3 Tips for a Healthy & Green Thanksgiving

By Sarene Marshall, The Nature Conservancy

Happy Thanksgiving! Today’s the perfect day for reflecting on what the traditional Thanksgiving meal can teach us about the right food choices for the environment, and for our health and happiness. Here are my top three tips:

Eat the foods that are in season. Think about traditional Thanksgiving desserts, such as apple pie and pumpkin pie. Ever stop to ask why strawberry shortcake isn’t typically on the menu? It’s because apples and pumpkins are in abundance in the fall.

Meanwhile, berries (which are summer fruits), aren’t typically around in November, unless they are flown from around the world. That’s an option that the pilgrims didn’t have at their disposal, and it’s best to follow their lead here, as transporting out-of-season produce to our grocery shelves comes with an enormous carbon footprint. In fact, studies show that the ingredients for the average American meal travel well over 1,000 miles to reach the dinner table, many times more if it includes out-of-season ingredients.

Anyway, out-of-season strawberries taste terrible. Since they are picked under-ripe to withstand long-distance shipping, they are pale, juiceless, and certainly not sweet. So stick with in-season ingredients – they taste better and do significantly less damage to the planet.

Eat your veggies (and few, if any, four-legged animals). Sure, there is a lot of food on the Thanksgiving table, and some of our most-loved side dishes and desserts may be laden with too much butter or salt. But the general balance of food groups on the Thanksgiving table follows what we know to be a blueprint for a healthy, balanced diet that contains a variety of colors, a large number of vegetables and grains and a small amount of meat – none of it red.

This kind of balance is also healthiest for the planet. Poultry has a much lower footprint than beef, and vegetables much less than poultry.

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Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of
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Jennifer C.

6:42PM PST on Nov 27, 2011

Thanks for posting.

November 27
send a green star

Penny A.

10:02PM PST on Nov 25, 2011

what a lovely looking feast!

November 25
send a green star

Lynn C.

8:51PM PST on Nov 25, 2011

Day late when I read this, but doesn't matter. After reading all the articles on what turkeys are fed and how they're treated it wasn't something I was going to eat anyway. Good vegetables dishes are just as satisfying to me. Please do not take this wrong! I am in no way trying to tell anybody not to enjoy their traditional family dinner! The enjoyment of coming together to share this celebratory feast is worth much more than being a fuss-budget about what you will or will not eat on this day!
Sigh...I have to add this caveat, because of the fervid comments that sometime appear on this site.

Donna H.

8:40PM PST on Nov 25, 2011

Even better to eat no meat at all. Thanks for posting.

Diane S.

4:05PM PST on Nov 25, 2011

Thank you.

Bruno M.

8:30AM PST on Nov 25, 2011

noted

Danuta W.

1:03AM PST on Nov 25, 2011

thanks for sharing