• Blog
  • Recipes
  • Store
  • About
MENUMENU
  • 0
    Rated 2.81 out of 5
    $11.99
    Add to cart

thewholefooddiary

Making sustainable + conscious choices feel doable in real life!
Start small • Go step by step • Make it fun!
📍West Sussex 🇬🇧
Kezianeusch@gmail.com

Kezia and the Neusch Family
Solo breakfast in Texas and a few answers on trave Solo breakfast in Texas and a few answers on travel! 🍞🍌🥜 My pregnancy hunger is REAL! Mostly I don’t feel extra hungry but  I ate this same thing at 2am, and now again for breakfast 🤤 
.
Ok travel questions: 😅 I’m in Austin, TX staying + isolating with my parents in law! I’ll be here just a few days. I’m filling my time with extra sleep and lots of work hours while I’m on US time and making it count while I’m away from the kids. 
.
Travelling now is a bigger deal and to me honestly getting on a plane is always a big wrestle in terms of 🌎 impact. I don’t have all the answers I’ll be honest and I struggle there. In being married to an American I’m fortunate to have US residency but as I’m not a citizen, to keep that status I have to come to the US periodically. I’ve thought deeply about that trade off and if I should let it go. Currently working with US based companies is how we earn money and I’m the sole provider so I’m doing what I need to to keep that so I can keep supporting our family. But I don’t want to be victim to “having” to travel, I know it’s our choice for that trade off through these uni years in the U.K. and I do wonder and keep assessing! There’s more to it but that’s a bit - for me it’s taking that reality, being grateful and then doing every thing we can to take steps forward in our impact as in everything. And offsetting flights via @mindfulflights which I don’t see as a complete undoing but a great step and thing to do if you can. ✈️ 
.
International travel feels very different from domestic flight travel within the US, you can pretty much only travel U.K. ➡️US if you’re a permanent resident with a -ive covid test so that limits people on planes and they’re very empty with everyone especially on the international leg being very careful and considerate. I did an antigen test with Collinson Group at Heathrow before travel and they were amazing and efficient. I’ll then take one here to get back to the U.K. then 3 more plus 5 days quarantine! I hope that answers the most FAQs! ❤️😅 #twfdgoestoaustin #26weekspregnant
6 SIMPLE MOVES THAT SAVE MONEY AND WASTE 🗑 💰 6 SIMPLE MOVES THAT SAVE MONEY AND WASTE 🗑 💰 

New on the blog: When you think “zero waste life” do you think more 1️⃣ reusing a stained plastic Tupperware or yogurt carton or jar for years, or 2️⃣ a flatlay of new wood, metal, and cotton products?
.
When we had a snow storm 3 years ago and lost power in our house in freezing temps for 2 weeks, we moved to a hotel after a week. I forgot my bar shampoo and stood in the shower looking at the plastic disposable bottles. I said to myself “you win some you loose some.” And then stopped myself. Yes, you win some you lose some BUT I was more winning some and … being fortunate enough to make choices that create waste in some other areas. For so many of us, our ability to create waste comes from our ability to choose things not everyone can: to fly ✈️ , to get takeout 🥡 , to buy more than we need 📦 , to choose very seasonal fast fashion 👖, to throw things out 🗑 , to buy more + not reuse… and then we create a message that says that’s the route to environment change which excludes people, a message that says lowering waste takes money, or that it can be bought, or that it’s about people with more options nobly saving the world. We’re all responsible to take responsibility to the extent we’re able to and we need to own the amount we’re able to make a difference in whatever ways we are. BUT: having more doesn’t make you more able to lower your impact at ALL, and you do NOT need to increase your spending to lower your footprint.  We need to get back to simple. 
.
The first in a series of ways to lower cost and waste at the same time. I hope it helps. 👩‍💻: thewholefooddiary.com/blog/savemoneyandwaste
Guess who’s not in lockdown anymore! 🐓 Yep, w Guess who’s not in lockdown anymore! 🐓 Yep, we’re starting the week with these ladies moving out of their lockdown home of 3.5 months and ooooh they were ready (aren’t we all 🙋🏻‍♀️) 
.
Did you know that chickens are omnivores? 🐜 Left to themselves they’d eat bugs, seeds, plants, and if they get it, maybe a mouse - but we mostly feed them and in lockdown it’s all they get so they’re really happy to be outside again! 🌾 In England you actually now can’t feed chickens from the kitchen 🙄 but in most other places you can and it’s a GREAT way to reduce waste and put good food to good use. 

Through WW1 and 2, households in the US were encouraged to keep 2 🐓 per person in their backyards and in the UK both 🐓 and 🐇 were encouraged (year round breeding and food and fur - would you?!) - you could trade your egg ration for chicken food which was a great trade given 1 sole fresh egg per week was the typical ration. 
.
In 2013 1% of households in the US had backyard poultry* and the number is rising especially through covid. And surprisingly, ‘ownership is spread evenly through rural/urban/suburban areas and is similar across racial and ethic groups.’ You have to check your local rules, but a 2015 review showed 93% of US cities of the most populated cities allowed backyard poultry. 
.
Depending on where you are, you might not be super regulated so I’d encourage checking in with DEFRA if you’re in the U.K. or the relevant bodies wherever you are and registering your flock even if you don’t have to to make sure you’re doing it safely and you know about things like lockdowns!
Stew stories. ⤴️To meat or not to meat? 🤷🏻‍♀️🥩
.
People asked for my messy dirty hair stories last night to be saved so they are in a highlight for you called “meat journey” cos IGTV just blurred the whole thing when I tried to upload it as a vid for you 😉 . 
.
It’s far from the whole story on meat but a few things that made me think. Growing up eating meat in the UK’s BSE era, and going vegetarian at 11, then a job working on a dairy farm killing my own meat and eating it, then more vegan years and marrying a hunting man. I’ve had some stages 😂 
.
But then we began to look at our footprint environment wise. 🌎 Did we need to cut down on meat to help the planet? We added meatless Mondays, then more meatless days and then I began to question... 
.
Is coconut oil in plastic flown across the world to me really better than local organic butter just cos it’s plant based? Lots of people said yes and had studies for me, but I had to keep digging. 
.
But then what if I can get grass fed meat but not everyone can - what do I do with choices I’m able to make but most people don’t get to? 
.
And is all meat production “bad” for people and planet just cos it’s animals, and conversely is all vegetable growing “good” just cos it’s not meat?
.
Can we feed the world on the kind of meat that might not hurt it? 
.
More on it all in that story highlight! 🥩
Last week saw Equal Pay Day on the calendar 📆 w Last week saw Equal Pay Day on the calendar 📆 which is more significant than solely a day to shout about a pay gap (which alone would matter) and I wanted to shed some light on something I say often! ⬇️
.
You know I love truly knowing the places I shop in terms of practices on ethics, personal health, and care for the planet.😍 I also often highlight “women run”, “female founded”, “black owned” or something similar. But why?! 

Here’s some of why ➡️ Equal pay day is the day in the year when 🇬🇧 /🇺🇸/🇨🇦 women on average hit the earnings of men in the same roles in 2020. As in, women have to work till March 2021 to earn what a man in the same role earned by December. And for some other countries, and for some women of colour, beyond March.
.
The world is MISSING OUT on gems! Some of the needed solutions I’ve found have come from the companies that don’t get the most funding, support, or exposure from the system: the female and minority owned ones… and we’re all missing out as a result. Everyone loses. So we get to change that. 😍
.
Did you know: Women are more likely than men to think that social, ethical and environmental considerations in business are important?* Yet in 2016, 91 per cent of investment by value in the UK was directed into companies without a single female founder? And in the US, through the pandemic women have left/had to leave the workforce at 4 times the rate of men with over 2.2 million** women leaving in 2020. 😭 

So if I can use my everyday choices to shop items that care for the planet, and my health, and others AND also champion a company that the system is less set up to champion or who get different exposure and opportunity… I’m ALL IN. Especially when they’re the ones that often give me the solutions and values I need! 
.
On the blog today are 21 or my MUCH LOVED female founded and women owned brands that feature in our every day lives and I’m so grateful for! And with worldwide 🌏 shipping options! THEWHOLEFOODDIARY.COM/FEMALEFOUNDED ❤️

*Women in Enterprise: A Different Perspective. RBS Group 2012 // **US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
You probably didn’t know... ⬇️ 🧠 . One T You probably didn’t know... ⬇️ 🧠 
.
One THIRD of all food produced worldwide gets wasted - did you know that? If you’re like me, as soon as I heard that a few years back, my head went straight to working out how it wasn’t quite true, so it wasn’t quite so shocking and painful. But no: One. Third. of what we grow worldwide gets wasted. 🗑 Obviously that could be eaten by people who so need it and literally save lives, but it would also save SO MUCH water that goes into the production of all of that food... that’s instead wasted. This planet doesn’t need wasted water. 💧 
.
Aaaand to make it better, when the food gets tossed, food doesn’t break down to compost in landfill, it actually gives off greenhouse gases. 
.
We NEED to see a change, right?! 🥦 And you know what’s great...? ➡️ In the U.K. household waste makes up 70% of the total food waste*. That means we as households ARE powerful to be part of the change. 🙌
.
There are so many ways to reduce waste (which also saves MONEY!) but one is checking your fridge regularly and making sure you eat everything! 
.
Those cauliflower leaves are DELISH! Olive oil and salt and 30 mins in the oven and we just made a side for a meal that’s nutritious and saving waste and preserving resources in so many ways! Water, energy, transport, green house gas production, money!! 
.
Here’s your challenge to go to your fridge right now and make sure nothing at all is going to go to waste! Go go, check their fridge! Tell me what you rescue! 👋 
.
*via Insinkerator // WRAP - 2020 study. .
Load More... Follow on Instagram

© 2021 The Whole Food Diary