Limits of USDA Organic on Water

Organic farming is better than conventional farming at reducing gray water runoff, largely because it avoids the use of synthetic fertilizers, but organic farming methods alone have limitations when it comes to achieving water-sustainable food production as do organic Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). A sign posted on a field I often pass reads, Organic farm. Do not spray, referring to the spraying of pesticides. But water efficiency is not a requirement for the USDA Organic Certification. It’s not uncommon to see blue water being sprayed on these fields from tall sprinkler heads, rain or shine. Often the sprinklers are on during the hottest time of day when water loss due to evaporation is at its peak. Sprinkler irrigation is second to flood irrigation, in which water is spilled onto the fields and flows indiscriminately around the crops, as the most inefficient method to irrigate crops.

The cabbage found in the organic section of the supermarket may be grown by the same producer of the non-organic variety. I use cabbage as an example because it so happens that the organic farm I just mentioned grows cabbage, as does the field directly across the road from it, which is marked with a sign that reads Danger, do not enter. This farm has been sprayed. One day I stopped at the organic farm and approached a farmworker making her way to her car at the close of the day.

“Do you know who owns the field across the road?” I pointed to the straight lines of cabbage.

“Yes,” she said. “It has the same owner as this farm.”

 

The cabbage found in the organic section of the supermarket may be grown by the same producer of the non-organic variety. I use cabbage as an example because it so happens that the organic farm I just mentioned grows cabbage, as does the field directly across the road from it, which is marked with a sign that reads Danger, do not enter. This farm has been sprayed. One day I stopped at the organic farm and approached a farmworker making her way to her car at the close of the day.

“Do you know who owns the field across the road?” I pointed to the straight lines of cabbage.

“Yes,” she said. “It has the same owner as this farm.”

How to save a river on Cinco de Mayo: Organic Margaritas

My margarita glasses look lonely this morning. But tonight they will sing a mariachi melody (if they could sing) and dress in a wrap made from chunky salt. Like millions of Americans, I will celebrate Mexico’s triumph against the French in the Battle of Puebla (never mind they ultimately lost the war.) The details don’t matter anyway for most. The truth is that Cinco de Mayo has become synonymous with margaritas and by extension- -tequila.

This is a huge holiday for tequila makers. The United States is the biggest customer of tequila thanks to the margarita. This Cinco de Mayo consider an organic tequila. There are four USDA certified organic tequilas, my favorite is Tequila Alquimia.

The conventional model of tequila production strains the integrity of fresh water resources in Mexico, from the chemical and synthetic fertilizers that run off farms into fresh water systems, to the extraction of underground water to irrigate faster than it is replenished, to the dumping of nitrogen rich vinazas untreated into rivers (this is the most egregious.) Read more with my article Tequila and Water.

This Cinco de Mayo support tequila makers like Tequila Alquimia that are committed to the preservation of water and soil in Mexico.

Organic Alquimia Margarita (AKA the Alquimia-Rita)
Shared by Dr. Adolfo Murillo

2 parts Alquimia Blanco
2 parts fresh lime juice
1 part orange juice
1 part Organic agave sweetener

Place above ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake til very cold, and serve over ice. Toast to clean rivers.

YouTube Video- How To Make Sustainable Pizza Dough

This is the first a series of cooking workshops. I had great fun making it, although it took much longer to film (shows how much I know about film making.) What I do know is how to cook using less water. In the film you will not only learn how to make great pizza dough but you will learn how the color of water, blue, green and grey, is important if we are to save fresh water resources on our planet.

I speak about dry farming in the workshop. My post Dry Farming and Water goes deeper on the subject. My post Pasta and Water is also a great post to learn more on the topic of wheat on water systems in general.

Click here for the Water-Sustainable Pizza Dough recipe plus some links and ideas for topping that will also save water at the kitchen table.

Be sure to post your own pizza success and/or pictures of your pizza on the Eat Less Water Facebook page.

Rainy Day Schedule

Today I watch raindrops fall. In my slice of the world raindrops have been few and infrequent. Although we in Southern California wish for endless strings of sunny days, we need the rain. According to the Southern California Weather Notes, our rainfall is 51% of normal.

Rain and snow naturally moves fresh water from the oceans to land and back in the elegant cycle of clouds, rivers, and underground aquifers. This hydrological cycle is our planet’s most important recycling system.

Rain makes my children giddy with excitement. The rain coats and boots are found smashed at the back of the closet, where things not used much live. Suited up they giggle with pleasure with the drip drop of a Spring rain.

My young beans, tomatoes and kitchen garden will not need watering from the garden hose. Today my plants are rain fed. My rain barrel will capture water that can be used over the next few weeks to water newly sown vegetable seeds.

Ninety percent of the world’s food is grown exclusively with natural rain. The problem is that farms that do use irrigation consume seventy percent of our planet’s finite supply of fresh-water resources. Irrigated farms grow double the food of rain-fed farms, but use three times the water.

When I leave my home to retrieve my children from school, I will pass thousands of acres of farm land. On this day farmers will not need to water their fields with water drawn from the ground. The ground water levels in my coastal town drops by 300,000 acre-feet or 98 billion gallons each year; enough water to fill nearly one hundred fifty thousand olympic size pools. This occurs because water is spent quicker than rainfall and seepage naturally replace it. Water managers call this a water deficit.

Tomorrow the sun is expected to shine again. Some of the water from this Spring storm will seep underground, some water will join local rivers and merge into the sea, and some will evaporate. Rain coats will return to closets, umbrellas will be squeezed shut. And the watering of backyard gardens and commercial farms will resume reliant on blue water (water drawn from the ground, or reservoirs.)

But there are farmers and backyard gardeners who stretch the rain beyond a scant rainfall with rain catchment systems, or by building the quality of soil so it holds raindrops in the ground during the dry months. You could say that these farms will remain on rainy day schedule, using little to no blue water draws to sustain their crops for weeks or months after the rain clouds have passed. We can all use some more rainy day schedule.

Organic Is “Better” for Water

“Why can I have only organic cereal?” my daughter whined in the aisles of the supermarket.

“Because organic is better for water,” I answered.

The details I left for some day when my daughter is old enough to understand are the following: A study released by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) found organically fertilized soils to leach significantly less nitrogen into the water supply — gray water — compared to synthetically fertilized soils. Water contaminated with fertilizer runoff from fields that grow the ingredients in those colorful boxes of cereal that fascinate my daughter, pollutes rivers and ground water. Forty percent of America’s rivers and forty-six percent of our lakes are too polluted with nitrates to support aquatic life — fish — according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The Mississippi is polluted with 1.65 trillion tons of nitrogen fed by the tributaries of thirty-six states. The gray water delivered from the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico causes a dead zone the size of Massachusetts, the largest in the world. It is called a dead zone because marine life must retreat the low-oxygen water or die. Bottom-dwellers, like the crab and sea star are left to compete for oxygen with flourishing algae blooms that thrive in the gray water.

Making Homemade Pizza and Water

A slice of pizza has a water footprint of 40 gallons of fresh water. Add meat and the water footprint sky rockets. Ten women and two children gathered around my kitchen table and mixed, kneaded and rolled pizza dough AND learned why the ingredients to their pizza matter to water systems locally and around the world.

Pizza is a great way to begin a water-sustainable lifestyle. 90% of the worlds wheat is rain-fed (green water). Here in the U.S., the largest growers of wheat, the Dakotas and Montana use no irrigation on their wheat farms. In addition to seeking flour from these regions, I use organic flours to ensure that my pizza is not contributing fungicides to water systems (read more about wheat and water with this link).

Friday is Pizza Friday. It is a tradition I borrowed from Barbara Kingslover in her part-memoir, part-food manifesto Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. Often I invite friends and family to join us on these evenings. I provide the pizza dough and cheese, friends bring the toppings. The toppings mirror the produce that is grown natural, local and in season. Our collective efforts are rewarded in flavor.

The pizza pictured above is curried potatoes, feta cheese with fresh cilantro scattered on top just after the pizza is pulled from the oven. I use an organic red tomato pizza sauce but organic tomato paste works just as good. This pizza was based on a slice I devoured at The Cheese Board in Berkeley, California. They serve one vegetarian pizza each day. Their website is a great source for seasonal, vegetarian pizza combinations ideas.

The pizza below is a winter favorite, broccoli, mozzarella cheese, arugula with a red tomato sauce. During the fall, winter and spring months I use canned organic tomatoes. Canned tomatoes are picked in the summer time (when tomatoes are in season) and canned for us to enjoy the rest of the year.

Some off my favorite vendors for pizza dough and toppings are as follows:

Ventura Meat Co. for pasture-raised organic meat seven days a week. Many farmers markets now sell organic, pasture raised meats.

Verni’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil. This oil is dry-farmed and organic and can be found at many Southern and Central California farmers markets. You can purchase in bulk (5 gallons for $45).

Spring Hill Cheese Company for pasture-raised cheese found at many California local farmers markets. I also love Organic Valley Farms cheese that can be found at some grocery stores. Organic Valley Farms is a cooperative of small to medium size family-owned, pastured, organic dairies from around the country.

To view more pictures and read more about the class please visit the V.C. Star.

Water-Sustainable Pizza Dough
I make an extra pizza expressly to freeze for the weeks lunches. Be sure you slice the pizza before freezing. I double the pizza dough recipe and freeze half of it for the next Friday. Buon appetito.

1 cup warm water

1 packet active dry yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)

1 teaspoon local honey

2 tablespoons dry farmed extra virgin olive oil

3 cups unbleached all-purpose organic flour (preferably rain fed or dry farmed)

1 teaspoon salt

Cornmeal or flour for sprinkling on the baking sheet or pizza stone

recipe based on Basic Pizza Dough by Emerill Lagasse

Directions….
Combine and stir
in a large bowl the water, yeast, honey, 1 tablespoon of the olive oil. Leave mixture to proof (you will see bubbles on the surface of the water). About 5 minutes.

Add
1 1/2 cups of flour and salt into the yeast mixture with your hands or wooden spoon. Continue adding flour 1/4 cup at a time.

Knead
the dough on a floured surface until the dough is smooth and round in shape (about 3-5 minutes). Place dough in an a large bowl that has been oiled with the remaining 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Cover bowl with a dish towel and set in a warm cozy spot free from drafts. The dough should double in size (about 1 1/2 hours).

Roll or hand shape dough
on a floured surface. I prefer to roll the dough but if you do not have a rolling pin available you can do it by hand. Coat your fingers with oil and push, pat and press the dough outward from the center. Leave the edges slightly thicker for your crust. Brush the edge of the pizza with a light coat of olive oil.

Bake
in oven at 425 degrees for 15-20 minutes.

Extras
To enhance the flavor of the pizza dough sprinkle with salt and pepper before adding the topping.

World Water Day Giveaway

To celebrate World Water Day, I will draw the name of one lucky winner on March 22. I will send the winner a water conservation pack valued at over $50 that includes three water collection buckets, one shower curtain with water saving messages (includes hooks), 12 reusable enviro stickers, and a four-minute sand shower timer.

To win you must be a member of the Eat Less Water Facebook group or a registered follower of the Eat Less Water blog. If you have done both your odds are doubled. In gratitude for spreading the word of the Eat Less Water Facebook page and blog I will place your name in the drawing two more times. The way it will work is as follows. Invite your Facebook friends to “like” Eat Less Water. Send or post a link of the Eat Less Water blog page to friends. Post your good deeds on the Facebook page and as a comment to this blog post to receive credit and increase your odds of winning.

I will notify the winner on the afternoon of March 22, World Water Day.