Recipe: Popsicles for Brekkie!

Credit: Allrecipes

My mum would have never allowed this ("Cold food on the stomach first thing in the morning will give you weak kidney and grey hair!") but apparently fruit and yoghurt breakfast popsicles are a thing! Don't you just want to make these as the obnoxiously hot and humid Hong Kong summer is returning with a vengeance?

Pee, Poo, Fertilise

Credit: Peepoo

Did you know that over 2.6 billion people in the world lack access to basic sanitation, and up to 40% of the world’s population don’t have access to even the simplest latrine?

To tackle the issue, Peepoo, a personal, single-use, self-sanitising and fully biodegradable toilet was invented to prevent faeces from contaminating the immediate area and the surrounding ecosystem, while solving the problem of scarce water supply by saving the need to flush – water is only needed for washing hands afterwards.

Weighing just 10 grams, Peepoo is really a slim biodegradable bag with an inner layer that unfolds to form a wide funnel. It’s designed to be easy to store, handle, and use in complete privacy. With the ability to remain odour-free for at least 24 hours, Peepoo can be stored in the immediate environment without endangering it. What’s more, it also transforms the faecal matter into high-value fertiliser to benefit the local organic farming industry.

Don’t you just love innovative, green and community-driven inventions like this? 

Grow Your Own Algae and Eat It

Credit: Fast Company

Read on if you’re the adventurous type that is curious about what the future brings in terms of food. While meatless meat is beginning to sound a good idea, we’re not quite sure what a green sludge of matter sounds to you.

Our world faces uneven food distribution, and more sustainable food production methods are constantly called for. In sight of this, architectural designer Jacob Douenias has created a conceptual line of photosynthetic furniture, which includes custom glass bioreactors that use waste heat, light and carbon dioxide from a home to feed the spirulina inside what resembles a fish tank. The resultant food is a green sludge of matter that is, according to the designer, “super nutritious”. And he’s right, because apparently the blue-green algae is used as a supplement at health food stores.

So what you need to do is pretty much live life as usual, and let the bioreactors collect your waste energy to provide food. If you come to think about it, Popeye also survives on algae-like matter too, so why not? 

Eat Cruelty Free, with Beyond Meat

Credit: ecozine, Beyond Meat

Despite the drastic increase in vegan and vegetarian dining options, Hong Kongers are constantly looking for options that enable them to eat cruelty-free, without compromising on food quality. So good news to those of you, as Beyond Meat, the top brand of plant-based food that has attracted investment from Bill Gates and the likes, is available in Hong Kong.

Free of antibiotics, hormones, cholesterol and gluten, Beyond Meat’s products are rich in high-quality protein and are cooked and pre-seasoned, meaning all you need to do is to add them to your recipes. From Italian Meatballs (HKD64) to Beefy Beef Crumbles (HKD59) and Beyond Chicken Strips (HKD59), Beyond Meat makes sure its products can fool even the most fastidious foodie by recruiting food and chemical experts to realign the molecules of plant proteins, so that they would have the same texture as meat.

And the best thing of all? These cruelty-free products are available at Green Common, Green Monday’s organic, healthy living store in Wanchai!

Green Common
Location: 222 Queen’s Road, East, Wanchai, Hong Kong
Phone: +852 2263 3153
Email: info@greencommon.com
Opening Hours: 9:30am to 8:30pm Monday to Saturday, 10:00am to 8:30pm Sunday

A Plate that Stops You from Overeating

Credit: Fast Company

Just when you snigger at the recent healthy living revolution, wondering what we have done to land ourselves in an era where our eating habits defy common sense, Dutch designer Annet Bruil launched the ETE Plate, which graphically illustrates a balanced meal by sketching out the portions deemed suitable for different types of food, into pie chart-like sections. From salad, meat or tofu, noodles or rice, vegetables to an overlapping ‘mix’ section that enables you to combine different types of food, the plate is designed to help people get the right portion sizes and eventually be able to eat healthily without it.

It will be a great idea, especially if the plate is used for catering at schools, so students will learn to get a grasp of the right eating habit from a young age, and apparently that’s what the designer has in mind too. What makes this plate that extra bit special is that it is made of bamboo, which absorbs CO2 as it grows and can grow in drought-prone regions. The plate is long-lasting but also biodegradable, in case you want to throw it away. 

Fashion with a Conscience

Credit: L plus H

The more we learn about the waste and human hardship the fashion/textile industry creates, the more we are inclined to source conscientious brands that does little harm to the environment, and better still, helps create equal opportunities for the community along the way.

Hong Kong’s own L plus H does precisely that. Founded by five bold and socially driven industrialists and entrepreneurs at the peak of the global financial crisis in 2008, L plus H, a social enterprise, intends to bring manufacturing back to Hong Kong while creating meaningful job opportunities for displaced skillful workers, so that these craftsmen can regain their dignity by applying and passing on their skills.

As a brand specialised in high-quality knitwear, L plus H hires artisans with an average of 20 years of experience in knitwear-making – most of whom started their career in their teen, and have so much to offer in the labour-intensive manufacturing process, complemented by cutting-edge machinery. Oh, and they have an annual charity sweater project where they’d give out 10,000 pieces of sweaters to the unprivileged – a project where yarn mills donate raw materials, some donate HKD100 per sweater, and L plus H itself donates part of the production cost and all administrative cost. Their community contribution aside, L plus H also ensures energy efficiency and environmental conservation wherever possible: their energy-saving air conditioner provides a comfortable and quiet work environment, and the factory is lit up with environmentally friendly fluorescent tubes, for instance.

There, you’ve got a local, conscientious garment brand to shop with.

Information
Location: 17/F, 11 Stanley Street, Central, Hong Kong
Phone: +852 2923 2288
Email: marketing@LplusH.com
Opening Hours: 10:00am to 7:00pm Monday to Saturday, closes on Sunday and public holidays 

Take Your Kids to the Eco Paper World

Credit: hk.on.cc

When it comes to raising an eco-conscious child, nothing beats instilling the values of environmental conservation and exposing them to eco solutions when they’re still young. If you’re stuck for places to bring your children this weekend, try Korean Corner in Kowloon Bay.

As both a mini playground and a shop that sells eco toys and furniture pieces for the little ones, Korean Corner appeals with the giant four-metre-tall dinosaur made of cardboard, which is complete with a slide and a mini maze inside its ‘body’. From mini houses to bookshelves, Korean Corner has stocked up on creative furniture pieces that are made with eco-friendly materials, such as wood sourced from eco forests.

Go on, let your little ones explore the fun of eco-friendly furniture pieces!

Information
Location: Room 17, 2/F, Metro Centre (I), 32 Lam Hing Street, Kowloon Bay, Hong Kong
Phone: +852 3976 2976
Opening Hours: 10:30am to 6:00pm Monday, 10:30am to 8:00pm Tuesday to Friday, noon to 6:00pm Saturday, Sunday and public holidays