that one night without heat was a cold night
indeed, but I learnt a valuable lesson about reading instructions.

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