MY WEEK WITHOUT PLASTIC
SUNDAY
this is the day i plan meals for the week and head to sainsbury’s. uK supermarkets produce more than 800,000 tonnes of plastic packaging waste every year, so it’s no surprise that i can’t buy most of our usual shop – cereal, milk, loo roll, cheese, gnocchi and bread all comes in single-use packaging. Fortunately, screw-top wine is okay. Fresh produce can be bought unpacked but i have to put them in paper bags used for mushrooms. i head to the counters, where i ask if sliced chicken, beef and haddock can be wrapped in greaseproof paper.
MONDAY
a trip to my local sustainable supermarket, hisbe (hisbe.co.uk), to top up on the items i couldn’t buy yesterday. even here, much of the food is wrapped in plastic but i also find items such as bran flakes, rice, pulses, nuts and popcorn kernels (an easy swap for crisps in lunchboxes) that are dispensed via a tube into paper bags. my daughter loves it! bulk-buy grocers like this are cropping up all around the uK; go to zerowastehome.com to find one near you.
TUESDAY
i wake up to an old-school milk ilk d delivery li (milkandmore.co.uk). it’s weirdly comforting to see the traditional glass bottles but the eggs come in a plastic bag to stop them getting wet on the doorstep; i’ll need to leave a note for the milkman next time. We run out of loo roll so i put in an order from Who Gives a Crap (uk. whogivesacrap.org), which delivers 100% recycled toilet paper “as soft as unicorn kisses and as strong as 1,000 ponies” to the door, from £36 for 48 rolls. Who said eco-living has no sense of humour?
WEDNESDAY
i need to buy washing-up liquid and bathroom cleaner, so use it as an opportunity to check out the packaging of cleaning products. many say they can be recycled yet only a fraction of plastic waste is turned into new products. i decide to play safe and opt for bottles already made from sustainable materials, so that’s a yes for ecover’s new washingup liquid, made from 100% recycled and recyclable plastic. i go online and order a starter box of eco cleaning products from splosh (from £9.95, splosh.com). When the reusable bottles run out, i can order refills that fit through the letter box – like a birthday present, if your idea of a gift is toilet cleaner. >>
THURSDAY
i usually work from home but today i’m heading to Herefordshire for an interview. buying my usual plastic box of salad, bottle of water and takeaway coffee from the service station is out of the question. the night before my trip, i prep roast vegetables and rice in a glass Pyrex dish (the lid is plastic but reusable). i whizz up a smoothie and pour it into a s stainless-steel flask and take a another bottle filled with tap w water. and i pack a fork (no d disposable plastic cutlery) and a KeepCup that’s the p perfect size for a flat white. a all this heavy-duty kit is so much heavier than my usual throwaway plastic.
FRIDAY
getting ready for a night out and suddenly those pampering goodies don’t look so pretty. my bath and hair products, and all my make-up, come in plastic packaging. my make-up artist friend tells me about the Freedom system Flexi eco Palette
– a gorgeous bamboo palette that you fill with a choice of lipstick, blush and eyeshadows (£12, inglotuk.com). For bath time, lush’s solid bars of shampoo, conditioner and melt-on-the-skin massage bar are a revelation. then my son tells me that the tubes of his butch-looking bulldog skincare are made from responsibly sourced sugar cane. it looks like plastic and feels like plastic, so why can’t more companies embrace technology like this?
SATURDAY
the last day of my plastic-free week and d we’re having a family y debrief in starbucks – we take our own cups (a 25p discount t on each coffee) and buy pastries from the counter, which come in a paper b bag. after initial panic, we’ve come up with a plan – avoid single-use plastic where possible, and buy products wrapped in recycled and recyclable plastic if not. i may have found a slice of chicken in the bottom of my bag (it fell out of the paper wrapping), but it hasn’t put me off – my plastic-free challenge is only just beginning.