One of the best environmental book buys I’ve ever bought is Eating to Save the Earth: Food Choices for a Healthy Planet. Linda Riebel and Ken Jacobsen’s book may look tiny—it’s a thin guide just under 100 pages—but it’s jam packed with facts, figures, tips and just about everything you need to eat a healthy diet that’s good for the planet.

Part One discusses your purchasing power as a citizen. It covers everything from where to buy earth-friendly foods to food labels, organic foods to processed, frozen, packaged, and canned foods. It also gives facts about different kinds of foods—from coffees and drinks to fruits and veggies to dairy, fish, meat, and more. Each chapter has so much information you may want to re-read sections twice.

Part Two highlights on eating at home. We already know that this is the best way to eat, right? But why is it the best way? You’ll learn how to save the most energy while you use appliances, cook, use water, and more. Find out how to share or make the best use of leftovers as well as how to reduce your waste, recycle, compost and more.

Part Three discusses the hardest part of eating to save the planet—eating out! We all do it, but we know it’s not the best thing for ourselves or the Earth. So how can we do it with a smaller carbon footprint? There are lists of endangered species, packaging and other things to avoid, as well as things to seek out, such as green restaurants and caterers.

Finally, Part Four touches on the other areas left out of the first three sections, including different debates and opinions regarding the ecology of food, growing your own food, animal cruelty, and more topical issues. The book ends with a list of other reading materials the reader may be interested in for further research.

A great book for any beginning environmentalist, vegetarian, or socially conscious person, Eating to Save the Earth will also come in handy as a reference guide for many school papers and projects. I’ve referenced it during debate meets, science papers, nutrition class reports and several other occasions. It really does provide a lot of information at your fingertips in a small volume, and is worth every penny you pay for it (which isn’t likely to be much; I bought my copy for under ten bucks when it first came out in 2002).