Search Results for: label/build it/page/5/2011/04/making-it

455 results

L’hamd markad – Preserved Salted Lemons

Mr. Homegrown
Fermentation, Food
2 Comments
One of the big problems with citrus trees is that you get a whole lot of fruit all at one time. There are two ways to deal with this–share the harvest and/or preserve it. Homegrown Revolution has done both this week by mooching some lemons off of a friend’s tree and preserving them by making one of the essential ingredients of Moroccan food, L’hamd markad or preserved salted lemons. L’hamd markad is easy to make. HereR...

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Make a Spore Print

Mr. Homegrown
Mushrooms
5 Comments
Making a mushroom spore print is a fun activity for the kidlings and it’s simple: 1. Pick a mushroom (from the wild or the supermarket) and break off the stem. 2. Put your mushroom, spore side down, on a piece of white paper (or a 50/50 split of of dark paper and white paper to check subtleties in the color). 3. Put a glass over the mushroom and wait 24 hours. The next day you should have something that looks like the picture above. Spore...

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Alternatives to the Funeral Industrial Complex

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
40 Comments
urtail the rights of any alternatives to their products and services. In Louisiana the State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors, staffed almost entirely by funeral directors, tried to shut down a group of monks who were making and selling simple wooden caskets. And let’s not even get into the horrific tales of abuse, theft of dental fillings, reusing graves, etc. The good news is that there seems to be a growing alternative funeral mo...

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Laundry to Landscape Legal in LA

Mr. Homegrown
Water and Power, Water Conservation
4 Comments
8220;free”, “zero time for compliance” legal systems that are better, and can be installed by professionals instead of having to do it yourself. This involves surrendering the illusion of control, in trade for actually making things better on the ground.” By foregoing permits, city government can play a role in encouraging greywater. Legalizing the practice makes it possible for professional plumbers to do the installations in addit...

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Home Baked Bread in Five Minutes

Mr. Homegrown
Bread, Food
9 Comments
...ipe can be worked into all but the most crazed work schedule. But our recipe does rely on equipment and tools, specifically a heavy duty mixer and a wooden bread form. This month’s issue of Mother Earth News has a bread making solution for those of you unwilling to make the investment in the mixer or unable to fit the long rise times of wild yeast bread into your work schedule. The article, “Five Minutes a Day for Fresh-Baked Bread...

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Make an Aluminum Can Lamp

Mr. Homegrown
Preparedness
RLeave a comment
Inspired by an article in Wilderness Way, SuriviveLA made our own post-apocalyptic lighting out of two aluminum cans. According to the author of that article, Del Gideon, the Vietnamese used to make these lamps back during the war. You can also use these lamps to heat up water. Making one is easy: 1. Remove the top off a can. We like to do this by scoring the inner ring of the top with a razor blade and then using a pair of pliers to bust it o...

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CooKit Solar Cooker Made Out of Wood

Mr. Homegrown
Solar, Water and Power
6 Comments
The nice folks at Solar Cookers International gave us permission to reprint plans for their CooKit solar cooker in our book Making It. You can access those plans, as well as many other solar cooker projects, for free, on their website here. I’ve made CooKits out of cardboard and aluminum foil a couple of times. One problem is that I eventually bang up the cardboard and I’ve got to make a new one. This summer I had a lot of  1/4 inc...

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Vote Yes on 2 (if you’re in Cali)

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
4 Comments
Homegrown Evolution ain’t making any political endorsements regarding that little election thingy happening tomorrow, with the exception of California’s Proposition 2, a measure that would, “prohibit the cruel confinement of farm animals in a manner that does not allow them to tum around freely, lie down, stand up, and fully extend their limbs.” Whether you are left, right, center, libertarian, carnivore, vegetarian or no...

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New Year’s Resolutions

Mr. Homegrown
Reviews, Thoughtstylings
5 Comments
to consider Adrià’s point of view even if I disagree. 2. Speaking of Adrià’s creativity–he spends half the year developing new methods in Barcelona and the other half the year working at the remote El Bulli. Making the time for creative thinking is essential, I believe. Even after co-writing two how-to books I find myself spending too much time answering emails and not enough time growing, tinkering and building things. Adrià ha...

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Garden Design: Quantity vs. Quality

Mr. Homegrown
Design, Garden Design, Gardening
5 Comments
...them on a wall and see which ones pop out. I think Kelly made more than the three drawings we saved, but we certainly could have done more–I’d say 20 minimum. Part of what we learn by focusing on quantity is about making mistakes and learning from them. But I think there’s more to it than that. A gifted high school English teacher of mined likened our creativity to a tank of water. Sometimes you have to drain off the not so grea...

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