A Beginning

In December 1972, the Apollo 17 mission was on its way to the moon. When the astronauts looked back at Earth, they were offered a spectacular sight: our planet, fully illuminated against the darkness of space. The photo would become one of those images that many of us know and recognize.

“Blue Marble” shows not only our planet, but also our environment: at the top you can see the Sahara, at the bottom the ice shield of the South Pole. The photo is almost fifty years old - in the meantime, global warming has progressed further. The poles are melting and for some years now many people have been talking not about “climate change” but about the “climate crisis”.

But in the meantime, we also understand better what fuels global warming and how we can slow down and limit climate change, but there is a lack of implementation. The problem is huge and diverse, there is no simple solution - many elements of our economic system and our daily lives influence global warming. Our diet is one component of this. We will not be able to stop global warming just by eating differently - but at least we can try to eat in such a way that our effect is as small as possible.

With this blog, I would like to make a contribution to this. I have tried to find information on how I can eat in a climate-conscious way. There are now some scientific studies that deal with the carbon footprint of food, but relatively little concrete information for a concrete application in everyday life. This is exactly what this blog is intended to contribute to: I will be looking at recipes that are delicious and have as low a carbon footprint as possible compared to kitchen classics like schnitzel with fries or lasagna. These recipes are intended to be an invitation for you to cook them!

This carbon footprint will certainly be an approximation and not correct down to the last gram: I will have to use estimates, but the order of magnitude should be about right. It’s not about being perfect, but about doing it better step by step than before.

The Blue Marble photo was at the beginning of a better recognition of how vulnerable our planet is. In this sense, it is also a fitting symbol for the beginning of this blog.