Hey, Green Junkie!

According to Waste-Free Canada, household waste can increase more than 25% in the holiday season and with Halloween done and over with; the holidays are officially here! 

Whether you love it or hate it, there is no getting around the hustle and bustle this time of year. And if you happen to be the ‘lucky one' hosting a holiday party, you could have even more to deal with.

From the non-recyclable decorations like tinsel to the food waste and abundant buffet spreads to the garbage can filled with tons of gift wrap it can be difficult to keep things green. 

That's why in today's episode, I'm giving you tips and tricks you need to make a lasting impact on your guests and not the environment!

Here's what to expect:

• How to avoid using single-use items
• Alternatives to traditional party items
• How to be more sustainable with your party cocktail
• The types of foods to prepare to cut down on waste
• A fun way to use your leftovers
• How to decorate sustainably
• Quick tips for gift wrapping

You'll discover that and so much more in this episode.

By the end of this episode, Green Junkie, you'll have all the inspiration you need to host an eco-friendly holiday party.

If you love this podcast, be sure to leave a review and share a screenshot of this episode to your IG stories. Tag @greenjunkiepodcast so I can shout you out and publicly say thanks. 

Thanks for listening and being here.

Your green bestie,

xoxo Stephanie

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LISTEN BELOW

TRANSCRIPT FOR EPISODE 10

0:08 Hi, Green Junkie. I'm your host Stephanie Moram, and today I want to focus on how you can reduce your waste when hosting a holiday party this season. How can you have an eco-friendly holiday party?

0:23 With Halloween done and over with, the holidays are officially here; whether you love them or hate them, there is no getting around the hustle and bustle this time of year. And if you happen to be the lucky one that's going to be hosting a party, you can have even more to deal with. So I am giving you all my best tips and tricks that you need to have a lasting impact on your guests and not the planet.

0:54 I want you to think about the non-recyclable decorations like tinsel to the food waste from the abundant buffet spreads to the garbage cans filled with tons of gift wrapping paper. Keep it green and show your love for the planet this holiday season by throwing an eco-friendly holiday party

1:18 According to waste-free Canada, household waste can increase by 25% during the holiday season. By the end of this episode Green Junkie, you'll have all the inspiration you need to host your own party.

1:39 If you love the planet, and you love reducing your impact on the planet, please subscribe to the Green Junkie podcast on Apple, Spotify, Stitcher, wherever you get your podcasts. That way, you'll never miss another episode.

2:01 Now, let's dive into a few tips on how you can throw an eco-friendly holiday party. The first thing I want to touch on is single-use items. And most of the single-use items will come from your cutlery, your plates, your bowls, your cups. And I know it can sound daunting sometimes to have reusable items. But if you go to a thrift shop, you can find plates and bowls and cutlery—all reusable, very inexpensive. And then, when you're done with them, you can box them up and keep them for your next party. And this way you're avoiding buying plastic.

2:38 But I get it. You might not want to do that. And you might not want to use reusable items. And you're just like I just want to go to the store and buy it and not think about it. So how about you think about getting compostable items. So cups and plates that are compostable that you can just put into the compost, then you're avoiding buying that plastic that isn't recyclable.

3:03 I'm going to invite you to listen to episode number eight, where I break down all the different plastic. And most cutlery is not recyclable. It's just it's not recyclable, and there's no little triangle on it, which I break down in that episode. So go listen to it. And you'll find out more about plastic. But generally, cutlery is not recyclable, and so it ends up in the trash.

3:27 Next thing, often we buy napkins, right, we want to set our table, and put napkins out. Yes, they're compostable; you can throw the napkins in the compost. But have you thought about using cloth napkins? I've been using cloth napkins for gosh, I don't even know how long – 11 years, 12 years. And I have them on hand. And then I just set my table with it. And the beauty is I can throw them in the laundry with my towels and stuff. So I'm not doing an extra load of laundry for these napkins.

3:56 And also think of your tablecloth. Instead of rushing out and buying a disposable one, perhaps have a cloth one on hand that you can use for all your holiday parties. It doesn't just have to be this party. It can be any party that you're having. Have one on hand, and this way, you're reducing the amount of plastic potentially that's going to end up in your landfill.

4:15 Next up, I want to talk about prepackaged food. So how can we avoid piling up all this plastic from prepackaged food? The solution is making your own at home. Most people make their own food at home, but for some people, it's more convenient for you to go to the store and just buy something prepackaged. But remember, homemade food does taste better than the prepackaged stuff that you are going to find at the store.

4:41 Next, think about making your own cocktails at home before you reach for some pre-made drink at the store. Maybe you could just make your own at home with simple ingredients. Or if you are going to buy stuff that's packaged maybe reach for stuff that's in aluminum cans. Aluminum is 100% recyclable. And when you do put it in your recycling bin, it will get recycled.

5:06 So you want to avoid packaging in plastic, right. So look for stuff that's maybe in glass aluminum that I mentioned, or compostable packaging, if you are opting for something that is going to be prepackaged.

5:21 And when it comes to the food that you're perhaps going to be having at your party, maybe consider finger foods. And the reason that finger foods help to reduce your waste and have more of an eco-friendly party is that you don't need all that cutlery that comes with sitting down and having a big meal. So if you're hosting some party, and you don't want to have tons of cutlery and all that kind of stuff, well, finger foods could be a great option.

5:49 And also, people may not put as much food on their plates. So maybe there'll be less food waste less food that's going to end up in your compost because they're picking and choosing what they want to eat versus a lot of the time the food is put directly on people's plates. And then there's too much food that ends up in the compost, and then it ends up being food waste.

6:14 Since we're on the topic of food waste, let's continue on that topic. So my third tip is how you can reduce your food waste. The first thing is, a lot of the time during the holidays, we buy items that we don't normally use throughout the year, right. So we might buy a particular spice or a certain this or that, whatever it is. But maybe you can buy that item in bulk in a smaller quantity. So if you do need a certain spice that you don't generally use throughout the year, and it's just going to sit in your cupboard and not be used, try this next tip.

6:47 If you go to your bulk section, and you buy a tiny little bit only the amount that you need – well, you're gonna save money because you're buying less, and you are reducing your waste because you're bringing your own jar with you. And you're getting it from the bulk section.

7:01 Another way to reduce waste is a friend shared with me what she did last year over the holidays when she had like all these leftovers, let's say like the potatoes, and if she had stuffing or whatever it was that she had leftovers of, they made pies with it. And before you roll your eyes and maybe say that sounds gross, I did a couple of Google searches, and it's totally a thing. Either making casseroles or pies. So what you do is the first way you can do it is you can just throw all the ingredients with gravy and a pie crust. And then put it in the freezer and save it and just bake them later.

7:39 I also read about people making casseroles. So they'll take their potatoes and stuffing. And if they have meat after dinner or whatever it is that they have, they make a casserole with it. And then they bake it. And then they eat it at another meal. So this way, they're not throwing out stuff and putting it in the compost or the trash. Because they might not want to eat that food every day this way they're freezing it and having it at a later date. I think it's a totally awesome idea to do that.

8:09 If you're having lots of veggies and all that kind of stuff, keep those scraps. If you have meat at your holiday party, keep the leftovers of the meat and create broth with it. And this way, you can have soups, later on, you can freeze the broth and use them at a later date, you don't have to use it right away.

8:27 Another really good idea is to send your leftovers home with your guests. So you have two options, you can ask your guests to bring some containers with them. So say you have a handful of people coming to your house, you can mention, “Hey, do you mind bringing a container with you because we're probably going to have leftovers. And this way, if we do, you can bring some leftovers home with you.”

8:49 The second thing is I was I don't know where I found this idea. It might have been somewhere on social media. But I saw this person explaining that they go to the thrift shop and they buy extra containers like casserole dishes and stuff like that. And when they do have guests over at their house, and there are leftovers, they just give them one of those containers or casserole dishes. And they don't care if they get the container back or not.

9:15 Because how many of you give a container to somebody and you're like, don't forget to give it back to me, I really want it back. And then you forget, or they forget and then all of a sudden you had ten different containers, and now you're left with one because you keep giving them out to people. This way. If you go to a thrift shop and you buy five or six, and they're specifically to give to your guests, doesn't matter if you don't get it back right. And then they can use it for something else at home.

9:42 I mentioned freezing. If you don't think you're going to use all your food, freeze it. Simple as that, just freeze it and then pull it out of the freezer when you want to eat it. And another thing is to compost. If you compost at home please, please compost your food before putting it in the landfill. For me, it's kind of a last resort composting, but it is much, much, much better than throwing your food in the trash.

10:13 If you don't have a compost bin at home, or you don't have a municipal pickup of compost, maybe try to look around and see maybe your friends compost have a compost bin, or maybe your municipality does compost, maybe your community does compost, but they don't pick it up at your house. So how can you get your compost to them instead?

10:33 On the topic of food, we're still going to be talking a little bit about food. But my fourth tip is about buying local, buying the ingredients that you're having for your party locally. So when you're buying locally, you're helping the local economy rate, but you're also reducing your carbon emissions because there is less fuel that's being used to get that particular item to you. Because it's local to you. You're not getting it from a different state, a different province, wherever that is. And food that's grown locally, usually contains more vitamins, more minerals compared to those that were travelled super long distances and were raised or grown in who knows what, right.

11:16 So I'm going to give you a super simple example. I don't generally buy strawberries during the winter or when it's offseason. Why I know this has nothing to do with the holidays. But it's a good example. Because when I do get them from much further away, they're white, they don't taste good. And their white inside. Because they've travelled, they've been picked before they were ripe. And they've travelled a pretty far distance to get to my house. So I generally only buy them during the season when strawberries are being grown.

11:52 So think about that. What can you buy locally for your dinner that will be great for your holiday? So that could be your food. So getting your fruits and vegetables from like a local farmer, if you're getting meat getting your meat from a local farmer as well if you're getting bread and like desserts, and you decide not to make them yourself, is there a local bakery that you can support to get fresh bread and fresh ingredients for your meal.

12:23 And if you're planning on buying decorations, we're going to touch on decorations in just a couple of minutes. But if you are planning on buying decorations, is there a local store that you can support to get your decorations from instead of going to the big box stores and buying decorations that who knows where they were made or by who? But if you support a local store, you might have a better chance of knowing who made that product and that it was maybe made locally. And then you're supporting a local business and not those big box stores.

12:56 Since we're talking about decorations, my fifth tip is don't ditch your decorations and try to find eco-friendly alternatives to decorating. So when you are buying decorations for the house, maybe think about hey, can I reuse this next year? Can I reuse this as fall decorations? Instead of just buying something that you're just gonna throw in the trash? So how can you reuse that item that you are buying? And if you have decorations that you're going to reuse every year, like thinking of ways like thinking outside of the box, how can you reuse them.

13:34 I invite you to listen to episode four because episode four of my podcast talks about fall decorations. So maybe that will give you some ideas on how you can decorate during the holidays and reuse items that you already have.

13:48 Another way that you can decorate and have a nice smelling home is one you could diffuse essential oils in your house. Cloves, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, orange, whatever smell you like and then you can have that nice smell in your home. You can also opt for a potpourri type thing where you put on the stove some orange, some orange peels, some cinnamon, any other spices or smells that you like, and you put it in some water, and you just boil it on the stove. And then you have that nice smell in your house.

14:23 You could also decorate your home with greenery stuff that, yes, I'm putting in quotations, is disposable because the greenery doesn't last forever, but at least it is greenery. You can put it in the compost after, and it looks really, really nice.

14:41 I quickly wanted to touch on gift-giving. I'm going to do a whole podcast episode on gift wrapping and gift giving and those kinds of things but I wanted to touch on it quickly here. So a couple of things that you can do to throw away less stuff when you're gift wrapping is to not use gift wrapping paper. That's the big one. It's not recyclable. It's not recyclable at all. It cannot go in your recycling.

15:10 So what are some alternatives, newspaper, magazines, cloth you have around the house that you can use to wrap things up. You can use paper bags that you might have gotten from a store any sort of cloth or fabric that you have around the house. So it's to look around and see, what do you have that you can reuse? Maybe last year, you got some little box that was decorated really cute, and you never got rid of it. We'll take that and reuse it this year. What are things that you have around the house that you can reuse two gifts to wrap a gift in?

15:43 The other thing is if you get received gifts, and you get gift bags, keep them, keep them for any other time that you're giving a gift. I don't know how often people have received a birthday gift from me in a holiday bag in a completely different bag that does not represent what that gift is for. And honestly, I don't care. It's just a bag, and they're going to open it up anyways.

16:08 So I keep a lot of my bags, and then I keep the tissue paper as well. And you can even wrap your gifts in tissue paper if you don't even want to use the bag. And another tip is my local sort of shop takes back takes tissue paper and bags. So just last week, I went through all my gift bags, and gosh, I had a lot of gift bags that I don't think I'm ever going to use. So I took half of them out, put them in another bag to get some tissue paper, and I'm going to donate it to the thrift shop; it all goes back to the community, and there are people out there that might not have the means to buy gift bags. And this is going to be a way for them to get gift bags at a much lower price.

16:52 And the last thing is when it comes to gift-giving, if you are using tape, there are tons of plastic-free options out there. You can get the compostable tape; you can get it's unlimited the kind of tape you can get. You don't have to use traditional tape, a quick Google search and you will find some really cool eco-friendly tape.

17:12 So living a greener, eco-friendly lifestyle doesn't have to cramp your style. You can definitely enjoy the holidays with friends and family without feeling guilty. Simply keep these tips in mind the next time you host a party and do your best to give the planet love this holiday season too.

17:32 You don't have to do all the things that I mentioned. But small, little changes that you make will impact the environment. I know it can be overwhelming sometimes to live a green lifestyle. And perhaps after listening to this episode, you're like, Ah, I don't know where to start. One step at a time, Green Junkie one step at a time, one small change at a time.

17:55 So, as a Green Junkie and recycling fanatic myself, I want to guide you on a zero-waste lifestyle because it's simpler than you think. As I mentioned, it doesn't have to be overwhelming. And it's doing one thing at a time, not all of the things.

18:11 So make sure you're subscribed to get updates when new episodes are released. And please, I would appreciate it – follow me @greenjunkiepodcast on Instagram. There's lots of green goodness happening behind the scenes over here at Green Junkie. And I don't want you to miss what I have in store for you. Do something today to live a little more green. And when you start planning your holiday parties, keep these tips in mind. Thank you for tuning in. And I'll see you next week, Green Junkie.