Some More Questions for British Red
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They leached lye from wood ash. Set up a cloth funnel like apparatus and fill it with ashes from the fire (i think oak is best) then pour water in and catch it as it drips out. run it back through a couple time to concentrate.
They would make lye. Lye is a solution of potassium hydroxide created by filtering water through wood ash. It is then boiled down to a known concentration - crudely when an egg will float in it but soap makers of old used a weighted stick with a mark on it - a crude form of hydrometer used to measure specific gravity. This would then be mixed with processed animal fat (tallow) and stirred until saponification (change in molecular structure to soap from oil and alkali) occurred.
I enjoy a great number of "projects". I like to be able to get back to basics and understand "how" things work and why. I think its an extension of the child who disassembles his radio to see where the sound comes from.
I would like, ultimately, to be as "self sustaining" as possible. I find a certain paradox in bushcraft. That paradox is that we actively pursue the saving of skills that are thousands of years old. All the while we are losing skills that would have been commonplace to our parents and grandparents, Preserving our own food, making the things we need from scratch, not wasting the things we need. In John Seymours seminal book (The New Complete Book of Self Sufficiency) he describes a well run small holding as requiring "nothing to be delivered and nothing collected".
In a simple way I would like to pursue that dream. Not in a fluffy "Good Life" way (those who know me would never describe me as a fluffy) but in that I think it makes good sense from lots of standpoints - environmental, social, personal and financial. Its not that I wish to withdraw from the advances of the twenty first century - we all need proper healthcare and access to education for example. I don't find myself needing many of the "consumer doodads" of modern life though. My luxury is perhaps the internet - I love the access to information that it grants me. I try to "put something back" on the internet as a "thank you" to the community that furnishes me with so much learning in the way of the little pictorial guides that I do.
Anyway, to answer your question, the latest little project I am doing is trying to create high quality vinegar from scratch. Under the "nothing in, nothing out" rule (which is an absurdity logically when you consider a metal tool unless you have and mine and refine your own ore), food preservation is fairly complex, Clearly pickling etc. is perhaps the next simplest method after drying. So the goal is to create a simple and sustainable process to create a good quality vinegar from what I have in my garden only. I believe I have succeeded but the early experiments show that home made vinegar comes out to something like 10%acid whereas shop bought vinegars are around 5%. The problem is its not constant. So, in order to overcome this obstacle I have to create, from scratch, a pH titration kit. This of course also has to come from my garden etc. Some research shows that this is in fact possible utilising red cabbage water as a litmus solution. I can then titrate a known strength vinegar and measure the strength of my home brewed vinegar against it.
Its been a fascinating little foray into a bit of chemistry, some entymology, a bit of biology and a fair degree of home economics
. I was an easily distracted scholar at best but, as I get older, I find myself more interested in the practical application of these subjects against what I consider to be a useful output. I will be oddly proud to produce an acceptable vinegar out of garden produce, measure its strength, prepare and bottle it and then use it to make my pickles and chutneys.
I fully accept its much simpler to go to a supermarket, but it interests me in the same way soap making does and, for me at least, its better than watching soap operas.
Red
I enjoy a great number of "projects". I like to be able to get back to basics and understand "how" things work and why. I think its an extension of the child who disassembles his radio to see where the sound comes from.
I would like, ultimately, to be as "self sustaining" as possible. I find a certain paradox in bushcraft. That paradox is that we actively pursue the saving of skills that are thousands of years old. All the while we are losing skills that would have been commonplace to our parents and grandparents, Preserving our own food, making the things we need from scratch, not wasting the things we need. In John Seymours seminal book (The New Complete Book of Self Sufficiency) he describes a well run small holding as requiring "nothing to be delivered and nothing collected".
In a simple way I would like to pursue that dream. Not in a fluffy "Good Life" way (those who know me would never describe me as a fluffy) but in that I think it makes good sense from lots of standpoints - environmental, social, personal and financial. Its not that I wish to withdraw from the advances of the twenty first century - we all need proper healthcare and access to education for example. I don't find myself needing many of the "consumer doodads" of modern life though. My luxury is perhaps the internet - I love the access to information that it grants me. I try to "put something back" on the internet as a "thank you" to the community that furnishes me with so much learning in the way of the little pictorial guides that I do.
Anyway, to answer your question, the latest little project I am doing is trying to create high quality vinegar from scratch. Under the "nothing in, nothing out" rule (which is an absurdity logically when you consider a metal tool unless you have and mine and refine your own ore), food preservation is fairly complex, Clearly pickling etc. is perhaps the next simplest method after drying. So the goal is to create a simple and sustainable process to create a good quality vinegar from what I have in my garden only. I believe I have succeeded but the early experiments show that home made vinegar comes out to something like 10%acid whereas shop bought vinegars are around 5%. The problem is its not constant. So, in order to overcome this obstacle I have to create, from scratch, a pH titration kit. This of course also has to come from my garden etc. Some research shows that this is in fact possible utilising red cabbage water as a litmus solution. I can then titrate a known strength vinegar and measure the strength of my home brewed vinegar against it.
Its been a fascinating little foray into a bit of chemistry, some entymology, a bit of biology and a fair degree of home economics
. I was an easily distracted scholar at best but, as I get older, I find myself more interested in the practical application of these subjects against what I consider to be a useful output. I will be oddly proud to produce an acceptable vinegar out of garden produce, measure its strength, prepare and bottle it and then use it to make my pickles and chutneys.I fully accept its much simpler to go to a supermarket, but it interests me in the same way soap making does and, for me at least, its better than watching soap operas.
Red
Succinct brevity is one of my trademarks.
Of course, I love listening to you ramble. Very interesting side notes.
Of course, I love listening to you ramble. Very interesting side notes.
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