Warning: This Blog is Based in a Mediterranean Climate

January 16, 2013

...Why? Because it’s really, really boring. Nothing ever happens. Most of the time it’s sunny. Around this time of year it rains occasionally. In June it’s kinda cloudy. That’s all there is to say. For those of you who live here in Southern Calfiornia I’ve found a few good sources for edible gardening information: The Digitalseed Vegetable Planting Calendar and the Digitalseed Flower Planting Calendar Books: The New Western Garden Book: The Ultimate...

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I Made an Enzo Mari Table and So Can You

Mr. Homegrown

October 24, 2023

Design

6 Comments

...terial than the examples in this book. I experienced my own contradictions making this table. Using reclaimed lumber meant the base was free but the decking material used for the top (it’s an outdoor table) was expensive. And my little modernist experiments in furniture–this table and my Gerrit Rietveld chairs–live outside, while a Medievalist arts and crafts fantasy plays out in the furniture I’ve build for the inside of the house. Such is the fa...

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Baking Bread with Specialty Malts

Mr. Homegrown

June 13, 2016

Beer, Bread, Food

2 Comments

...king and just use malted grains directly in your bread. The grains used in making beer are, mostly, barley that has been malted (sprouted) and then either caramelized or roasted. To make beer you soak the grains in warm water to extract the sugars that form in the malting process. Fermenting that sugary malt water creates alcohol. Most of the grain used to make beer is two or six-row malt. You add so-called “specialty” grains (that have been caram...

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Bushcraft Video

Mrs. Homegrown

March 29, 2013

Appropriate Technology, Preparedness

22 Comments

...isplay and discussion of such implements–which seems a very masculine past time. But that’s generalizing, because I can attest that around our house, I’m the one with the fetish for sharp blades. And fire. And making things out of tin cans. Anyway, there are many bushcrafters on video, but only a few rise to the top. Many–many–are hampered by poor sound quality and camera work. Their info may be good, but if I can’t hear them, or see them, I’m cli...

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The New Homemade Kitchen

Mr. Homegrown

June 26, 2020

Fermentation, Food, Food Preservation, Recipes, Reviews

3 Comments

...le of the IDT’s methods. Yes, you get a Martini recipe. But you’ll also be making your own vermouth and it will be easier than you think. Then there’s the life changing chapter on coffee roasting. One of the perks of teaching at the IDT was getting to sit in on the other classes. This was how I learned to roast my own coffee in a Whirley-Pop roaster. Like a lot of IDT obsessions, roasting your own coffee simultaneously up-scales and bomb proofs yo...

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