In our eclectic library of green and gardening books, this is one of my favourites. I combines being a coffee-table “pretty” book and a great starting point for most smallholding topics. There are a couple of sections that I find invaluable: there is a better guide to deep digging than that inHow to Grow more [...]
Archive for the ‘peak oil’ Category
2 Feb
Cheaper, better – vegan – bread – the results
I’ve finally tried the Real Bread recipe from my “Baking cheaper, better bread” post. I have to admit I was pretty sceptical. about a third of the yeast I usually use, no sugar to feed it and no butter? I put it into my standard one-hour breadmaker cycle and was expecting a flat, solid, uninspiring [...]
31 Jan
How much food can you grow around your house?
Another great interview from Peak Moment TV. One woman’s experiment to see how much food she could grow from her own garden. She has bees, chickens and rainwater harvesting – it’s an inspiring video – take half an hour to watch, or at least listen, to one person’s view on sustainability and resilience – and the [...]
26 Jan
Baking cheaper, better bread
An interesting challenge this – a comment from Chris Young from the the Real Bread Campaign on my post on “how much does it cost to bake your own bread“. Apparently I can make delicious bread without the sugar or milk – Chris gave a link to this Real Bread recipe. I haven’t had a chance to try [...]
19 Jan
First signs of new life
A strange mid-winter warm spell has me feeling ridiculously springlike. In contrast to the -10c we were experiencing before Christmas, it’s now a balmy +12c. It’s not just me noticing the change – the garden is awakening. The broad-leaved sorrel is the first of the perennials to re-emerge from the softening ground, and the ivory [...]
17 Jan
Our Woodburning Rocket Stove
Rocket stoves are an incredibly efficient way to burn wood – they burn hot enough that they burn both the wood, and the gases it emits. While people do build them into their houses, I was looking for a simple one for outside for occasional and emergency use. You can build your own, and lots [...]
15 Jan
Still harvesting!
In spite of the snow and big freeze before Christmas (it got down below -10c) we have been able to keep harvesting food from the aquaponics and under the fleece tunnels. The pic on the left is perennial spinach, and the one below is the first of our aquaponic leeks heading for the dinner table. [...]
12 Jan
Saving Poppy seeds
As the snow has finally gone and the temperature is heading up into double figures we’ve been taking the opportunity to get back out into the garden and get it ready for the new growing season. As part of that tidying up we started weeding some of the more overgrown areas of the garden and [...]
29 Dec
Happy New Year!
It’s been a great 2010 at the Trafford Eco-House, we’ve not posted updates recently not due to lack of activity, but the opposite! The garden’s been going well and we’ve got trout and beds of winter veg surviving the snow. The pace isn’t going to stop in 2011 though, this is the year when the [...]
11 Aug
The Trout are growing well!
We’ve just got back from a week away, and in our absence the trout were being fed by an automatic fish-feeder. They seem to be pretty happy with that arrangement as they now look huge – at least in comparison to when we left! We weighed them to see and their weight is now over [...]
