The fact is that most of us like our meat and our milk. Unfortunately, cows produce a massive amount of greenhouse gas - yep, pretty disgusting. So, maybe try soy milk in your cereal, and follow these tips to help green your meat.

1. Skip the restaurant and learn to cook. By doing this you can avoid processed foods.

2. Buy Humanely Raised Meat. This can reduce the use of antibiotics and improve animal health, ultimately improving your health.

3. Purchase Meat with Less Packaging. Check out a farmers’ market or visit a butcher—that wraps meat just in paper.

4. Use Your Leftovers from home and the restaurant.

5. Buy Meat Direct. You can reduce your carbon footprint by buying locally.

6. Eat Less Meat.

7. Spend More. Pasture-raised, organic, and local meat will empty your wallet faster, but cheap meat costs a lot when you factor in its long-term effect on the environment and human health.

8. Support Your Local Butcher.

9. If You’re Going to Grab Fast Food, Choose Wisely. Chipotle Mexican Grill is a quick restaurant that only uses pork raised without hormones or antibiotics.

10. Buy Meat from Animals Raised on Organic Feed.

The Red Onion, pronounced dead by locals on multiple occasions, may actually be catching another glimpse at life. The historic restaurant and bar officially shut down on May 31, 2007. It was certainly a sad sight for many Aspenites, but now hope for the Red Onion's resurrection seems to be coming out of deep left field. By "deep left field" I mean Las Vegas.

Scott DeGraff is a recently imported Aspen local from Las Vegas. There he owns several successful clubs and restaurants, including Ghost Bar and The Playboy Club. The Palms is also famous and infamous for hosting MTV's Real World Las Vegas and has one of the best pools in the city, but I regress. Back to the Red Onion...

DeGraff is just the latest news to come out in relation to this controversial Aspen restaurant. Let's track some reporting made by the Aspen Times. On November 28, 2006, the newspaper released an article titled Last Call for the Red Onion. The article introduces Dave "Wabs" Walbert as the owner of the Red Onion for the past 23 years. Apparently, Wabs had signed a 20-year lease, and had one of the best rent deals in town.

Former longtime owner, Charles Israel, even gave Wabs 2 one-year and 1 six-month extension before the lease expired. The Aspen Times quoted Israel as saying, “A 20-year lease was unheard-of, and I wanted to help Wabs out. He’s been a wonderful tenant, and unlike the stories you normally write, I didn’t gouge anyone, I just helped out a local kid." Tear... In a meeting, new controlling owners Ron Garfield and Andy Hecht, told Wabs of their intentions to triple or quadruple the rent on the space. Adios, Red Onion.

That was the end of that, or so we thought. "Save the Onion" cry answered? appeared in the Aspen Times on January 10 2007. The opening paragraph of the article stated, "Aspenites who feared the Red Onion was about to breathe its dying breath, take heart. Plans are afoot to resuscitate the popular locals hangout."

The article went on to discuss details between the new Red Onion building owners and some local restaurant owners. Cache Cache is well known and well regarded as one of the best restaurants in Aspen. The Times spoke with owners Jodi Larner and Chris Lanter, and quoted Larner as saying, "We want to bring it back more to the way it used to be. That's what's cool about it."

Aspen locals' mouths were watering just thinking about rumors of a Cache Cache-like bar menu being available in a larger setting. Building owner Andy Hecht was even quoted as saying, "This is our effort to try and give you what we think the town wants."

Unfortunately, next thing we heard was that the deal was dead. There would be no revival. The building was being turned into retail and prime living space. Why the tease?

Fast forward to March 3, 2008. Headline: Aspen's Red Onion might turn into Junk. Unless you had your ear to the ground, and knew about some new restaurant and nightclub plans in Snowmass' Base Village, this was the first time many locals were introduced to Scott DeGraff. He said he is in negotiation with The Red Onion building owners, but “Until it’s signed, it’s not done ... but I am very interested in them and they are very interested in me.” He went on to say, “They don’t have to worry about it being too froufrou," adding the price point will be modest and the historic qualities of the bar will remain intact. “We will pay homage to the past.”

So, big props to DeGraff. Here is a relatively new local who obviously enjoys Aspen and wants to contribute to its future while paying real respects to its past. As a local myself, this is exactly what I want to see: businessman generating new energy while giving the town's history the attention it deserves. A good one should be able to accomplish this and still make a profit. Let's just hope this time the deal goes through.