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I harvested eggplant from the organic garden last week and I’ve been trying to find some good eggplant recipes ever since. You can make caponata a pasta sauce or you can serve it on bruschetta as an appetizer. Consider making your own pasta sauce from fresh local heirloom tomatoes as well as using local Vidalia onions.

But you can’t just eat any old egg. Just like everything on the diet nowadays, you have to know where it comes from. For me, choosing organic and cage-free isn’t enough, I want to know the farmer, that way I know my yummy local eggs are super fresh when I get them and that the hens are treated humanely. That is they are outdoors much of the day, they are not debeaked, and they are fed nutrient dense, organic feed.

According to the state environment department, at least two-thirds of the groundwater underneath or adjacent to New Mexico’s dairy CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations) has been poisoned by nitrates. When other pollutants are included, estimates of water contamination by these factory farms can rise as high as 90 percent.

The temperature has hit 100 degrees two days this week. The humidity is so thick that you could cut it with a knife. I’ve long been a fan of Columbia’s fall, spring, and winter weather, but the summers here are a bit more challenging. I wrote recently about the best ways to stay cool when [...]

Down here in South Carolina, when the weather warms up so does the need to have the air conditioning run 24 hours a day. And that’s a great way to run your electricity bill up in a big way. Wasting electricity also takes its toll on your personal carbon footprint. But with a little forethought you can stay cool without the AC blasting. The AC should be set at 78 when it is turned on.

If you’re a fan of gardening this is likely the time of year that you shine. My organic garden is currently growing strong and that’s no thanks to pesticides or herbicides. I shun them because they’re bad for the planet and I don’t want to ingest them. They seep into our water supply and pollute [...]

Happy Earth Day Breathe readers! Today a lesson in the good old days.

Cornell senior Abbey Liebman created a fashion first — a solar powered dress. This light pink dress debuted this past Saturday at the Cornell Design League fashion show. The panels on the dress are made from ultrathin, flexible solar cells that you can use to charge your cell phone or iPod (there’s a USB charger [...]

Spring has finally arrived after one of the most brutal winters on record. And with spring, comes the need to detoxify. The term spring cleaning has real meaning. We are in hibernation throughout the winter time, covered in clothing, blankets, and weighed down by comfy foods. And this isn’t a bad thing, this is how [...]

GUEST POST: TreeHugger’s Kara DiCamillo offers up seven eco-savvy ideas for V-Day! Love is in the air! Yup, Valentine’s Day is right around the corner and whether you love it or hate it, you can’t deny that there are loads of cheap, wasteful gifts that usually get tossed. So why not make it a little [...]

Starting today, we’re excited to add Sara Novak to our wonderful group of Breathe Bloggers. Tune in to Tickled Green every  other Thursday to get Sara Novak’s take on living the green life.  Sara has always had a profound love, bordering obsession, for all things green. Since moving south, that passion has expanded into a [...]

Despite Kermit the Frog’s memorable ballad, it’s actually becoming easier to be green. And this translates to the way we clean our homes, too. The war on dirt, germs and grime is a fiercely fought battle, but the conventional household cleaners are petroleum-based and can cause serious health and environmental problems. Opting for natural products [...]