July - August 2020

Grit

Rural American Know-How

Grit2 min readCooking, Food & Wine
Preparing To Preserve
This week, I’m dusting off the canning gear and making sure every sealing ring and gauge is in good working order. I want to be ready when the tomatoes, peaches, and green beans start to come in. More pertinently, I want to be prepared, because I’ve
Grit3 min read
WIT & WISDOM
The most popular homegrown edible plant is surely a healthy tomato, just as the most disappointing one is undoubtedly a diseased tomato. For a bountiful crop, keep an eye out for these spoilers, and act accordingly: Blossom-end rot is a dark or water
Grit1 min read
Grit Magazine
RYAN CROWELL, Lead Editor OSCAR H. WILL III, Editor at Large CHRISTIAN WILLIAMS, Editorial Director REBECCA MARTIN, Group Editor, Rural Lifestyles LANDON HALL, Group Editor, Collectibles TRACI SMITH, Senior Editor CAITLIN WILSON, Senior Managing Edit
Grit5 min read
Skunked
I grew up on a 70-acre farm in central Ohio. We had cows, chickens, horses, and a mule team rescued from an auction. I have such fond memories of my childhood. On my sixth birthday, I was elated when my parents gave me an adorable 3-month-old fox ter
Grit3 min read
Catching Up
JOIN THE CONVERSATION (www.Grit.com/Homemade-Bread) William Laut: I’m taking the next step in my baking by buying a grain mill so I can mill my own flour. Not only does it lower the cost to about 26 cents per pound, but it also preserves the nutrient
Grit1 min read
Looking For
I’m looking for any seeds, stamps, stickers, stationery, postcards, and coupons. Joe Perlot 3321 E. Almeria Rd. Phoenix, AZ 85008-3839 My grandson is looking for vintage bumper stickers that advertise rural and small-town radio stations for a communi
Grit7 min read
Frugal FARMER
I’m gazing at three pigs under the white light of a headlamp. They’re snorting, oinking, and rooting around their new enclosure in the dark after a nearly three-hour drive to get to my farm — they’re already hankering for some food. I’m not too keen
Grit5 min read
Companion Planting With Vegetables And Flowers
Each spring, I grow legions of onions and shallots from seed, and my biggest challenge is keeping them weeded. Last year, I planted pinches of arugula between the short rows of shallots, and the leafy, fast-growing arugula smothered any weeds and sho
Grit4 min read
Coronavirus Anxieties Lead To Seed Scarcity
The coronavirus pandemic upended business as usual for our seed company friends. Due to wildly increased demand, many were forced to temporarily shut down website orders and stop answering phone calls and emails. Four companies answered our questions
Grit5 min readCooking, Food & Wine
Cool As A Cucumber
More often than not, there’s a cucumber salad on my dinner table in the summertime. Any leftover salad is eagerly finished the next day, served atop scrambled eggs, spooned up with a hunk of feta, or stuffed into a pita pocket with turkey for a quick
Grit6 min read
HOW TO ORDER A SIDE OF Beef
I was cleaning up my knives after a presentation at the Texas Mother Earth News Fair when an elderly man approached the stage. He smiled up at me and said, “Nobody’s ever going to do the stuff you’re telling them. They’re too lazy.” I remembered his
Grit5 min readAgriculture
Nose-to-Tail Ordering Tips from Readers
I live in rural Kansas, where my family raises beef cattle. We frequently get requests for locally raised beef. Here are my suggestions. First, consider what your family likes to eat. If you love a certain cut or dish, then order more of that. My hus
Grit7 min readCooking, Food & Wine
Render A Light In The Darkness
Turning ordinary animal fats into candles for emergency lighting is one of the easiest self-reliance skills to master. These plain, old-fashioned candles begin by rendering fat into tallow, and then forming that tallow into candles using minimal equi
Grit7 min read
SeekingOut SCRAPS
Have you ever been in the middle of a woodworking project and fallen just one piece short? Or been making roof repairs during a break in a storm, but then discover there’s not a single piece to fit the space you’re covering? What do you do? Both of t
Grit1 min readCooking, Food & Wine
Sample Cut Sheets
FOREQUARTER (NECK TO END OF RIB) Cuts from Chuck Primal Rolled boneless neck roast Chuck eye steaks Boneless chuck roasts Denver steaks Petite tender Ranch steaks Ground beef Soup bones Cuts from Foreshank/Brisket Primal Boneless brisket Ground beef
Grit2 min read
Making a Trivet
When making a trivet, the type of wood isn’t as important as the size. Whether you’re using scraps of wood flooring or pine boards, the wood should be no less than ¾ inch thick. You’ll likely be putting hot and heavy pans on the trivet, so you want i
Grit5 min read
WILD Elderberries
Many years ago, after my wife and I had established our first homestead, a friend came out to visit. As we walked around the property, Ben would occasionally bend down, collecting what seemed to me to be nothing but weeds or bark or other scraps of p
Grit2 min read
Hive-Body Wax Melter
If you have more wax than the pot method can handle, the hive-body wax melter should suit your needs. This is as simple as the pot melter, with the added benefit of handling a 9-by-13-inch pan’s worth of wax in a single session. Another benefit of th
Grit5 min read
The Sour Power of Sumac
In nature, one man’s pest is another man’s pearl. Dandelions are often considered pesky weeds; nettles seem a most unlikely side dish; and sumac may look like just another roadside shrub. To the resourceful, however, all of these plants are desirable
Grit8 min read
GRIT RECOMMENDED PRODUCTS for Wiser Living
Whether you’re making Cajun biscuits and gravy or peach cobbler, cast-iron cookware is always the perfect pan for the job. One Pan to Rule Them All is filled with 100 recipes perfect for cooking in a skillet on the stovetop or outdoors on a grill or
Grit4 min read
Owning an Oberhasli Goat
If you’re a cheese lover, or a hiker, you’re sure to become a fan of the Oberhasli goat. In the mountainous regions of Switzerland where the breed originated, they’re known as gemsfarbige gebirgsziege, or “chamois-colored goat,” in reference to their
Grit4 min read
Portable POULTRY
Permanent chicken houses and fenced runs are wonderful if you have the space and the means to keep them clean, compost the litter, and spread it around. However, if you want your chickens to be productive workers in your yard and garden, you might wa
Grit6 min read
Mine Your Own Beenwax
If you’re into bees, whether you keep one hive or a thousand, you know that the wish list of equipment can seem endless — and expensive. Some items are an absolute must, such as hive bodies, frames, a hive tool, and, most would argue, a smoker and a
Grit9 min read
BACK To OUR Roots
Back in 2015, you might have noticed a new product in the beer aisle called Not Your Father’s Root Beer. This was an alcoholic beer, 5.9 percent alcohol by volume (ABV), that tasted like root beer soda. Depending on your father’s age, the name was li

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