Jun 2, 2013

Why Glass Instead of Plastic

By TatteredTiques

What is it about glass? Plastic manufacturers have gone out of their way to make plastic safe. We now have the BPA-free tags popping up everywhere. This is all good stuff. When I was young, my Dad would take us to Pizza Hut on some friday nights and they would give us our soft drinks in these plastic cups with monsters on them (dracula, wolfman etc.) and he would keep them, take them home and wash them 1,000,000 times. We re-used those filthy cups until I was well into my teen years. I didn't realize his mistake until I had a conversation with one of my friends who does body piercings and he explained to me why the "gun" they use at the mall to pierce ears is atrocious and unsanitary. Legally, this "gun" has only been approved to tag animal ears and that's only because they were going to die soon anyways. These devices are plastic and plastic is porous! Thats right, like a sponge. So BPA-free or not, plastic absorbs. It absorbs food and bacteria and the dishwasher only gets rid of so much- ever noticed how your plastic gets discolored over time? Yeah, that's exactly what it looks like- gross!

Glass is 100% non-porous! It also cleans much easier and is super easy to recycle into something else. Recycling doesn’t compromise glass’ quality or structure and no toxins are produced in the process. Glass’ safe, glossy surface repels food odors and residual flavors. And food reheated in glass—whether in a conventional oven or microwave—tastes superior to victuals nuked in plastic. Also, glass is much prettier. I would take a pantry and fridge full of sparkling clear any day! The glass containers are super versatile- I use the same kind of glass jar to hold preserves, cuddle my toothbrush & put beautiful wild flowers in.

Okay, so since we're rational people trying to make better choices obviously we dont want to throw out all of our tupperware and rubbermaid containers. Unless of course you look at how discolored they are and cant bring yourself to use them again. Bring in the glass storage at your own pace. If you're still shopping at Walmart or Target check in the food storage section and you should find a box of 12 Ball Jars for somewhere between $7 and $10 dollars! That's 12 containers for less than $1 per jar. Also, because of its non-absorbency powers, you can safely buy them from thrift stores- but make sure you're getting them for well under a buck. You can always order them on Amazon and they even have the Classic Blue Ball Jars for sale right now!


Caprock Vintage for Pyrex

Have you ever heard of Pyrex? It's heaven-sent. If you're into vintage cookware these are an absolute staple in your kitchen. Pyrex is super high-quality storage and cookware and its getting harder and harder to find for cheap. Whenever I'm scouring thrift stores the first thing I look for is 100% authentic Pyrex. When I find it, I do a little gleeful dance- kind of a like a jig in the aisle with lots of people glaring at me. But I don't care, it's Pyrex!

I personally don't do my own preserves (yet). But obviously a good collection of glass storage and tight lids is going to be beneficial in that process as well. You'd be amazed how quickly your collection grows if you kinda just pick some up while you're there. I've got a whole shelf in my pantry of various, clean, glass storage.


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