Have you met chaga (Inonotus obliquus)? It’s a medicinal “mushroom,” although technically the part that we use is not a true mushroom. Chaga has been used for health maintenance and healing for millennia. It’s an amazing medicine and happens to also have a pleasant taste. We love putting into into spiced winter “chai” tea blends. […]
Most of us gardeners peruse seed catalogues in the fall and winter. After checking out what’s new and interesting, plus covering the bases with our trusty standbys, we place our orders. At that point, all there is to do is await the arrival of our box full of neat little packets. Some folks stick to […]
Acorns look delicious, don’t they? They’re so smooth and appealing in their cute little “cupules” (hats). They are full of nutrition, but they’re also full of bitter, astringent tannins. These are compounds that make raw acorns distasteful and hard to digest. However, people all over the planet, from California to Japan and everywhere in between […]
Aren’t pickles fun? They’re such a great way to preserve the harvest, plus they’re a place to experiment with flavor combinations. Not to mention, pickles of all kinds make great snacks and accompaniments to meals. Here we explore two very different ways to turn vegetables into pickles: lacto-fermentation and vinegar pickling (with a hot-water bath […]
So, you’ve gotten your hands on a deer skin and you want to turn it into leather. This is an exciting moment! We’re going to walk you through how to tan a hide in 10 comprehensive steps with the wet-scrape brain tanning method. Using all natural materials and getting a hide velvety soft […]