Browsing: fairtrade fortnight

Take a tropical island paradise, a flourishing cocoa producer and a group of people determined to improve the lives of others and you get Cafédirect’s empowering story of its involvement with the people of Saõ Tomé & Principe.

Read the rest of Saõ Tomé’s Story »

After the success of the the Fairtrade Wine Tasting, our friends at Shared Interest decided they’d like to try out a Fairtrade towel. After all, we shouldn’t just be thinking about swapping our food and drink during Fairtrade Fortnight, Fairtrade cotton is a must.

Read the rest of The Big Swap – Shared Interest tries Fairtrade Towels »

We’re more than half of the way through Fairtrade Fortnight, and people have been swapping to Fairtrade in their thousands – just check out the Fairtrade Foundation’s Big Swap-ometer to see how it’s been going.

Read the rest of The Big Swap – Shared Interest tries Fairtrade Wine »

Tropical Wholefoods

It’s Fairtrade Fortnight, hurrah!  It’s the season when we all have a chance to consider what we buy and where it’s come from.  As we’re munching on some yummy food or dressing ourselves in new clothes in the morning, this is the time for us to have a good think about who is involved in producing some of the things we buy.  Are the workers who pick my bananas being paid properly?  Are the weavers of my new top given a fair wage?

Read the rest of Fairtrade Fortnight Producer Stories: Tropical Wholefoods »

Are you joining in the Big Swap?

Read the rest of The Big Fairtrade Swap with Harriet Lamb »

Breakfast - The most important meal of the day?

We all know the theory. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. But in practice? Not a chance. Not in our house anyway. How can the most important meal of the day happen first thing in the morning?

Read the rest of The Fair Trade Big Breakfast Swap »

Fair Trade or not Fair Trade?

You will no doubt have heard of, and probably experienced compassion fatigue. You know the symptoms – arranging a day’s holiday for the date of Children in Need or Comic Relief; busily texting as you walk past the Big Issue seller; never having any change in your pocket; writing off sponsored abseils and runs as publicity stunts…..and then a tsunami causes devastation in Asia, an earthquake creates tragedy in Haiti and our compassion is reawakened. We respond, we give, we care.

Read the rest of Fairtrade Fortnight – Challenge Fair Trade Fatigue »

What better way to celebrate it being Friday than with a delicious bar of Fairtrade Divine Chocolate?

But the big question is – do you think about where your chocolate comes from every time you enjoy a bite..?

Read the rest of Friday Fun – Fairtrade Chocolate Tales »

Having messed around with my family’s food and drink options during Fairtrade Fortnight, I’ve decided to sneakily introduce Meat Free Mondays at a time when their defences are low.

Before I move on to that, my fair trade education went down a storm. As expected, there was outrage when one member of the family got a bar of chocolate and the rest got none. Not sure how much the message got through their own seething sense of injustice at that stage. Then the emotional pressure exerted on the most fortunate one worked and we experienced a family bonding moment as he broke the chocolate into pieces into the fondue pot and let us all dip fair trade fruit into it. Touching. Memorable. An insight into fair trade? Time will tell…

Back to Meat Free Mondays. This idea has been brewing for a while, having read about it in a magazine. My husband is back to being a full-time vegetarian; my ten year old daughter is toying with the idea; and we are definitely eating more vegetables since joining the organic veg box scheme. Even my oldest son is being pressured by his girlfriend to eat

Read the rest of Meat Free Mondays »

Banana Beer, Banana Cake, & errm . . . Bananas!

Whether you’re bloated on bananas or you’ve simply bought too many; there’s only hours left of Fairtrade Fortnight’s Go Bananas campaign!

So here’s another way to get peeling and get eating to help set the Fairtrade banana-eating record attempt.

Try this simple recipe to make your very own scrummy Banana Cake . . .

• Take 3 medium bananas (Fairtrade, of course!) and mash up; add lemon juice to prevent browness

• Combine 150g soft butter and 150g soft brown sugar (Demerara) and mix well

• Add an egg and 150g of self raising flour to the sugar butter mixture and beat then repeat and add another egg and 150g of self raising flour

• Then add 80g of walnuts or sultanas (or both!) roughly chopped and stir through

• To finish add 2 tablespoons of olive oil to keep the cake moist and stir through

• Line a loaf tin with grease proof paper and add the wet mixture

• Place in a preheated oven on 190c for 40 – 50 minutes depending on how temperamental the oven is then take out of the oven and leave in the tin on a rack to cool down for 20 minutes.

• DONE!

Try it over the weekend and let us know how you get on, or if you’ve any other suggestions on how to use up those bananas before they’re past their best drop us a comment below. . .