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Category Archives: Fun Experiments

Harvesting and Drying Mint

19 Aug

Mint is wonderful in the kitchen, medicine cabinet, and as a pest repellent.

Mint is one of those herbs that has a ton of uses and grows prolifically in the garden. Sometimes that prolific growth can be a nuisance (it has, in fact, take up residence in one of my raised beds and it’s definitely a battle between me and it). But like anything else in life, what can be seen as a hassle can also be take as a gift with just a slight shift in perspective: Instead of cursing your prolific mint, harvest it shamelessly and exploit it for one of its many uses! SHAMELESSLY!

There are many kinds of mint (spearmint, peppermint, chocolate mint, apple mint, pineapple mint, and others. They are all perennial, meaning they’ll come back year after year; you’ll have a never-ending supply of this tasty plant after sticking just one in your garden. But beware: if you don’t want it to spread everywhere make sure you plant your mint in an area where you won’t mind it getting a bit out of hand. However, flavored mints such as chocolate and apple are not as prolific as the straight-up peppermint and spearmint.

Mint does best in full sun to part shade with a soil that is slightly acidic, rich, and fairly moist, so if you live in a more arid environment, your mint won’t explode as it would in more ideal growing conditions. And, of course, you can grow mint in a pot for year-round fresh use provided it gets a southern exposure when indoors.

Mint not only serves as a valuable food and flavoring in the kitchen, it also has medicinal uses such as calming the stomach, assisting with gingivitis, helping relieve colds, and cooling overly warm skin, among others. It can also be used to repel pests in the home and garden, and lend a wonderful scent to washing linens when included with vinegar in the final rinse water of a wash. I’ll cover these uses in more detail in a future ‘spin.

HARVESTING

If your mint is a new planting, wait a year or two for it to establish a strong root system before you start harvesting it. You can clip fresh mint sprigs during this time for sure, but for a full-on, no-holds-barred harvest, wait until the mint is well established. With my established mint, I literally hack it back in late spring, mid summer, and again in very early fall until there is only about 6 inches of stem left; it grows back readily. Just make sure you don’t harvest too late in the fall; you want to give the plant enough time to recover before winter hits. Like any other herb, the best time to harvest mint is in the morning while the volatile oils in the plant are at their strongest.

After washing my mint, I lay it on a towel in several loose layers to dry thoroughly in the sun.

Before drying mint, rinse it clean under a spray hose in the kitchen sink, or outdoors if you have a lot of mint you’re processing in one batch. After cleaning, the mint must be thoroughly dried. I do this by shaking off the mint thoroughly, then laying it out on a few loose layers on a towel in the sun.

AIR DRYING

After my mint is washed and dried, I bundle it up for hanging and drying. I make my bundles loose to allow for the much-needed air to circulate around the herb and draw the moisture away. Air circulation is key when it comes to drying herbs; the air removes the moisture from around your plants and helps prevent mold from developing.

When making my bundles, I use rubber bands to secure the ends. Rubber bands have two main advantages over string: first, the contract as the stems dry out and shrink, thereby maintaining a tight bundle throughout the drying process and second, they can be used over and over. I save all of the rubber bands I end up with from the grocery store or anywhere else, and use them for my herb drying. I attached an unfolded large paper clip to my bundle and use the paper clip to hang the herbs from my ceiling. You can hang herbs from wall racks, or anything else you can think of as long as the location is warm and gets plenty of air circulation (i.e., basements are poor choices).

Rubber bands are the best way to hold herb bundles for drying. Here, a rubber band is first slipped over one stem, then wrapped around the bundle several times.

After wrapping the rubber band around the bundle several times, secure the end by slipping it over a few branches. This provides plenty of give for shrinkage.

You may have read that herbs should be placed in brown paper bags to dry. I believe this is nonsense. I think the only exception is when you are drying an herb such as dill and want to save the seed, then you’ll need to place a paper bag around the seed head. Otherwise,  unless you live in the driest of environments there is no way you’re going to get enough air circulation to draw the moisture away from your plants if they are suffocating in a bag. I am also lazy. Packaging herbs up for drying is just not something I am interested in spending my time doing since I see no detectable benefit from doing so, unless I am saving the seed. But I’m sure many will disagree with me, and that’s ok!

This re-purposed screen serves as a wonderful drying rack for herbs when hung from a ceiling in a warm, airy locations such as my front sun room.

Instead, I hang my herbs upside down from a drying rack I have hanging from the ceiling in my front sun room. The rack used to be a screen with rice paper lining, but the rice paper was torn at one point, so I removed all of the paper and the hinges, and hung it from the ceiling to serve as a drying rack. It also just looks kinda cool.

The ideal temperature to air dry herbs really varies; I’ve read anywhere between 70F and 120F. Frankly, whatever warm location you have available is the best location. So many guides provide supposed “rules” but ultimately the best environment is the one you have available to you. You just need to find a way to work with what you have. But with drying herbs, good air circulation is a must…without it your herbs will mold. If you don’t have good air circulation, consider placing a fan in the room in which your herbs are drying. And it’s best to keep your drying herbs out of direct sunlight; while my sun room is sunny, the herbs at ceiling level are protected from direct exposure.

How long does air drying take? It depends upon those unique conditions you are working with. In an 80F, moderately humid environment with moderate air circulation, bundles such as the ones shown above can take two to four weeks. Here in Colorado in my very warm sun room, it only took about 4 days to get crisp-dried mint.

OVEN DRYING

I encourage you to air-dry your herbs whenever possible; it just seems a lot easier to me if you have the space and if your environmental conditions are dry enough. However, if you live in a moist environment or don’t have the space to hang herbs, oven drying is a great option! Some people even prefer the flavor of oven-dried herbs to air-dried. Frankly, I can’t tell the difference.

To oven dry herbs, you also want to wash and either air dry or pat them dry before proceeding. Then you can either strip the leaves from the stems and place them in a single layer on a cookie sheet, or lay the stems on the cookie sheet themselves in a single layer. Place the herbs in a warm, 180F oven for 3 to 4 hours with the oven door cracked to allow moisture to escape. Then, crush the leaves and store.

COLLECTING AND STORING

Collect your dried mint by crushing the leaves off the stem.

The leaves are the edible portion of mint, so when it is thoroughly dry, you’ll need to remove them from the stems. I do this by taking one of my bunches, holding it over a large bowl or sheet, and simply pressing the stems. The leaves crush off cleanly from the stem, and any bit of stem that might break off and fall is easily removed after I have finished removing all of the leaves from my mint.

It is recommended that you store your mint in a cool location away from direct sunlight. I store a portion of my mint in a used tea tin and keep it in a cupboard by my tea kettle. The rest of my yearly supply is stored in a large air-tight mason jar in my pantry. Sometimes I just take the jar out and look at it…herbs that you harvested and dried yourself are not only fresher (and thereby tastier) than store bought, looking at them can also help us feel the summer sun on a cold winter day as we recall the harvest.

 
11 Comments

Posted by on August 19, 2012 in Edible Plants, Food Preservation, Fun Experiments, Gardening, Great for Kids, Hobbies and Arts, Home Remedies & Apothecary, Homesteading, Recipes, Saving Money

 

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Homemade Cottage Cheese, 1839 Style

29 Jul

In 1839, making cottage cheese was just a matter of leaving raw milk sit out until it formed curds, then strain overnight.

First, let me say that this won’t work unless you have raw milk available to you. The reason is that raw milk never really goes “bad,” it just sours. You can use it months after it’s left the cow (properly handled, of course). Pasteurized milk, on the other hand, has had its molecular structure altered, and because of that it doesn’t ever sour, it putrefies. This means if it goes bad, it’s not edible. I know, I know, this happenstance eliminates the possibility for many to make cottage cheese using this method, but it’s still interesting to see how people made food 175 years ago.

But if you do have access to raw milk, this makes a wonderful creamy cottage cheese that I love. It’s creamier than store-bought cottage cheese, and the “lumps” are very small. The flavor is a combination of cottage cheese, sour cream, and cream cheese. It doesn’t taste like store-bought cottage cheese because the store-bought stuff is cultured, which gives it a specific flavor. You can make cultured cottage cheese at home, too, if you purchase the culture from an outside source, but this recipe allows you to make your own like folks made it at home long ago. And, it’s easy as pie!

INGREDIENTS & HOW-TO

  • 1/2 gallon raw milk
  • salt (optional)
  • butter (optional)

Raw milk forms curds on its own after it sits in a warm location for several hours.

Take your milk out of the refrigerator and set it in a warm corner (room temperature or higher) until curds form, which will take between 12 and 24 hours, depending upon the temperature of your room. You’ll see the curd development easily as the curds will separate naturally from the whey, as seen at right.

Once the curds form, strain them overnight, making sure not to press them. This can be done in different ways. I took a colander and placed it inside a larger bowl, and then poured my curds into a jelly bag. I left the jelly bag sit in the colander in the refrigerator overnight (you don’t need to refrigerate it). If you don’t have a jelly bag, you can just line your colander with a kitchen towel. Or if you don’t want to save your whey, you can secure a jelly bag or towel (tied at the ends) to the kitchen sink spigot and just let it drip into the sink.

The next day, turn your cottage cheese into a clean bowl. At this point you can choose to add more cream if you want it super creamy (I don’t find this necessary), butter for additional richness, or salt or spices to taste. I like it plain, myself. I just dump the cheese into a bowl and call it good.

I eat my cottage cheese with fruit and nuts, and I use it in recipes for things like homemade ranch dressing, dips, or anywhere I’d use cream cheese, sour cream, or sometimes plain yogurt. It has a wonderful flavor, and is so easy to make that I use cottage cheese in many ways. It is really only limited by your imagination!

Note: The references for this came from  the 1839 publication, “The Kentucky Housewife,” by Mrs. Lettice Bryan. The original text reads: “Take a large bowl of milk* that is just beginning to turn sour, cover it and set it in the corner where it will keep lukewarm till if forms a curd. Then place a linen cloth over a sieve; put in your curd, fold over the corners of the cloth to keep out the dust, and let it drain till next morning, without pressing it in the least. Then turn it in an earthen dish, add as much rich, sweet cream as will make it a little soft; add a large spoonful of butter to each pint of the curd, mixing it in a very little salt, and work it with a spoon till th whole is very smoothly mixed. Then put it in a china bowl, and set it in a cool place till the tea-table is ready.”

 
16 Comments

Posted by on July 29, 2012 in Fun Experiments, Great for Kids, Homesteading, Recipes, Saving Money

 

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Dyed Eggs, All Natural!

18 Mar

Dyeing eggs with natural ingredients offers the chance for a LOT more experimentation, imagination, and fun than buying a kit from the store. And you can save money dyeing eggs this way–onion skins, and veggies that are ready to go bad can be used to dye eggs. These food scraps can make dyeing eggs almost free, except the cost of the eggs.

You can dye eggs using foods that you already have in your kitchen, and the results are more beautiful than when you use synthetic dyes. It can either be a fast process, or one that unfolds overnight for marvelous effect; the choice is yours!

The basic recipe for dyeing natural eggs is:

  • Your dye object (fruit, vegetable, spice)
  • Salt: 1 tablespoon
  • White vinegar: 1 tablespoon
  • Water: about 3 cups
  • Optional items include leaves, wax crayons, muslin, thick and thin rubber bands, and whatever else you can think of to create different effects on your egg.

My favorite ingredients for dyeing eggs include blueberries, turmeric, grated beets, and red cabbage sliced into strips and chopped. I also use chlorophyll for green, which I know is hardly common in the average household but it makes for great green eggs (I use it in smoothies, so I have it on-hand). I’ve tried other ingredients for green and orange colors (spinach, carrots, chili powder, paprika) but the results were not that great and in the case of carrots and chili powder, didn’t work at all. I know other ingredients are touted as good egg dyes, but the above four give me everything I need and can be combined for different color effects. If you have egg dyes that you have used successfully, please feel free to share them in the comments at the end of this ‘spin!

These are my favorite eggs, dyed using beets, blueberries, red cabbage, and turmeric.

MAKE YOUR MIXES:

Making the dyes is pretty easy, though it does involve some grating and spooning. The basic concept for all mixes is to place your “dye” (food or dried spice) in water (enough to cover your eggs) and add 1 tablespoon of salt and 1 tablespoon of vinegar per 3ish cups of water. From there you can either hard boil your eggs directly in the dye, or you can hard boil your eggs first, then let them sit in the dye for a few minutes or up to overnight.

The temperature of the dye has a huge effect on the colors you get. Boiling the eggs in the dye will create much more intense effects, while leaving cooled eggs sit in cooled dye (even overnight) will create more pale colors. But this is influenced by whatever you’re using as your dye. Blueberries create very dark colors overnight, while beets are more subtle. You just need to experiment.

There are literally an infinite amount of variations, combinations, and tools you can use that will change how your eggs will look. The only limit is your imagination! Here’s the step-by-step description of what I did to create the eggs I’ll show you today! But be sure to come up with your own recipes…it’s soooooo much fun!

TURMERIC

Turmeric can create wonderful effects on eggs. At right, the egg on the left was hard boiled then placed in a turmeric/salt/vinegar boiling bath for 1 minute (leaving it in for about 15 seconds creates a light yellow color). The egg in the center was wrapped in rubber bands then left to soak in warm mix for about an hour. The egg on the far right was hard boiled in the solution for about 15 minutes then left to cool for an hour.

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At left are two tablespoons of turmeric bubbling away with vinegar and salt. The egg on the far right from above is boiling away somewhere in there.

Turmeric can create a range of yellows, from a light canary yellow to an intense burnt butter color.

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The egg at right is wrapped in rubber bands before being dipped into its dye. These rubber bands created the striped center egg from the photo above. You can also use things like stickers or crayons to create negative space.

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BEETS

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I grated two beets to serve my egg-dyeing needs this year. It can be a mess, but beets are one of the best dyes and grating them compared to slicing them allows the release of more dye. Not only that, the gratings themselves can create lovely mottles on your egg shells.

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Eggs can be left to sit in their dyes for anywhere from a few minutes to overnight. Here, an egg sits in grated beets, salt, and vinegar; I’ve mounded the grated beet pieces over the egg to create a mottled effect.

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In addition to creating your different dyes, you can also “treat” the eggs in different ways. Here, I’ve wrapped a raw egg in muslin and secured it with a twist tie…

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Then the egg was hard boiled in boiling grated beet/salt/vinegar bath for about 20 minutes, then left to sit for about 15 minutes after I turned off the heat. It created a lovely pink color.

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Beets were also used on the two eggs at right. The egg on the top had two thick rubber bands placed on it before being left to soak in a cooled beet mixture over night (notice how the egg is yellow under the rubber bands; I dipped the eggs in turmeric for a few minutes before placing the rubber bands on the egg). The bottom egg was also left to soak in cooled beet mixture over night; notice the difference in color since this one had not been dipped in turmeric first.
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This beautiful egg was made by taking a hard boiled egg and wrapping it in muslin and soaking it with beets and juice over night. I wrapped the muslin in bunches, making sure it was uneven in places and secured it tightly with rubber bands. I then placed it in the dye, making sure that grated beet pieces were mounded on the top and around the egg.  You can see the wonderful effect.

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BLUEBERRIES AND RED CABBAGE

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This is my favorite egg. It is a hard boiled egg that I wrapped in red cabbage leaves then wrapped in muslin to keep it held together using a rubber band. I then boiled the egg for 15 minutes in a blueberry solution and left it soak there overnight.

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Here are the raw red cabbage leaves, laid out to be wrapped around the egg and then wrapped in muslin. You could also place a leaf or flower next to the egg if you wanted to create an image on the egg.

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Here I used frozen blueberries to boil in water, vinegar, and salt. I used about a cup of blueberries in 3 cups water. This egg was hard boiled, then I took some of the blueberries from my boil and laid them underneath and on top of the egg. The egg spent the night in a bed of blueberries.

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Here is the egg, getting put to bed with blueberries.

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This egg was made by taking about a dozen blueberries from the dye mix, and wrapping them next to the egg using a piece of muslin to hold them in place (closed at the top with a twist-tie). It was left to soak in beet juice for about an hour.

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This egg was created by creating a solution of cabbage leaves and blueberries together, then boiling this hard boiled egg for about 30 minutes in the mix.

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This egg was dyed using liquid chlorophyll. I tried spinach for green and it just looked dingy, and I’ve read elsewhere that chlorophyll works. It obviously does, but there’s a trick to it. The best way to get the green from the chlorophyll onto the egg is to rub it on with your fingers (no salt or vinegar needed). You only need about two drops of liquid chlorophyll to do the job as it is very concentrated. But it really works great.

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If you have tried any other natural ingredients or techniques to dye eggs in your kitchen, please share with us! And if you try my methods illustrated here, let me know how it worked for you. Don’t forget to have fun!


 
22 Comments

Posted by on March 18, 2012 in Fun Experiments, Hobbies and Arts, Holidays, Kitchen Tips, Saving Money

 

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Creating a Personal Seedbank

12 Feb

Heirloom, open-pollinated plant varieties are your only bet for a successful personal seedbank.

You have probably heard of seed saving, where you save a plant’s seeds or tubers at the end of a growing season to serve as the seed source for the following year. This is great because choosing the proper plants and practicing proper seed-saving methods gives you to a free, self-perpetuating garden year after year. Saving seed also means you can share seeds with friends and neighbors, so everyone can start growing their own.

Many people, however, are not as familiar with the concept of a personal seedbank. A personal seedbank is like seed saving on steroids. You save seed for the coming season’s planting, but you also bank seed for longer storage, just in case.

What that “just in case” might be varies. Some people have created a personal seedbank as insurance against crop failures. Others believe a personal seedbank is necessary in the event of a partial (or total) societal collapse. Many people just like the idea of being sustainable and self sufficient. And, of course, seed saving can be a fun hobby.

PLANNING YOUR SEEDBANK

The most important thing to remember when planning your personal seedbank is that you can only save and store open-pollinated, non-hybridized, non-GMO seeds. Why? Because genetically modified and hybridized seeds have been dinked with by large corporations such as Monsanto, which doesn’t want you to be able to save your own seeds. Why? Because they want you to have to buy seeds from them year after year. Hybridized or GMO seeds frequently have sterile first generation offspring (F1 is a designation you might have seen). This means that while you’ll get viable plants from the seeds you buy, the seeds you save from those plants will likely be sterile. If they’re not sterile, they’ll produce offspring that are so unlike the parents with such a wide variety of characteristics that they will be a disappointment and not useful. Only buy heirloom, open-pollinated seeds from trusted sources.

The second thing to decide when planning a seedbank is what kinds of seed you want to save. The best seeds to save are from fruits and vegetables you enjoy eating the most, but experience comes into play, too. If you’re a beginning seed saver, to start it’s best to bank seeds that require the lowest skill set. This way you can focus your first growing season on learning seed saving techniques and still have viable, usable seed banked in preparation for the following growing season, at which time you’ll expand your skill. The easiest seeds to save and bank are self-pollinated seeds (see below for more info on this).

The third thing to decide when planning a seedbank is what seeds would be best to save. This can vary greatly depending upon the reason why you are choosing to create a personal seedbank. If you’re banking seed as insurance against a crop failure in your garden or to be more self sufficient, then banking what you like is the best option. If you’re banking seed as insurance against a societal collapse, then you’ll need to bank a wider variety of seeds and include many types that you may not have ever grown before, including grains like wheat or barley. Be advised, though, that in these cases it is a good idea to get some experience growing these seeds before a collapse occurs; your seedbank will be useless if you don’t know how to grow the seeds you have.

Ready-to-order seedbanks are great options until you have a chance to store your own varieties.

SEED SOURCES

If you’ve never saved seed before, you’ll have to buy your first seeds from a commercial grower or be lucky enough to have seed-saving friends who are willing to help you with your first crop. Excellent commercial sources for heirloom, open-pollinated seeds include Seed Savers Exchange, Native Seed Search, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, Sustainable Seed Company, Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, and Abundant Life Seeds, among others.

Another alternative is to buy a pre-made seedbank that is already packaged and set for storage. This is a great idea for those who want a head start on their seedbank and have some insurance on-hand until a self-made seedbank has been created (which can take several years). A good source for a seedbank such as this is sold by Camping Survival. They sell a 6-can set that is organized by use type. For instance, the “Culinary Herb” can includes a variety of common herbs from basil to thyme, and the “Ancient Grains” can includes barley, flax, amaranth, and others. The ‘Medicinal Herbs” can is especially beneficial to have and is often overlooked in seedbanks.

SELF-POLLINATED SEEDS

The best and easiest seeds to save (and therefore bank) are self-pollinated seeds, which include tomatoes, beans, lettuce, peas, chicory, and endive. These plants have reliable seed set the same year they are planted, and they are self-pollinating. Self-pollinated seeds fertilize themselves, meaning the pollen from a plant’s flower fertilizes the stigma on that same flower. No muss, no fuss. There are few worries about cross-pollination or accidental hybridization. You get the same variety of tomato or bean year after year, though it is recommended to separate varieties by a row, just in case.

Self pollination is one way seeds of concern to home growers reproduce; the other two modes of reproduction are insects and wind pollination. This is where things can get tricky, because in these cases pollen from a plant up to a mile away can fertilize a plant in your garden. This increases the chance of hybridized plants, whose seeds will not breed true when planted. Because of this, insect- and wind-pollinated plants such as corn or onions have to be manipulated by the grower to ensure that pollination is limited to same varieties.

WIND- AND INSECT-POLLINATED SEEDS

More experienced seed savers can take on plants that require more intervention to insure that saved seed breeds true.  Crops such as corn, cucumber, radish, spinach, and squashes (among others) produce seed the same year they are planted, but require the grower to intervene to prevent unwanted hybridization. This intervention can come in the form of hand-pollinating the plants to prevent cross-pollination, or making sure there is considerable distance between the variety you are growing and other varieties (this distance can vary between 100 feet and a mile, depending upon the plant).

Biennial vegetable seeds set seed the year after they are planted, and as a result expert seed savers can take on the two-year commitment needed to save these seeds. Biennial vegetables include onions, carrots, cabbages, beets, swiss chard, turnips, celery, leeks, and others. Instead of harvesting at the end of the first growing season, the plants need to be successfully overwintered the same year they are planted (this can vary depending upon if you live in the north or south). The second growing season is when the plants will flower and set seed. These plants also need to be separated from other varieties to avoid cross-pollination.

Seeds like beans, peas, and cucumber can be dried and frozen and remain viable for storage.

ORTHODOX SEEDS

No, this has nothing to do with religion. What it does have to do with is how well a seed withstands the freezing and drying conditions that are necessary to maintain a seedbank. Orthodox seeds can be dried and frozen for storage and remain viable for a period of time, but some seeds take to this better than others. Some seeds can be stored up to 10 years or more, others begin to lose viability after one year. For most common vegetable plants, three to five years is about as long as they can be stored, though some plants (like parsnips) really need to be used within a year or two.

Ideally, seeds need to be dried to less than 7% moisture and, for maximum storage length, frozen to no warmer than zero degrees Farenheit (a home freezer may reach this temperature). The lower the temperature, however, the longer seeds will remain viable. Most vegetables known to the home gardener are orthodox seeds, such as peas, corn, and tomatoes. In fact, about 80% of plant species are orthodox seeds.

Recalcitrant seeds can’t be dried for storage and must be planted immediately. Tropical plants such as mangoes, coconuts, and tea are recalcitrant. Intermediate seeds can take some drying for short-term storage, but they are not viable options for a personal seed bank. Examples of intermediate seeds include coffee, papaya, and others.

SEED SAVING SPECIFICS

The best free online resource for learning how to save specific vegetable seeds can be found at the International Seed Saving Institute. They have a complete seed-saving guide that you can find here, which includes how to address the pollination needs of individual plants and harvest the seeds to best advantage. I’ll be writing plant-specific seed-saving Spins this growing season, but for now ISSI is a great resource.

If you have a personal seedbank story that you’d like to share, please do so in the comments!

 
6 Comments

Posted by on February 12, 2012 in Fun Experiments, Gardening, Outdoor and Survival, Saving Money

 

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15 Ways to Paracord Power

06 Feb

Paracord's construction gives it strength and durability, and opens the door for multiple uses.

For those of you who have no idea what paracord is (and I didn’t up until a year or two ago), it’s like the duct tape of the fiber world. Paracord is nylon rope that was originally used in parachutes in World War II, which is where the name came from (originally it was parachute cord). Now it is a versatile utility cording that is still used extensively in the military, but is also gaining in popularity for personal use. Military-grade paracord is so useful that it deserves a Spin so those without military connections can learn about and make use of this great material.

Military-grade paracrod comes in six different types. We’re going to focus on the best quality one that is most readily available to civilians: a variation of the military Type III paracord frequently called Mil-spec 550 paracord. Construction of 550 paracord is done by taking seven two-ply threads of nylon and wrapping them in a shell braided from 32 nylon strands. This composite construction gives paracord a tensile strength of 550 pounds (when the seven internal threads are removed the outer sheath has a tensile strength of 200 pounds). Not only that, but paracord is mildew and rot resistant, and it’s only 1/8″ thick, making it great for a variety of uses. Here are some examples of the uses of paracord, many of which focus on ways to help you survive if you get lost hiking, or otherwise find yourself in a survival situation:

A paracord bracelet is like having safety around your wrist.

1) Crafts and parawear: Braiding bracelets, belts, lanyards, or any object you can think of with paracord is easy, and since it comes in so many great colors it looks cool, too (not to mention the durability). And you’ll have paracord on you all the time, which is a great way to keep a little safety around your waist, wrist, key chain, or more. If needed, say to tie down a load on the roof of your car, all you need to do is unweave the bracelet or belt and voila! You are ready for the task at hand! This is especially useful for camping and hiking, where you can wear some safety so it doesn’t take up room in your pack.

2) Dog collars and leashes: You can braid great custom dog leashes and collars out of paracord; paracord’s strength and rot-resistance make it ideal for this purpose.

3) A saw: That’s right! By pulling on a length of paracord fast enough to create actionable friction, you can saw some things in half, such as two-inch wide tubular webbing! Check out this brief video from Estela Wilderness Education, LLC for a demonstration.

4) Catching food: Paracord is so versatile it can be used to catch animal food, big or small. You can cut a length of paracord and remove one of the internal two-ply threads for use as fishing line, or use the in-tact cord for animal snares and traps.

5) Useful thread: The internal threads are also thin enough to sew on loose buttons or torn seams in clothing or tents, and even as dental floss.

6) Camp construction and utility: In any sort of camping situation (intended or not) paracord has too many uses to mention. Because of its strength and rot resistance, it can be used for things like pole lashing, pulling logs, hoisting food into trees for protection, and for guy strings and shelter ridge lines for tents or temporary shelters. The only limit is your ability to adapt and improvise!

7) Making fire: Since paracord itself is nylon it won’t burn for you but it does catch heat so it can be used as tinder to light larger pieces of kindling. And, you can use paracord as the necessary string in a bow-drill, a primitive way to make fire if needed. Here’s information on making and using a bow drill from Nature Skills.

8) Medical emergencies: In the unfortunate circumstance that you get hurt while camping or hiking, paracord can literally save your life or the life of a friend. It can be used as a tourniquet, a sling, or to lash splints together on a broken limb. You can even string the paracord between two sapling trunks to make a stretcher of sorts.

9) Automobile fix: No, really! You can take 550 paracord and use it as a temporary replacement for something like a fan belt. Just be sure to knot the cord every few inches, otherwise the slippery nature of the cord will cause it to slip off.

10) Rappelling: No, paracord is not great as a regular climbing rope, but in an emergency situation you can rappel or otherwise haul your body weight with 550 paracord (provided you don’t weight more than 550 pounds).

11) Woven items: With enough skill you can weave things from paracord such as water bottle holders, fishing nets, bird nets, or other traps.

12) Pulley systems: Around the house or in the woods, having a good block and tackle pulley system can allow you to haul and lift weights much heavier than you could without pulley assistance; paracord is great in pulleys.

13) Weaving rope: If paracord isn’t strong enough for you, you can use it to braid even stronger rope for hauling or pulley purposes, such as to remove a stuck vehicle. This is an option if you are in a situation where you don’t have proper rope available.

14) Wrapping stuff: Paracord is a great material to use for all manner of handle-making, from knives to luggage to hatchets, tools, and more. Anything you want wrapped can be quickly covered with paracord!

15) Making weapons: Having to make primitive weaponry on-the-fly for killing food or protecting yourself is never something we want to have to do, but it’s nice to know that with paracord on hand you are covered.

Paracord shoelaces eliminate the need for melting the ends.

Not all paracord is created equal. Much of the paracord that is available is substandard quality that is not up to military specs and as a result will not provide the benefits outlined in this article, so don’t go buying it from some place like Walmart and expect it to perform for you in any useful capacity. I recommend buying your paracord from Camping Survival. This site provides mil-spec 550 paracord at a great price not to mention proper paracord shoelaces (with aglets so you don’t have to melt the ends), bracelets, belts, and kits to make your own braided paracord items.

 
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Posted by on February 6, 2012 in Fun Experiments, Hobbies and Arts, Outdoor and Survival

 

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Winter Edibles: Cattails

03 Feb

Cattails are a common edible during the growing season, but they can save your butt in winter.

People like to learn about and collect wild edible plants for a variety of reasons: survival foods if they are lost in the wilderness, a source of free food and culinary exploration, or just plain outdoor fun. But it’s a common mistake to only think about many wild edibles as food sources during the growing season. In fact, there are edible plant sources during the winter, too.

Cattails are one of those plants that can be counted on as a winter edible, which is one reason it is sometimes known as “Supermarket of the Swamp.” Cattails are a great winter edible because they are easy to identify, they occur frequently wherever shallow water is present, and they usually exist in large stands. Their sheer quantity can provide a substantial food source if you really get your butt in a sling in the wild.

The reliable edible part of the cattail in the winter is the plant’s roots (rhizomes), which are a great source of starch and can also be turned into a flour. You may also find the coming season’s growth shoots (corms), which also make an excellent edible, attached to where the rhizomes meet the base of the plant.

To harvest the plant, reach to the plant’s base and dig or pull the rhizomes out of the soil. Cut them from the dry, above-ground stems and wash them thoroughly. At this point you’ll be able to separate the rhizomes, which will be brown and covered with root hairs making them look like an old rope, from the more succulent corms. From here you can do several things:

You can make a flour with the rhizomes: Peel the rhizomes and crush them in a fair amount of cold water to separate the white, starchy goodness from the fibrous portions. Remove the fiber and let the container sit for several hours until the starch settles to the bottom. Pour off the water carefully and strain the starch if you can. From here you can use the pasty starch as a flour immediately or let it dry well for storage. If you dry it for storage, you’ll need to grind it fine, but then it can be used in conjunction with other flours in baking.

You can supplement a soup with the above starch: Follow the same instructions as above, but instead of straining off the starch, heat the water and starch and add any other wild edibles you’ve been able to collect. Staying hydrated in a winter survival situation is very important, and this soup will kill a few survival birds with one stone (hopefully you’ll have a bird to add to the soup, too).

You can eat the corms: The corms may be as small as peas or larger, depending upon where you are and how far along you are in the winter season. Peel or scrub these new shoots and eat them as-is, or you can slice them and cook them. I recommend adding the corms to the above soup if you’re in a survival situation; it will provide warmth, hydration, and starch for energy. But if you’re just eating the corms for an interesting food item on your table, they are tasty cooked in some butter with a sprinkling of salt and thyme!

Sources: “Edible Wild Plants: Eastern/Central North America” by Lee Allen Peterson, “Wild Edible Plants: A North American Field Guide to Over 200 natural Foods” by Thomas S. Elias & Peter A. Dykeman.

 
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Posted by on February 3, 2012 in Edible Plants, Fun Experiments

 

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Collecting and Maintaining Wild Yeast Sourdough Starter

22 Jan

My sourdough starter is six years old and lives in this jar in my refrigerator. The liquid on top is called "hooch" and is perfectly normal.

No, you do not have to buy yeast to make really great bread. In fact, you never have to purchase yeast from the store again if you collect your own wild, local yeast and make your own sourdough starter. After you collect your wild yeast, the sourdough starter lives in a jar in your refrigerator. In fact, it can live there for hundreds of years if you take care of it properly. Here are the basics of collecting and maintaining your own wild yeast sourdough starter.

It’s important to note that not all wild yeasts are created equal. The iconic San Francisco sourdough is a wonderful wild yeast, but it is exceptional. In my last home in eastern Kansas the wild yeast was on the weak side, so while it was great for things like bagels and soft pretzels, it wasn’t the best for a light bread. However, now that I’ve moved to the Colorado Front Range I’m pleased with how wonderful the wild yeasts are and the wonderful light bread they make.

The ultimate goal with this is to have fun and to have another way to cut your tie to the commercial food chain. This is not always easy, and with wild yeast it means that you need to experiment with your starter often to learn the nature of your local yeast. But that’s where the fun is! Through time your wild yeast starter will be like an old friend; one that you can literally pass on to your children and grandchildren. For a video introduction on sourdough check out our video, “Intro to Sourdough.”

COLLECTION

Collecting wild yeast is pretty easy. All you need is a bowl, flour, warm water (about 85F) and a jar in which to store your starter. When you’re first collecting your yeast, white flour seems to work a bit better than wheat flour, but after you have a nice starter going you can add wheat flour as you maintain your starter, and you are free to use just about any kind of flour when baking.

First, take a bowl and mix together 2 cups of flour and 2 cups warm water (about 85F). It’s ok if there are lumps–it doesn’t need to be perfectly mixed. But do not mix in anything else besides flour and water! This is very important. Incorporate air into the mix with some vigorous strokes, however; yeast floats around in the air, so the more air contact your mix has the better.

Next, cover your bowl lightly with cheesecloth or a kitchen towel; never use anything like a plate or saran wrap, as this will prevent air (and therefore yeast) from making contact with your mix. If it’s summer time you can let the bowl sit outside so your mix has access to as much wild yeast floating around as possible. If it’s winter, put the bowl in a warmish, protected spot like in a cold oven. Over the next 24 hours, stir your mix about once every three to six hours just to get more air incorporated.

For a review of the process up to this point watch “Step 1: Collecting Wild Yeast for Sourdough.”

After 24 hours, check your starter and see how bubbly it is. You may not have many bubbles at all–it just depends upon a variety of factors like season and the nature of your local yeast, so don’t feel discouraged if the process takes two or three days. If you don’t see a lot of bubbles, whip the starter with a fork or something to incorporate more air, then let it sit, covered, in a warmish spot for another 24 hours. For more info on this step watch “Step 2: Growing your Wild Yeast.”

After two days, we have foaming and bubbles, proving that we've caught the wild yeast!

It can take two to three days for the yeasts to start growing in your starter. You’ll be able to tell if the bubbles you’re seeing are “active” bubbles or just air bubbles that you’ve mixed in coming to the surface. Check out this video to see what you can expect: “Step 3 Final Step Sourdough.”

Now that your starter is done, you can put it in a quart-sized jar and add another cup of flour and another cup of 85F water. Leave it sit for another day or so, then put it in your fridge where the yeasts will go dormant, ready for you to activate when you bake.

SWEETENING THE POT

The only thing that can really kill your sourdough starter is too much heat or starving it to death, and to prevent the later your starter does require some maintenance to remain happy and productive. Luckily, keeping it happy is easy, and it gives you the chance to share your starter with friends and family. You need to feed your starter once every five or six months, so this is not a time-consuming endeavor. Gold miners of old, who coveted their starters, called this maintenance process “sweetening the pot.” For a video of this process, see “Maintaining Your Sourdough Starter.”

The first step is to remove the jar of starter from your refrigerator. If you haven’t used your starter in several months, you’ll notice there is a layer of liquid at the top. This is called the “hooch” and can simply be mixed back in with your starter.

Grab another jar, which has been cleaned and sterilized, and place half of your starter in the new jar. Add a cup of new flour to this, and a cup of warm, 85F water. Mix until incorporated (lumps are fine) and let it sit overnight so the yeasts have a chance to start eating the new flour. Put your new jar back in the refrigerator until your next baking (or next pot sweetening). That’s all there is to it!

What do you do with the other half of your starter that’s in the original jar? This is your chance to earn some good karma and give it away to friends or family. It will be a great chance to bond with people you care about, and spread some fun and food independence along the way.

Check out our recent post on baking bread using your new sourdough starter: Using Wild Yeast Sourdough Starter: Basic Bread.

 
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Posted by on January 22, 2012 in Fun Experiments, Great for Kids, Recipes, Wild Yeast Sourdough

 

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Grow Your Own Tobacco

16 Jan

Yes, you can grow your own tobacco! But be ready to experiment with what you have on hand, and be patient!

When pondering the Zombie Apocalypse, Mayan Meltdown, Government Collapse, or whatever disaster awaits us, a tobacco shortage is on every smoker’s mind. We don’t smoke at The Spin, but we also recognize that sometimes the things that bring joy to life are not the healthiest habits in the world. We are all free choose our own vices, and there’s no reason why we can’t make it a little healthier. Growing your own tobacco is one way to go!

Is growing tobacco legal? Yep! What is not legal is growing it and distributing it for sale; you need a government license for that. But you’re more than welcome to grow your own tobacco for personal use, and here are the basics:

GENERAL GROWING CONDITIONS

Tobacco grows best in a sunny location. While you can grow tobacco in shadier locales, the plants will be thin and spindly and will not likely make you happy with the results.

The soil needs to be well-drained to avoid rot, and the ideal pH is about 5.8. Once pH gets to about 6.5 and above growth disorders start to occur. Whether this would be detrimental to the home grower probably depends upon a few factors, but it’s not a bad idea to have your soil checked if you are serious about growing your own supply of tobacco.

Tobacco plants can only be grown on a piece of land once every four or five years to avoid disease. And, tobacco is related to tomatoes, peppers, and potatoes, so this means that during the “off” years, these vegetables can’t be grown on that plot, either. Good plants for crop rotation include grasses or other vegetables that are not related to tobacco such as beans or squashes.

STARTING SEEDS AND TRANSPLANTING

Tobacco seeds can be purchased from different suppliers such as The New Hope Seed Company, The Tobacco Seed Company, Victory Seeds, and the Sustainable Seed Company. The sites have an overview of the many kinds of tobacco you can buy, so you can select the variety that will best meet your needs, whether you intend to smoke it or chew it. You can even choose heirloom varieties!

Tobacco seeds are about the tiniest seeds you can plant! Think grains of sand are small? Ha! Because of this seeds need to be planted indoors first so you can keep an eye on things. Mixing the seed with a bit of sand first is a safe way to make sure you don’t plant them too closely.

Start the seeds in a well-drained growing medium indoors about 50 to 60 days before you plan on transplanting outside; you can use plastic flats or even something like an egg carton. Sprinkle the seeds on the surface of the soil  as evenly as possible, and pat them down to get some good seed-to-soil contact.

Water the seeds with a gentle spray and apply a gentle fertilizer. You want the soil to remain moist during germination, but not water-logged. Application of a weak fertilizer that is appropriate for related veggies like tomatoes or potatoes will help produce healthy transplants.

Make sure your transplants get adequate light and heat. The newly planted seeds need to be in a southern-facing window, or you can supply sufficient light using a grow lamp. Keep the seedlings covered with plastic to retain moisture, and make sure they are warm for the best germination. A heat mat is one way to go.

When your plants are 6 to 8 inches tall and all danger of frost is past, it’s time to plant them outside. Plant them in your well-drained soil about 24-inches apart and water immediately.

Fertilize enough to keep the leaves a healthy green color. This will depend upon the fertility of your soil, but what you do NOT want is to fertilize so much that you get huge plants…this will negatively affect tobacco quality.

HARVESTING 

Topping tobacco (photo source at end of article)

Remove the terminal bud of the plant (called “topping”) as soon as the flower buds form, but before they open. This will help the plant produce larger leaves, which is the thing you’re producing the plant for (though the flowers are quite pretty, and there are some species of tobacco plans that are grown for ornamental purposes).

Remove the suckers that will occur after you top the plant, similar to removing suckers from tomato plants. This will increase your yield at harvest. You can just pinch them off or cut them off.

Harvest the leaves at one-week intervals, from the bottom of the plant to the top. You can start doing this soon after you top the plant, when the leaves start to yellow slightly. You can get four to five harvests this way.

CURING AND AGING

Your harvested leaves need to be hung upside down and properly air-cured before they are fit for use as a tobacco product, though some pluck the leaves right off the plant and call it good. (mass-produced curing occurs with supplemental heat, but the home grower is not likely to have this sort of set-up). Tobacco can be cured at temperatures between 60F and 95F, and at humidity levels between 65 and 70 percent. Make sure air circulation between leaves is good to avoid rot and mold. It takes a few weeks to cure tobacco.

Age your tobacco for at least year (or even up to five years), for improved flavor (but, again, this depends upon your taste). Aging requires environmental conditions that do not allow the tobacco to rot/mold nor get too dry and crumbly. You don’t want to dry tobacco like you do herbs…it needs to stay somewhat supple without getting moldy. Unfortunately, each grower needs to experiment with their own home options to determine the best location for aging. Is it a basement or a barn? It all depends upon where you live and what you have available. But have fun experimenting!

For more information on growing tobacco visit: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/aa260

Visit tobacco topping photo source here.

 
3 Comments

Posted by on January 16, 2012 in Edible Plants, Fun Experiments, Gardening, Hobbies and Arts, Homesteading

 

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A Lamp from a Chestnut?

09 Jan

I have a lot of old books: old cookbooks, home economics books, tool books, farming books, you name it. Many of the tips and recipes I share with you either come from these books (always cited!) or are inspired by them. We’re headed back to a simpler way of life, and old books are a wonderful resource I learn from again and again. Imagine my excitement when I started reading in several old sources (an old science book, a book on pre-Civil War Virginia) about making a night-light from a horse chestnut! Naturally I had to try it!

The instructions from all sources were the same: Take a horse chestnut, prick the skin all over with small holes, and soak the chestnut for 12 hours in lamp oil. After the soaking, probe a hole into the center of the chestnut, insert a cotton wick, float the chestnut in a glass of water, and light! The chestnut lamp was guaranteed to stay lit all night! How could this not be fun to try out?

After soaking in oil for 12 hours, I drilled a hole into the center of the nut.

I had a bag of chestnuts leftover from Christmas that I never got a chance to roast, so I dug a few nuts out of the bag to try this out. I selected chestnuts that were decidedly flat on one side (another tip from days gone by) so the nut wouldn’t roll over when placed in the glass of water. I tested each nut in a glass of water and they did, indeed, float.

A large needle served to prick a nut’s skin all over with small holes, but since I didn’t have any lamp oil on hand I soaked the nuts in canola oil, which I’ve read can be a substitute for lamp oil. I let them sit overnight and then moved on to the next step, which was to bore a hole into the center of the flat side, insert a cotton wick (I used a thick thread), float the transformed nut in a glass of water, and light the wick.

It looks great, but mine only burned for about 10 minutes, and not the promised over-night duration.

It certainly looked pretty! But I was really curious whether the nut would burn all night as promised, and serve as a safe light via flame (presumably the reason for floating the lit nut in water) all night.

Alas, neither nut lasted for more than about 10 minutes of burn-time (I tried one in water and one on a plate). Whether soaking the nuts in lamp oil would have made a difference I’m not sure. But it’s worth a shot! In any event, it was a fun experiment and the next time I have lamp oil on hand, I’ll give it a go again!

 
9 Comments

Posted by on January 9, 2012 in Fun Experiments

 

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