Dog Cheese

...nd in our nation’s supermarkets simply isn’t worthy of the table. As urban homesteaders we’re particularly interested in finding sources of food in our dense concrete jungles, and we are not alone. The movement is full of solutions to small scale animal husbandry: from pigmy goats, to pot-bellied pigs, city dwellers are trying to do that farm thing in the city–but sometimes with limited success. So we were thrilled to find out that one of the best...

Read…

A Homegrown Revolution manifesto by way of a short (true) story.

1. Fitness is part of the urban homesteading thing So on our daily bike ride to the downtown YMCA we spotted four tires laying by the side of the road. 2. Try to grow as much food as you can Tires are a great way to grow potatoes–we’ll explain this when we try it ourselves. Meanwhile you can read about doing this, as well as many other uses for old tires in the informative archives of Backwoods Home Magazine. 3. Cargo bikes rule Later on in the d...

Read…

A Sports Utility Bicycle

...reeRadical Hitchless Trailer Kit that I bought on ebay combined with an old 1980s mountain bike. This is the bike I would recommend – an older mountain bike without front suspension, which adds weight and is not necessary for urban riding. And remember that the kit does not work on bikes with rear suspension. I would, however, recommend buying straight from the company as the kits don’t seem to be selling on ebay at a significant discount. Putting...

Read…

Moonshine

...preferably from a source that will lend itself to a pretty picture on the label — bottle it, and you’re in the vodka business.” As it turns out there is an art to good homemade moonshine — a far cry from the soulless mouthwash Archer-Daniels-Midlands turns out. Here’s some excerpts from an interview of ex-moonshiner John Bowman conducted by the Coal River Folklife Project from “Tending the Commons: Folklife and Landscape in Southern West Virginia...

Read…

Quince: the “Poster Child of Slowness”

...bor was nice enough to pop by with some she bought local Asian market. The label must have lost something in translation, but refers to a variety called “Pineapple quince”. Karp points out in his article that this is the most prevalent commercial variety. When picked fresh it could conceivably be eaten raw, though the commercial stuff ain’t fresh. Quince is indeed, as one of Karp’s sources notes, “the poster child of slowness.” I tried to make som...

Read…