Shortly after coming into office three years ago, President Trump began to undo many of the major climate and environmental policies put in place by his predecessor, Barack Obama, calling them unnecessary and harmful to industry.
The Times climate team chronicled this flurry of reversals, one by one. And, for Mr. Trump’s first 100 days in office, we pulled together each of these early actions into a single list, so readers could better understand the scope of the president’s deregulatory agenda. At the time, we counted 23 rules being rolled back.
We’ve been tracking them ever since.
Today, our tracker counts nearly 100 rules and regulations reversed or on the way out under Mr. Trump. More than 60 rules have been officially revoked or otherwise undone, with an additional 34 rollbacks still in progress, including rules governing clean air, water and toxic chemicals.
One thing you can do: Make plant-based milk
I’ve been experimenting around the pantry during quarantine, and one happy discovery I’ve made is that plant-based milks like soy, almond or oat milk are easy to make.
It was happy for a couple reasons. For one thing, alternative milks are a lot harder to find in stores these days. Sales of oat milk, for example, recently jumped more than 350 percent as coffee shop regulars, cut off from their baristas, started making their brews at home.
And, plant-based milks can help you reduce your personal carbon footprint.
The production of dairy products — including milk, cheese, ice cream and yogurt — accounts for almost 4 percent of planet-warming emissions, worldwide, each year. Soy, almond and oat milks have a far lower carbon footprint overall than cow’s milk, and use less water. (Yes, even almond milk, which has gotten a lot of bad press during California’s recent droughts.)
If you want to try making alternative milk at home, follow this guide. They’re all pretty much made the same way, and don’t require any fancy equipment.
First, soak a cup of soy, almonds or oats in plenty of water overnight. Soy, especially, will grow two or three times in volume, so make sure to do this in a big bowl.
In the morning, use a colander to drain the water, and rinse the soy, almonds or oats. This is especially important if you’re using oats, to prevent the milk from getting slimy and glutinous.
Then put your soy, almond or oats in a blender, together with three cups of water, and blend for about two minutes. Thorough blending will maximize how much milk you can squeeze out. (You can experiment with the amount of water: I’ve made oat milk with both 1.5 cups and 3 cups of water. The cup-and-a-half version is far richer and tastier, and probably better if you’re adding it to coffee — but it’s gone very quickly.)
Next, pour out the mixture into a clean cheesecloth — a dedicated “nut milk bag” makes this part really easy and prevents any spills — and squeeze out the milk. And I mean squeeze and squeeze, until you get the last drops out.
Then, if you’re using soy or almonds, gently heat the milk, but stop before it reaches a boil. That’s common practice in Japan, because people there tend not to eat raw nuts. But I wouldn’t heat oat milk, which can easily get slimy.
You can add a little sugar or maple syrup to any of the milks, to taste. It should keep in the fridge, covered, for about five days.
You’ll have some pulp left over when you’re done. I use it for baking. I’ve been making these vegan soy doughnuts (though in muffin form, because I don’t have a doughnut pan) and they’ve been wonderful. When I was growing up in Japan, my mother also used to fry up soy pulp, which we call okara, with vegetables. It was delicious.
The last thing to remember: Dairy contains nutrients, like calcium and protein, that are important for bone and muscle health but missing from nut milks. So take a look at your overall diet if you are going to limit or avoid dairy, to make sure you’re getting enough nutrients from other foods.
If you like what we’re doing, please spread the word and send this to your friends. You can sign up here to get our newsletter delivered to your inbox each week.