Ashes to ashes...

[Peregrine]

Greetings all you foragers and nomads and settlers and bears and -and...
I am a newborn baby on this forum and I have lots of questions, starting with this: Can anybody tell me what to do with all the ashes? Can it be used for paint or anything but just throwing it to the wind...? If so, how? I'd appreciate any suggestions. Thank You.

 

[soup_monger]

Hello Peregrine and welcome to BCUK.
What kind of ashes are you writing about?

 

[torjusg]

Maybe you could use it to buck skin.

Torjus Gaaren

 

[Daniel]

Hi,

Welcome to BCUK!

I suppose you're talking about ashes from a fire?
On one of Ray Mears' episodes, I think it was the last episode in Great Britain from his most recent series, he boiled some ashes up in water, and then soaked some bark in it (I think it was willow...)

He did this, if I can remember right, to make it softer, or more durable, to make cord out of...

I think that's right, its a while since I watched it so can't remember all the details. I'm sure someone on the forum will know what i'm on about!

Dan

 

[running bare]

i think you can make soap with ash and pig fat iirc or something like that

 

[pierre girard]

Greetings all you foragers and nomads and settlers and bears and -and...
I am a newborn baby on this forum and I have lots of questions, starting with this: Can anybody tell me what to do with all the ashes? Can it be used for paint or anything but just throwing it to the wind...? If so, how? I'd appreciate any suggestions. Thank You.

To make lye:

Make a trough of two boards in a V shape, slanting slightly to one end. Fill the trough with ashes. Place a collection basin on the ground at the lower end of the trough. Let water run slowly through the trough. Lye is ready when the solution in the basin will float a potato.

Can be used for making soap or sloughing hair from hides.

PG

 

[Peregrine]

thanks to all of you. its a wonderful feeling when you ask and get answers.
btw i did mean fire ashes, sorry for not being specific.
p :You_Rock_

 

[BorderReiver]

Boil up horses hoof fungus with wood ash to make tinder.

 

[Spikey DaPikey]

Hi and welcome

 

[jdlenton]

hello and welcome to BCUK


James

 

[Tor helge]

You can use the lye of ashes to make "lutefisk" .

Welcome to the forums from a fellow norwegian.

Tor

 

[g4ghb]

hello mate and welcome - this really is a great place to hang out. Its full of friendly people that are always there to help!

BTW - Tor, what on earth is a Lutefisk?

 

[pierre girard]

You can use the lye of ashes to make "lutefisk" .

Welcome to the forums from a fellow norwegian.

Tor

Lutefisk!

Great stuff - if you need to fume the wallpaper off your walls. Cooking it also rids your house of vermin.

When we were young, my mother, who is not any part Scandinavian, would try to make lutefisk, as my father liked the stuff. She never cooked it right. It was horrible. You could have sucked it up with a straw. It reminded me of nothing so much as a large pale gob of snot. I have this memory of all of us kids sitting around the table crying because my father would make us eat this stuff. He'd tell us to mix it with our potatos (just made the potatos taste awful). Then he'd tell us to hold our nose when we took a bite. Even as a child, I remember thinking, "If you have to hold your nose to eat it - what's the point?"

I've had it in more recent years - cooked by someone who knew what they were doing, and it is edible - only just.

We were surprised, when some relations came to visit us from Norway, that they'd never heard of it.

PG

 

[ilan]

Hi i am a newbie to. i always feel a tinge of sadness when i come across an old fire site i think it only fair that you leave a site without any trace of a fire and to that end you should soak the fire ash untill very wet stir with first a stick then your hands now you know the fire is out and put the ash into the woods away from the site replace the grass sods you dug out or scratch the surface and scatter any seeds you find grass etc or cover with old leaves . job done ian

 

[Seagull]

Greetings all you foragers and nomads and settlers and bears and -and...
I am a newborn baby on this forum and I have lots of questions, starting with this: Can anybody tell me what to do with all the ashes? Can it be used for paint or anything but just throwing it to the wind...? If so, how? I'd appreciate any suggestions. Thank You.

Keep the Ashes in England, m8, keep em in England!

Ceeg

 

[Willowbark]

Hi and welcome.
I use ashes for getting the hair off hides before tanning them, either in a solution with water, or just spread over a hide which is then folded up and put in a plastic bag (how long, depends on the weather ~ the hotter it is, the quicker the hair "slips")
Mind you, it's really stinky!

 

[Ketchup]

You can use the lye of ashes to make "lutefisk" .
Tor

Interesting. I had Lutefisk on Senia Island (near Tromsö) once, and I'm sure it's just an excuse to have more aquavit (Linien, of course).
This said, how do you make it? Soak the stockfish in any quantity of white ashes and water, or is it more technical than that?