ZRecs has formally partnered with Safer Cans, a campaign to get BPA out of metal food packaging like soft drinks and food containers. The impact of BPA from food packaging is profound, particularly in comparison with some products consumers are extremely sensitized to - we have mentioned in past reporting on SIGG, for example, that levels of leaching from their bottles are far less than that found in canned food, which can contain up to 350 times the amount of BPA at the point of consumption, thanks to the near-universal coating of cans with a BPA-containing epoxy lining.

One company, Eden Foods, uses a non-epoxy-based coating for their canned beans. Many cite this as a sign of progress in the industry, and it is certainly a bright spot. But it's the exceptionalism of this case that tells the real story. The can lining is applied to Ball cans for Eden by the Ball Corporation, their can supplier, but the cans are available to any food company that wanted to buy them from Ball (Eden pays about 14 cents extra per can) and the material used to coat the cans is available to any canning company that wanted to line a can with it - the material has been around for decades.

Eden Foods is a small company. But they're using BPA-free packaging when they can, pushing for a BPA-free alternative for their higher-acid products, and setting a transparent and progressive example that no other company has yet been willing to follow.

The real question is, why are they alone in taking the simple steps that are available, and why are they the only voice openly calling for new materials?

The North American Metal Packaging Alliance has taken a hard-line stance against BPA reform, and made a name for itself with some unfortunate backroom planning. Their goal is to ensure that metal packaging companies "stay on the same page" as far as their interests are concerned, on the theory that a threat to one is a threat to all.

Until the Environmental Working Group got a timeline-free commitment from Coke to work on developing alternatives to BPA linings in its soft drink cans, the issue of BPA in metal packaging appeared to be deadlocked. But in an economy with relatively free markets, nothing stands still. I'm not sure if there are many consumers who would switch from drinking their soft drink of choice to another brand in order to get a BPA-free can. (Who knows? Maybe there are.) But I bet many consumers would switch from one brand of beans, or soup, or tomatoes, to try an alternative that was actively advertised as BPA-free. There is competitive advantage to be gained in safer products, and sooner or later, someone is going to seek it out. Any major baby bottle company executive could tell you that - and wince over the market share they abandoned to new competition by their unwillingness to acknowledge the public's concerns about BPA.

We've had extensive discussions with organizers of the Safer Cans campaign and believe there's a useful role for us to play in information-gathering as well as reporting and consumer advocacy; based on the temperature of the water we'll be dipping into here, we'll be working far more on the former channel than the latter, conducting discussions with food company executives, industry analysts, environmental and consumer groups, and joining many others who are working to broker conversations that may not be happening as quickly or as frankly as they could be.

We will be reporting on progress only on an occasional basis, and generally deferring to the wishes of those who might prefer that some of these dealings not occur directly in the public eye. There's a reason peace talks don't offer media passes, and on this issue we're going to operate as changemakers first and journalists second. This means that although we'll enthusiastically bring readers news as we're able, our role in this issue will be a little different than the way we typically report on consumer safety issues.

You can support Safer Cans by displaying their badge on your own site, becoming a fan on Facebook, or following the campaign on Twitter.

If you work in the plastics industry, the metal packaging industry, or in any other company that has an interest in this issue, and we have not already contacted you, we'd love to speak with you. Feel free to call us at 979-220-0395 or email us at zrecsmedia [at] gmail [dot] com. Z Recommends aggressively protects confidential and anonymous sources and can provide references in this regard.

Monica, a former elementary school teacher, parent of a 2.5-year-old, and dear friend, turned us onto the idea of making butter in a jar. The process is simple and is a fun way to demonstrate to little ones what, exactly, butter is. It's actually pretty surprising even to adults: Shake heavy cream in a jar, wait as it whips, thickens, and separates into butter and buttermilk, drain the buttermilk several times, and press it out between a couple of cutting boards.

I've set up a Flickr photo set with 12 images documenting the process with step-by-step instructions. Your child will be amazed and will never forget where butter comes from.





This post from the ZRecs Archives was originally published on March 16, 2007. Z was, geez, about two and a half. It was Christy who got us thinking about this post again.

Teaching kids to appreciate where food comes from and how it comes to be will play an important role in raising a generation able to live more sustainably than ours does. Haba's In the Country links farmyard activities, simple recipe building for kids, and the company's time-tested use of high quality yet simple wooden game pieces to create a captivating game that helps kids think about how their food gets to the table while helping them to develop some complex "habits of thought" at the same time.

Like many Haba games, In the Country can function along a continuum of cooperative or competitive play. Players collect recipe cards which show a series of ingredients needed to produce a meal or dish, ranging from the simple (a snack of carrots, an egg, and a glass of milk) to the complex (a piece of carrot cake). Here's where things get interesting: Each recipe card shows not only the cookbook-level "ingredients" for the dish, but the chain or process that brings that ingredient into being, and that's where the farm comes in.

The farm features a cow pasture and a chicken pen, each supplied with wooden animals; a vegetable garden, wheat and grass fields each supplied with thick cardstock supplies (rows of carrots, bushels of wheat, and bales of hay); plus a dairy area to make cheese and a mill to grind wheat into flour, all surrounding a farmhouse that serves as the players' home base and harvest drop-off area.


Rolls of the die allow players to move around the board in pursuit of raw ingredients, their steps measured in lengths of a cardstock tractor (rolling a "3", for example - the highest roll available - allows the player to move three tractor lengths, and three tractors are provided so the player can string them together to define their path). That's an interesting feature of the game in itself, as it allows players to roam freely over an open 2-D space in measured steps rather than moving along designated "spaces." (It's this kind of small, unassuming innovation, one or two of which can be found in almost any Haba game, that makes games produced by the company so interesting to us as reviewers, and make it clear these games are designed on an individual basis, rather than applying a predefined formula.)

Some die rolls result in animals moving around on predefined spaces of their own, rotating around in their pens and moving closer and further from the reach of the approaching players. Wheat and carrots can be collected from their positions on the board, and the wheat taken to the mill to be turned into flour. To get a small wooden bottle of milk (which can be used in its original form or taken to the dairy to be turned into cheese), a player must go to the hay field, collect a bale of hay, and then bring it to the cows, who are moving around in their pen based on a die roll; to get a wooden egg, a player collects wheat from the fields, carries it to the mill to grind it into grain (an end ingredient in many of the recipes in itself) and then takes it to the chickens, who are similarly mobile, to exchange for an egg.

It's funny to write out because it sounds complex. But unlike some kids' (or adult) games with overly complex actions that keep players returning to the rules to figure out what comes next, gameplay in In the Country is very simple; its complexity lies in planning one's activities, guided by the simple diagrams on every recipe card that show all the steps necessary to produce the final dish. And this is a very good and interesting kind of complexity for young children; independent of the fact that they are being invited to think in a far more comprehensive way about where their food comes from, they are also asked to think of approaching a goal in stages and putting multiple parts together to achieve it.

Z has enjoyed this game very much since sometime in her third year. Interestingly, it taps into the natural thrill children have in cooking food, despite the fact that the collection of ingredients is never physically transformed into a representation of the final dish; none of that seems to matter, and Z seems almost as proud to be "baking bread" in the game as in real life. We played In the Country for several months in our own home and then donated it to a local cafe, where we occasionally spend a long, relaxed lunch eating hearty, simple organic meals in the perfect setting for this game!

In the Country sells for about $36 on Amazon.com.

This evening Z, Jeremiah and I experimented with natural Easter egg dyeing.


We boiled enough different vegetables and other plant materials we were reusing our few cooking pots two or three times each. Beets, prickley pear cactus tuna, and blackberries for shades of red; spinach in hopes of a yellow or even a green; and yellow and red onion skins.




The onion skins we soaked, then wrapped around eggs, wrapping them afterwards in scrap fabric from an old sheet, from a great tutorial we found on Instructables. The wrapped eggs were then boiled


The rest of the plants were each chopped and boiled for about ten to fifteen minutes. For some things, this may not have been long enough.


The strained juices looked promising - that's the beet stock in the center, flanked by prickley pear and blackberry.


As you can probably see, the spinach stock didn't have much verve. At least, not after we accidentally dumped a bit too much vinegar in it (a dash of vinegar is supposed to help the color stick to your eggs). That mug isn't filled with anything you'd want to drink - it's a turmeric stock, which we'd hoped would make a nice yellow dye. It probably would have worked better if we'd boiled the eggs in it, but as a dye it was pretty pale.


Some early tears made it clear a fresh dinner needed to accompany the dyeing event...


Including, naturally, freshly boiled eggs. (The "not pretty ones," Z insisted.) She has eaten hard boiled eggs at salad bars, but this apparently was the first she'd seen unshelled before her very eyes. She was tickled.


The eggs wrapped in red onion skins were the most beautiful, followed by those left to steep for a while in the beet juice. We'd recommend beets over either of our other two red options, hands down.


With a light rubbing of vegetable oil after they had dried, the eggs were truly lovely.

If you've used natural pigments to dye eggs, let us know your tips! We'll definitely be doing this again next year, and will rotate in some other plant materials to try for some more strong colors. We'll also be wrapping a lot more in red onion skins...

We've spent the last month or so looking into the status of BPA, PVC and phthalates in food processors and blenders to add them to the ZRecs Guide. The kitchen appliance industry seems to be a year or more behind the baby product industry in its awareness of plastics concerns and their ability to access and share information about the materials they use. Some company reps expressed confusion about ingredients present in plastics, making numerous misstatements about plastic types and their own products, and one company's customer service reps didn't know what BPA, PVC or phthalates are. It was very reminiscent of the earliest calls we made to baby bottle companies a couple of years ago.

Thankfully, we're trained for this. After multiple cold calls, store checks to cross-reference any stamps or markings on the plastic parts of each company's products, and discussions with high-level representatives at most of the companies below, we have collected enough information to warrant a post outlining the relative chemical safety of the U.S. food processor and blender market.

Each of the brands below have been added to the ZRecs Guide to Safer Children's Products, where findings can be filtered by what type of chemicals you'd like to avoid and what we call a "Confidence Rating."

ZRecs Guide listings are flagged with Chemicals of Concern - substances that may be present in the products - along with a Confidence Rating denoting our level of confidence in that particular chemical profile. A Confidence Rating of "low" means that we do not have much faith that we have the whole story - a product might not contain the Chemical of Concern it has been flagged with, or might contain others; a Confidence Rating of "high" means that we are highly confident we know the whole story, and would be quite surprised to learn otherwise.

As you'll see here, depending on your priorities and your planned use of the products below, you may need to make some compromises. But with the information in hand, those compromises are within your control. We hope it's helpful to you!

Beaba

The Beaba BabyCook is BPA, PVC, and phthalate-free. We wrote about this product's story a while ago.

Cuisinart

Cuisinart's large food processor bowls are made of Lexan, a brand-name polycarbonate, and contain BPA.

Cuisinart customer service representatives initially told ZRecs that the hard, clear plastic bowls and lids of products such as the food grinder and mini food processors are made with polypropylene, but the company's public relations department refused to confirm this, told us that the customer service department "shouldn't have said that," and would not state whether the products contain BPA. The bowls and lids of this product, labeled number 7 (and "other" plastics category which includes polycarbonate), appear to be made of polycarbonate plastic; this would be consistent with Cuisinart's larger food processors, many of which are labeled as being made of Lexan (the "brand-name" version of polycarbonate). Alternately, they may be made of SAN (a styrene).

Cuisinart's blender jars are made of glass; lids are labeled "#7," although this seems unlikely to be polycarbonate. Cuisinart will not state what plastic type the blender blade base is made from or whether any parts contain BPA, PVC, or phthalates. The food processor bowl and lid included with some of their blenders are made of SAN and are unlikely to contain BPA.

Hamilton Beach/Proctor-Silex

Hamilton Beach's PR rep was one of the best we've worked with, a clear contrast to Cuisinart's confused and confusing public relations strategy. She worked quickly and efficiently to get us the information we needed, and did not hesitate to tell us which parts of their products are made of BPA-containing polycarbonate, knowing full well that this would be considered a negative feature by our readers. This is the kind of company we like to deal with, both professionally in our blogging, and as consumers.

Officials at Hamilton Beach stated that the blade attachment for both the glass and plastic blender jars is made of polycarbonate. Depending on the model, the lid is made of either polypropylene or PVC; lids which are made of PVC do contain phthalates.

Hamilton Beach and Proctor-Silex food processors and food choppers are made of SAN and POM or ABS. (All of these materials are believed to be BPA- and phthalate-free.)

We have updated information on the chemicals in Hamilton Beach products in this follow-up post.

KitchenAid

All Kitchenaid food processors have bowls and lids made of polycarbonate, and thus contain BPA. Glass blender jars have been discontinued; current blender jars are also made of polycarbonate. Blender lids are made from PVC, but company representatives stated they did not know whether this PVC contained phthalates. For what it's worth, it is likely that they do.

Vita-Mix

The new model of the Vita-Mix blender, the 5200, is BPA-, PVC-, and phthalate-free. The jar is made of Tritan copolymer, the new plastic Nalgene and others are using for hard plastic sports bottles. You can purchase it from Vita-Mix's website. Please note that all other Vita-Mix blenders have polycarbonate jars, and thus contain BPA.

A lot of information, we know. We have two ways for you to cut through all of this information and find a product that's right for you. One is the ZRecs Guide itself - just select your product area or brand and you can drill down into our listings to find the best matches for your family.

The other is a slate of quick recommendations, which you'll find below. (We're still seeking information about Black & Decker and Oster blenders and food processors; we've placed repeated calls to Oster COO James Lille and are waiting on Black & Decker to pass back information from their R&D department. So you won't find either of those brands represented here.)

Recommendations: Blenders

If you can afford a $500 blender, by all means buy the Vita-Mix 5200. It's a top-of-the-line blender that can handle whole grains and whole plant foods and get the most nutrition out of them, and thus does a lot of the work a food processor can do if you like your food pureed.

Otherwise, we'd recommend the Hamilton Beach's Wave Power Plus blender, and advise against using it for hot foods (use a good immersion blender instead). Wash the plastic parts by hand (the blade attachment and lid) and you should be minimizing exposure to the BPA and phthalates present in this product. Avoid some of the cheaper Hamilton Beach blenders which, like most cheap blenders across brands, get poor reviews.

Recommendations: Food processors

For food processors, Hamilton Beach offers a welcome shift in both openness and materials safety compared with Cuisinart and Kitchenaid. All Hamilton Beach and Proctor-Silex food processors and food choppers are believed to be BPA-, pthalate-, and PVC-free, as they contain no food-contact PVC or polycarbonate parts. We recommend Hamilton Beach's Big Mouth Food Processors, which get predominantly positive reviews in high numbers on Amazon.com; these food processors retail at $100-$150, but are on sale for about $65-$95 at the moment.

If you're interested in a multi-functional device for preparing homemade baby food, the Beaba Babycook has received high marks from ZRecs readers as well as reviewers on other sites.

Update: A reader comment brings up another great product we should note here. We haven't yet collected data across brands for immersion blenders, but we did get details on the plastics used in the Bosch Mixxo when we were offered one for consideration for the Tranquil Parent Gift Guide late last year. The Bosch Mixxo is a rechargeable immersion blender that comes with an interchangeable mini food processor. It has a charging station for your counter that holds both the top motor part and the stainless steel immersion stick. It also comes with a pitcher for making smoothies or blending other things and lids for both the pitcher and the food processor bowl. It has a safety lock for blending to protect your fingers. Bosch representatives told us that the Mixxo uses no polycarbonate or PVC in food contact parts and is thus free of BPA and phthalates. (The clear plastic parts are styrene.) Some other immersion blenders may be free of these chemicals - we just haven't taken on that research area yet - but we do know the Mixxo is a great product, and recommend it if an immersion blender suits your needs. It runs about $100 on Amazon.com.

Questions?

Check out the full Food Prep section of the ZRecs Guide here, and let us know if you have any questions!

The Washington Post shares some disturbing news about the peanut butter recall:

Officials at the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which have been investigating the outbreak of salmonella illness, said yesterday that Peanut Corporation of America found salmonella in internal tests a dozen times in 2007 and 2008 but sold the products anyway, sometimes after getting a negative finding from a different laboratory.

Companies are not required to disclose their internal tests to either the FDA or state regulators, so health officials did not know of the problem. [Link]

Check out the Tranquil Parent for three things you can do to avoid salmonella-tainted peanut butter.