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Self Sufficiency & Homesteading
Serious food gardening, raising homestead animals, and off-grid self reliance from The Nourishing Hearthfire.
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Nostalgia
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We’ve moved into our house in the forest. We haven’t built the mud room/wood storage area yet so every morning I tromp towards the door in my muddy boots and leave bottles of fresh goat milk on the doorstep before taking my boots off. During my husband’s childhood milk was still delivered each day in glass bottles, a layer of cream would rise to the top. The bottles would be washed and returned, reused again and again. In my childhood…
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How to Make Butter Without any Special Equipment
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You don’t need a butter churn to make butter at home, or a even mixer or food processor. All you need to make homemade butter is a bowl, a whisk, and some cream. Ingredients for homemade butter The cream used for making butter should have no additives, just cream, and if it’s créme fraiche for making cultured butter, then it will have cultures as well (here’s my recipe for culturing cream at home). Cultured cream is far far easier to…
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How to Move to the Country with Market Gardening – Homestead Income on 1/5 acre
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Photo credit: here Market gardening as a way to escape the rat race and move to the country One of the things many folks struggle with when wanting to get away from the city and move to the country is income. Since the increased mechanisation of farming less people are needed to work in mainstream farming operations, and there aren’t many jobs available in these areas. People in cities often feel trapped in them, under the assumption that they need…
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Mason Jar Chèvre (easy 1 minute soft cheese)
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An easier way to make soft cheese Chèvre and other soft cheeses are pretty easy to make to begin with, but they usually begins with boiling water and sterilising everything in the boiling water, which adds extra time and hassle to the process. I’ve been getting massive cravings for chèvre, so much that I even looked at soft goats cheese in the shop (before quickly moving away, knowing that I can make better stuff at home) and knew I had…
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We bought a cow.
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For a while I thought it was the wrong decision. I committed to buying this cow assuming that hay prices were the same as the last time I looked. I asked all the questions that I thought I needed to ask, about her personality, udder and teat size, when she’d last calved, and so on. I forgot to ask whether she likes to eat grass. She stands in various places in the paddock, looking around with her big Jersey cow…
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Superkraut (Fermented Salad)
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Why this homemade sauerkraut recipe is so good This kraut is super for a number of reasons: Special superfood ingredient While these vegetables (especially fermented ones) are superfoods in their own right, I like to add iodine-rich sea vegetables to my ferments, to give added nutrition. Fermenting for beginners If you’re new to ferments, or have never successfully fermented before, or aren’t sure why I am recommending the ingredients and techniques that I do, I recommend you read my article…
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7 Secrets to Making Successful Sauerkraut Every Time
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This will help you to make perfect sauerkraut every time.
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Autumn Leaves and Hearth Fires
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The leaves are falling off the trees today. The wind isn’t particularly strong, the day not much different from the last few, it’s just a combination of things that tell the trees it’s time to go to bed. My oldest son climbs up the apple tree to harvest apples, I never see him happier than when he’s harvesting fruit and vegetables, he used to harvest potatoes with me and would jump up and down with excitement whenever one was unearthed.…
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On work
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“I once knew an old lady who lived by herself in the Golfen valley of Herefordshire. She was one of the happiest old women I have met. She described to me all the work she and her mother used to do when she was a child: washing on Monday, butter-making on Tuesday, market on Wednesday, and so on. “It all sounds like a lot of hard work,” I said to her. “Yes, but nobody ever told us then,” she said…
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How to Make Jam Without White Sugar or Pectin
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How to make jam the old fashioned way, without sugar or pectin Jam made with honey brings out the flavour of the fruit, and tastes better than jam made with refined sugar. It keeps well too. Making jam with honey isn’t a very well known skill. There are some recipes around showing how to make jam without sugar, but they’re often designed to be a small batch that’s kept in the fridge and used up quickly, not for serious fruit…
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