Sustainablicious

"Is that USDA organic? Or Oregon organic? Or Portland organic?"

In the premiere episode of Portlandia there's a hilarious sketch in which a bohemian couple goes to great lengths to make sure that their restaurant order is ethical and humane. Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein harass the server with a barrage of questions about the chicken dish, inquiring about the type of diet on which the animal was raised, his name, and even if the chicken had friends on the farm.

At one point, the server even hands them papers for "Colin the chicken," which documents his living conditions and upbringing. Later in the episode, the two actually go to the farm and end up joining the cult living there. The skit is an over-the-top skewering of farm-to-table fanatics, but raises an important question for those who want to make smart choices that help to protect and support the planet when eating out: What is a green restaurant?

For a couple of years, the Nature Conservancy hosted the People's Choice Nature's Plate award in which voters where asked to nominate their favorite green restaurant. The organization offered the following guidelines for determining whether a restaurant adhered to sustainable food practices:

Sustainable seafood: Uses ocean-friendly seafood that comes from a sustainable source (not depleting fish populations)
Free-range and grass-fed meat: Uses meat that is grass-fed, free-range, raised without antibiotics, organic and/or sustainably raised
Organic: Uses organic produce or other organic food
Local and seasonal: Uses regionally (within 300 miles) or locally (within 100 miles) grown produce
Water: Serves tap water rather than bottled water

There are other standards, certainly, but these are useful as a stepping-off point for a larger discussion. The Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch, for example, makes recommendations that help you choose seafood that's fished or farmed in ways that have less impact on the environment.