It’s a fantastic idea to get curious about the things around you, particularly cooking facilitators like parchment paper. If you have a green thumb, you would also be interested in knowing the household items you can add to your compost pile and the ones that should stay far away from it. You can compost unbleached parchment paper because it has no chemicals in it, however, you cannot say the same for the bleached ones. Keep them away from your compost pit.

In addition, silicone, aka siloxanes, can cause uterine tumors and reproductive issues, possibly even leading to infertility. (7) Silicone baking mats can not be cut down, while parchment papers can be cut down into any desired shape, fitting any unusual size pan. Bleached paper, on the other hand, is white parchment paper. Technically, parchment paper should be brown; however, the bleached ones are always white. The main purpose of bleaching parchment paper is to make it easier on the eyes, nothing more. You have probably noticed that I line my baking sheets with unbleached parchment paper instead of cooking directly on the surface or lining them with aluminum foil. And if I want to roast a head of garlic, I always wrap it first in unbleached parchment paper and then aluminum foil. Since I have been fielding a lot of questions about this practice recently from some newbies in my cooking classes, I thought I would shed some light on it here.

Those of you who have been reading this blog for a long time will remember that I used to use it to cover my aluminum bakeware to protect the food from heavy metal exposure. After you have finished, you can remove the parchment paper from the desk along with the splashes of flour or eggs left there — a simple way to keep your table clean.

I am also now using stainless steel baking sheets and pans (this brand). “Grease and Flour” Approach Not all parchment paper can be compostable. For instance, there are two major types of parchment paper; bleached and unbleached ones. You guessed right; the bleached ones are the white ones, while the unbleached ones are the conventional brown ones. Don’t get it mixed up. Non-biodegradable materials can also be broken down, but the difference is that those materials only break down into smaller pieces. They never really disintegrate entirely. It also takes several decades for this process to even get completed, and most times, it happens because of weather and time factors. However, you can use lay it between your table and bread dough, or any other food item that can leave a mess. You can also use it when you want to cool your freshly baked foods, wrap foods and place them in the fridge and any other function that does not involve a strong heat source.Soaking or even elbow grease is sometimes necessary to get those muffin tins and cookie sheets clean too. What exactly is silicone anyway? Is it the samething as silicon, the natural element with the chemical symbol Si and atomic number 14? Here’s another awesome tip for you. Now that you know that unbleached parchment paper is compostable, what is stopping you from adding it to your compost pile? If you choose to do this, then we have a cheat tip for you. Thus, it would seem that silicone that is ingested may very well pose health risks. This would include an inflammatory response at minimum. (4)