After a week of back to back blizzards, the sun came out and the temperature climbed to 50 degrees today. It was SO nice. And today my son Bill and his wife, Kelly came up to help Mom celebrate her 92nd birthday. Of course their son, Mason, came with them and both Greatgrandma and Grandma got to play with him and be wowed by his frequent smiles!

He was afraid of the chickens, but it won’t be long before he’s ready for a pony. His daddy was riding his pony, Sprite, while still in diapers. And they had years of history together. They went to lots and lots of horse shows, to compete with not only kids Bill’s age, but also adults on expensive horses. And you know what? They won a lot! We had Sprite until she was 42; she was a member of the family. I hope we can find Mason such a good pony!

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Readers’ questions:

Cracked corn for chickens

I only have a handful of chickens and have access to pleny of free field corn. I would like to make my own “cracked corn”. What kind of grinder do I need? And, do you have any suggestions on where to get one?. Thank you SO MUCH for all of your help and articles. You are a treasure trove and I bow to your feet. I also have many other questions- how is it best to ask, snail mail or like this?

Grace johnston
Tangier, Indiana

If you have field corn, GREAT!!! You don’t need to crack corn for chickens. They digest it fine whole, and really prefer it that way. There really isn’t a home grinder for cracked corn, other than using your grain mill, which is plenty labor intensive for the results given.

You can certainly ask questions either way. Via snail mail shares the answer with a lot more readers. — Jackie

Uses for pig fat/suet

What are some uses for pig fat/suet, besides lard? Is there other uses such as candles or something? Thank you, I enjoy your writings and the knowledge you give out. This means a lot to me and helps out so much.

Scott Michael
Canyon City, Oregon

You can make soap from pork fat! Candles don’t work because pork fat has a low melting temperature and the candles won’t handle hot temperatures before melting down. (You could make fat oil lamps in a pinch, but I don’t think you’d like the results, otherwise; it tends to smoke and not put out great light.) Soap is a much better alternative. — Jackie

Canning bacon

How does one can bacon?

Kimberly Baxter Packwood
Ames, Iowa

You can home can bacon, but you’ll need “real” bacon, not store bacon, because store bacon is too fat and not “solid” enough to hold up for canning. I canned my own bacon by first smoking it, then cutting it into chunks that would fit into a wide mouth pint or quart jar. You don’t can it sliced. I heat the bacon in a roasting pan, in the oven at 200 degrees until it’s hot all the way through. Then I pack it into hot jars to within 1/2″ of the top. Bacon, as with all meat, is processed for 75 minutes for pints and 90 minutes at quarts, at 10 pounds pressure.(Check your canning manual if you live at an altitude above 1,000 feet and must adjust your pressure to suit your altitude.) Bacon is canned without adding liquid.

Important note: As far as I know, there isn’t an approved method of canning bacon, but this has worked well for me. Consider it an “experimental” method. — Jackie

Canned bacon

This is a response to the question asked by Pete Gibson in the May/June issue regarding canned bacon. It used to be manufactured by Celebrity Foods Canned Bacon but has not been available for approximately 10 years. According to the company’s web site it will soon be available again produced in Ohio under direct license from MRE wholesalers.com. Thought this might be of interest to the readers of BHM. Their web site shows them opening a can that was 20 years old and the product still good. Great idea for storing in case of an emergency.

Bill Lahnen
Lakewood, New York

Thanks for the info, Bill. There’s been a lot of interest in canned bacon, and for good reason; it’s a great product. I’ll be waiting to see it once again on the market! — Jackie

Freecycle groups, dehydrating

I hope you have plowed yourself out. We are getting snow this weekend in PA, but not like you. Thank goodness!! Recently, I joined a “free to join” group -”freecycle”, which, by the way, you probably would love. It’s an organization where people give others what they no longer need to help keep things out of landfills. The main stipulation for being able to join and participate is that every thing is “free”, absolutely no money exchanged. Today I received a slightly used dehydrator. If it’s been used, I would be really surprised, it’s still in the original box and spanking clean.

I’ve noticed that in several of your answers to questions, you mention your preference for dehydrating. Could you please tell me what you dehydrate and give me some tips for success. Onions are on sale for a really good price this week. I use a lot of onions and wanted to know if you have been successful drying them and how you do it. Also, potatoes. After they are dried … can’t they be used for frying, mashed or only in casseroles? What’s the storage method?

If you are interested in more information about “freecycle”, go to www.freecycle.org then browse the many groups by specific states. There are groups all over the US and possibly in your area, which might help you get things you need for your homestead and also possibly help someone else. Today was the first time I requested one of the offers and have gratefully benefited. Thanks for any advise you have time to offer. Since your advice helps me all the time, I hope I have given you something to help you too.

Rosemarie Wesolek
Mahaffey, Pennsylvania

I’m sure many readers will pick up on your tip about freecycle. I do know about them, but just don’t have the time to go so far out of town; there’s none within 35 miles of us and most of the better stuff
is in Duluth, 80 some miles south. Mom kind of ties me down as to my “going”. I dehydrate a whole lot of foods, as well as canning them. I dehydrate peas, carrots, onions, fruits of all kinds, asparagus, tomatoes, corn, squash, jerky and a whole lot more. Onions are dead easy; I just slice them into whole rounds, then lay them on the dehydrator trays, in a single layer. When they are dry, I either put them in jars that way or whiz them through the blender to make chunks or powder. These, I put on cookie sheets in the oven, with only the pilot light on and stir until they are really dry; they tend to clump without this extra drying.

To do potatoes, I slice them into salt water to keep them from blackening. Then I drain them and drop them into boiling water for a minute. Then I drain them and lay them out onto the dehydrator trays. The boiling keeps them fromdarkening during dehydrating. No, you can’t make French fries out of them, but you can rehydrate them and then make fried potatoes out of them. Or you can make potatoes augratin, scalloped potatoes or the like. Dehydrated foods are very good and take up little room on the shelf. I lovethat! — Jackie

Gooseberries not producing

I ordered & planted some Gooseberrys plants May-2005.They were 2 yr.old plants called (Hinnonmaki ) the red kind.Well they have never produced anything but they grew. Last fall I moved them & replanted to another place as I thought that might help. Why don’t they produce any fruit? What am i doing wrong? Thanks for the great info you give..

Sharon Beck
Sikeston, Missouri

Have patience. Most trees and shrubs, including gooseberries need a little time to sink their roots down and get over the shock of transplanting. This can take a year or more; often several years.
Moving them just delayed things. If they’re getting sunlight, a little compost and kept weed free, you will get fruit. — Jackie

You know that storm that was heading for us?  Well it got here.  And how!  Saturday night it started.  Then by Sunday morning, we had a foot and the snow was still falling heavily.  Just think, Saturday morning I was in my garden, looking at the nice soil, with the frost nearly all gone out of it, thinking that I could begin tilling it the next day.  My multiplier onions were starting to poke up, looking nice, green and lush.

David hung the plow back on the Ford truck Sunday, and started plowing our driveway.  Unfortunately, it never did get cold and the ground was muddy under the snow.  And the snow was heavy and wet.  You know how it is when you shovel heavy wet snow?  It won’t come off the shovel and each shovel weighs a ton?  Same deal with the snow plow.  It just didn’t plow worth a darn and the drive was a mire.  He didn’t dare drop the plow all the way down or he would have thrown off a whole lot of gravel and dirt with the snow.

Then he was trying to shove snow off the drive in some open spots, to get rid of it; the drive gets awfully narrow when you plow this kind of snow because it doesn’t throw off into the woods.  Well in one of those spots was a spring he’d forgotten about and he dropped the front of the truck into it, right down to the plow frame.

Luckily he had his cell phone with him and he called me, asking me to bring the old blue truck to pull him out.  To make a long story short, it drive was too icy and he was stuck too badly.  No dice.

So back home we went to get the dozer, our last hope.  Fortunately, it started and I followed him back to the truck.  He lined the dozer’s blade up with the truck’s plow and shoved it back out of the spring.  Even with the dozer, it had to snort to push that hard.  Whew!

This morning it was still snowing.  We now have over 26″ on the ground; all wet, heavy snow over mud.  David plowed for neighbors and friends today, as well as doing our drive again.  But bad luck dogged us again; he found he has two cracks in the transmission housing!  Oh chiching!  $$$$$  OUCH.  I felt like going to bed and pulling the covers over my head.  And it’s still snowing…….

Readers’ questions:

Saving seeds

Dear Jackie,
I just became a subscriber to your magazine and I really have learned a lot from your blog.  My girlfriend and I have been growing a large garden for two years and we save our own seed (ex. beans okra pumpkin ect…) but my question is how do you save seed from vegetables like carrots, onions, beets, and cabbage? Thanks for you advice.

Challis Moffitt
Ramseur, NC

To save seeds from these vegetables, you just have to overwinter the “mother” plants in a cold, dark root cellar or unheated corner of the basement.

Then in the spring, just plant them outside and watch them grow.  They’ll then make seed.  But don’t expect the mother plants to look like they did the year before.  Carrots look “wild”, beets rank and cabbages strange as the send up a seed stalk.  Just let them do their thing and give them good care.  You’ll get your seed in abundance.  Enjoy! — Jackie

Keeping hens in Winter

I have a question for you about chickens. We raise a mixed flock of turkeys, ducks and meat chickens each summer, but we don’t keep any over the winter for eggs. I’d like to keep a couple of egg layers, but I’m wondering how many is the minimum number to keep each other warm over our northern Minnesota winters. We do have electricty available in our pole barn, but I’d prefer not to have to run a heat lamp all winter long. Also, do you have a suggestion for the best type of coop for just a few hens?

Carmen Griggs
Bovey, MN

You’re right in that you’ll need at least half a dozen hens to provide enough body heat to keep them warm enough over winter.  And even with that number, you’ll need to provide a relatively small,insulated coop
so that so few chickens will stay warm enough.  If you insulate and build a small coop, say five feet by 6 feet and with a low ceiling, they should remain comfortable.  In addition, it’d be a good idea to keep a light bulb in the coop.  Not a heat lamp, but just a plain incandescent bulb.  Not only will it give heat and not kill your pocketbook, but it will fool the hens’ bodies into thinking there are longer days and make them lay eggs despite winter.

You can let the “girls” out of the coop on milder days and just shut them in at night.  They seem to do  well this way and enjoy a stroll in the sunshine. — Jackie

Canning beef

I have a black angus cow that we just had too butcher. We only had a pocket knife and a sawsall to work with. It was eather kill it or have it run over on the road. We could not keep it in the field. You would think that with close to a hundred achers finced it would not be a problem. Now The meet didn’t hang and it dosn’t taste like beef, is there any way too can it and use it later and have it taste better? I have plenty of jar and 2 large canners with gages so canning is not a problem. thanks

Brenda Jarrell
Varnville, South Carolina

Yes, you can sure can up that meat.  The best way I’ve found is to partially precook the meat, browning it, either as steaks, roast slices or stewing beef.  The ground meat is also browned first.  You can add some spices, but beware of adding too much as it gets stronger with processing.  I think you’ll find your beef tastes just fine that way and will provide a whole lot of meals for your family.

Precooked meat is processed at 10 pounds pressure for 75 minutes for pints and 90 minutes for quarts.  I add enough broth to just cover the meat, leaving an inch of headroom in the jar.  (If you live at an altitude over 1,000 feet, consult your canning manual for instructions on increasing your pressure to suit your altitude. — Jackie