The Prairie Homestead Cookbook


Book Description

Jill Winger, creator of the award-winning blog The Prairie Homestead, introduces her debut The Prairie Homestead Cookbook, including 100+ delicious, wholesome recipes made with fresh ingredients to bring the flavors and spirit of homestead cooking to any kitchen table. With a foreword by bestselling author Joel Salatin The Pioneer Woman Cooks meets 100 Days of Real Food, on the Wyoming prairie. While Jill produces much of her own food on her Wyoming ranch, you don’t have to grow all—or even any—of your own food to cook and eat like a homesteader. Jill teaches people how to make delicious traditional American comfort food recipes with whole ingredients and shows that you don’t have to use obscure items to enjoy this lifestyle. And as a busy mother of three, Jill knows how to make recipes easy and delicious for all ages. "Jill takes you on an insightful and delicious journey of becoming a homesteader. This book is packed with so much easy to follow, practical, hands-on information about steps you can take towards integrating homesteading into your life. It is packed full of exciting and mouth-watering recipes and heartwarming stories of her unique adventure into homesteading. These recipes are ones I know I will be using regularly in my kitchen." - Eve Kilcher These 109 recipes include her family’s favorites, with maple-glazed pork chops, butternut Alfredo pasta, and browned butter skillet corn. Jill also shares 17 bonus recipes for homemade sauces, salt rubs, sour cream, and the like—staples that many people are surprised to learn you can make yourself. Beyond these recipes, The Prairie Homestead Cookbook shares the tools and tips Jill has learned from life on the homestead, like how to churn your own butter, feed a family on a budget, and experience all the fulfilling satisfaction of a DIY lifestyle.




A Guide to Residential Wood Heating


Book Description

This publication is intended to help plan a successful installation of a wood-burning heating system and to use the system in the most safe and effective way. Topics covered include: low-emission wood burning technology; wood heating options, including space heaters, wood stoves, conventional and high-efficiency fireplaces, pellet stoves, high thermal mass masonry heaters, and central heating; planning a space heater installation; installation safety; installation of wood stoves and flue pipes; chimneys; avoiding wood smoke spillage; efficient wood combustion; purchasing and preparing the wood supply; calculating costs of heating; and heating system maintenance.




Wood Heat


Book Description

Using the latest technologies to stay warm safely, cleanly and efficiently. Wood Heat is a comprehensive and practical homeowner's guide to using wood as a reliable source of heat with the latest wood stoves and traditional fireplaces. The book explores the efficiency of wood compared to other fuels, the environmental impacts of various fuel types as well as sustainability issues that have led to so many adopting a wood-burning lifestyle. Heating with wood does more than keep a house warm. Though it can be a hands-on expression of self-reliance, it does bring us closer to the land by using fuel that is renewable and sustainably harvested, and renews our wonder in the cycle of the seasons. And the biggest benefit is that wood heat saves money in the long run. There are four ways that wood can be used to heat a home or cottage: wood stoves (the most popular), fireplace inserts, pellet stoves and masonry heaters. Wood Heat explains the pros and cons of each. The book provides all of the information and advice needed to convert to a wood-heated life. How-to topics include step by step directions. They include: The comparative advantages of heating with wood Buying, cutting, splitting, stacking, storing and moving firewood Building the perfect woodpile Varieties of wood and their burning characteristics The latest technology for burning wood efficiently and cleanly Energy content of wood varieties per air-dried cord (BTUs) Catalytic and non-catalytic stoves Cooking with a wood stove How to make a good fire Essential hearth and fireplace tools Sizing wood-burning appliances A chimney maintenance checklist. Currently, over 10 million U.S. households use wood as their main heating fuel or to supplement other forms of heating. Unstable, increasing fuel costs and the desire of many people to move toward self-sufficiency will only increase the numbers of those choosing to burn wood for heat. Wood Heat is the ideal guide for all.




Heating with Wood and Coal


Book Description

This is the 2003 revision of the 1985 book Burning Wood and Coal. It includes updated information on building codes, newer heating systems and components, installation and safety issues, cutting wood with a chainsaw, and much more.




Masonry Heaters


Book Description

Masonry Heaters is a complete guide to designing and living with one of the oldest, and yet one of the newest, heating devices. A masonry heater’s design, placement in the home, and luxurious radiant heat redefine the hearth for the modern era, turning it into a piece of the sun right inside the home. Like the feeling one gets from the sun on a spring day, the environment around a masonry heater feels fresh. The radiant heat feels better on the skin. It warms the home both gently and efficiently. In fact, the value of a masonry heater lies in its durability, quality, serviceability, dependability, and health-supporting features. And it is an investment in self-sufficiency and freedom from fossil fuels. The book discusses different masonry heater designs, including variations extant in Europe, and explains the growth of their popularity in the United States beginning in the late 1970s. For the reader who may be familiar only with open fireplaces and metal woodstoves, Masonry Heaters will bring a new understanding and appreciation of massive heat storage and gentle-but-persistent radiant heat. Masonry heaters offer a unique comfort that is superior to that from convection heat from forced-air systems, and more personal than that offered by “radiant” floors. As Matesz demonstrates, the heat from the sun or from a masonry heater is genuine heat instead of just insulation against the loss of heat. Those who are looking to build, add onto, or remodel a house will find comprehensive and practical advice for designing and installing a masonry heater, including detailed discussion of materials, code considerations, and many photos and illustrations. While this is not a do-it-yourself guide for building a masonry heater, it provides facts every heater builder should know. Professional contractors will find this a useful tool to consult, and homeowners considering a new method of home heating will find all they need to know about masonry heaters within these pages.




Wood Stoves


Book Description




The Compost-Powered Water Heater: How to Heat Your Greenhouse, Pool, Or Buildings with Only Compost!


Book Description

It seems almost too good to be true: make high-value organic compost while generating reliable combustion-free heat. But it works, and this book is your practical introduction. With detailed plans for constructing small DIY systems, step-by-step illustrations and photos to guide you through the process, and calculations to help you estimate the heating capabilities of various approaches, this book will be invaluable.




Drying Hardwood Lumber


Book Description

Drying Hardwood Lumber focuses on common methods for drying lumber of different thickness, with minimal drying defects, for high quality applications. This manual also includes predrying treatments that, when part of an overall quality-oriented drying system, reduce defects and improve drying quality, especially of oak lumber. Special attention is given to drying white wood, such as hard maple and ash, without sticker shadow or other discoloration. Several special drying methods, such as solar drying, are described, and proper techniques for storing dried lumber are discussed. Suggestions are provided for ways to economize on drying costs by reducing drying time and energy demands when feasible. Each chapter is accompanied by a list of references. Some references are cited in the chapter; others are listed as additional sources of information.




Art of Heating with Wood


Book Description




Rocket Mass Heaters


Book Description




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