Sarah

Yes, the electric slow cookers like you describe. I have a base, and three crocs to put in, about a quart. I did not grow up with electric as you now know. And thank you for the slight gentle correction for 'bisque', I updated that in the idiom book. I tried one this morning. A lot larger than an croc boat would have been. My man attacked. Sarah

Dogmom4, thank you for that link. I suspect I will be doing a lot of reading there. 'Croc Boat' is the english phrase the 'idiom' book gives. I do not know a better one. So let me describe one. It is a small bowl of china, holding about a half cup, with large drooping lips, and a tab on the end with a hole for hanging. The lips trap air so the crock will float on water. The inside is glazed, the outside not. Often embossed on the bottom is a symbol, or a very smooth panel for marking with a china marker. The embossments can be a goat, cow, chicken, rabbit, sheep, fish, etc. Also the embossment can be a wedge (for cheese), a circle (for egg), a buttercup flower (for butter), garlic clove, etc. Red is the common ones, grey is the higher quality. Meat and markable crocs often have isenglass covers. I was a 'lesser' daughter. The third. So my rearing was different, not as lady as my two older sisters. A 'Cinderella'. One of my chores, each morning, was to be the first up and make sure the fire was good in the stove. The night before, before she went to bed, Mother would put four (Father, my two sisters, and me) in a pot of water on the stove. In them, usually, were two eggs, some sort of small meat chunks (to include organ or 'head cheese'), 'farmers cheese', and spices/seasoning. It was a warm bite for us to eat before breakfast was ready. My favorite was lamb cubes, about a quarter inch, 'american process' cheese, two eggs (too small to be sale-able), and springs of mint. Oh that mint! Today, with the exception of glis (idiom book says 'clarified butter') making, these are now forbidden by Ordnung ('the way', the rules we live by) in almost all OOM and OOA (A for Amish) groups, due to the fact that the oils/greases/etc could soak into the biske portion of the boat, and turn rancid. The water simmers, not boils, and so you have no germ kill. We often boiled them, another of my chores. I make garlic glis for him. Take butter, unsalted, put in boat, keep skimming off. Once 'clarified', about a quarter cup, use a clove press to squeeze crush two cloves, and put all in the glis. Let simmer for a few more hours, and reskim. You get very stong garlic butter. But do not try to use store bought butter, even if unsalted, as it will be too salty. I do not know what stabilizers are in the unsalted, but you get the same effect. 'Land O' Lakes' comes to mind. What is skimmed off when clarifying is used as a bread spread. He loves fish. And his mother did a lot of 'trash' fish this way. So I am looking at this 'crock pot' to see if it can do the same. Sarah

I admit it, I have never owned a crock pot. I do now. My husband found one with zebra stripes that he snatched up, and repainted. And with it came three 'bowls'. I had him paint it, as I am not having that striped thing in my kitchen! Apparently, crock pots are relatively new. I found little in our online icsarchive.org old cookbooks archive. I have tried pinto beans with fatback which came out well. I know better than to try mutton. Bread raising? Is this an alternative to 'crock boat' cooking? Or is boat cooking too ethnic to be understood here? I am thinking that the lower temperature would help with cooking 'trash fish'. My man loves fish. And would that work for rabbit and game? Is there a book out there? Recommendations? Sarah

Bats are sensitive to some pesticides. Any spraying in your area lately? There also seems to be a parrallel with lightning bugs and bees. Also, if someone has recently put up or refurbished bat boxes, some paints can poison them. We jellously guard our bat population.

Ummm... Jeepers, reintroduction. I am OOM. Old Order Mennonite. Knostic sept (Knosis means 'knowledge', one who, in order to perform ones function, requires education beyond the 8th grade level). I was a simple 'home mother' until I lost my husband. Having to support, I switched to Gnostic, My much loved and dearly missed Patriarch (think Bishop in Amish speech, but much more senior) helped me and found me honest honorable work. Then #2 asked me, remarriage is rare for us, and does not mind me 'working out'. I deal with the different types of OOA (Old Order Amish), OOM, NOA (New Order), NOM (New Order), and other 'brethren' every day. I access via the Librum, which is a OOM community center, (translation: place where the scales are kept), where I work as librarian, researcher, liason, 'gal friday', and the 'vot' ('Information') desk. ...now where is that icon for friendly wave... (drats!) Sarah ...got it...

Snowmom, Congrats! I am keeping my head down. Oh, I did well, this year, but my husband took a 'Best of Catagory'. A cake. Beating out my two. My head is down, trying to avoid my kinder teasing... Sarah

Maybe for Amish, but not mennonite. Shared. But with coppered 'tin' cup. It is believed that the copper plating fights germs. And with a charcoal filter. I wish I had a camera, I would take a picture of a couple around here.

The cheeses and other dairy float in that 'unpurified' water. And 'pitcher' pumps go up to 150 foot, and can be staged, at 125 foot. Staging is where one pumps up to the next stage. You can go three stages. Be advised though, such are avoided, due the 'leathers' (the pump seals) tendency to grow microoranisms on them, leather (original) or black rubber/synthetic. But I think the folks here are right, from an 'English' viewpoint. Many of the practices of my mother and relations would seem dangerous to the folks here. By all means, filter, if you do not trust/test your water. I certainly would filter a staged pitcher pump. Still, the bail bucket is an option, in a loss of electricity or SHTF, not to be discounted. If overly concerned, grab a bottle of 'old settler' (brandname) and use that. A point of curiosity. Local 'code' requires all private wells to be tested every six months. Is this the same everywhere else? 'Shared' are also six months, but also require a full chemical analysis. Shocking then testing is verboten. Nice fine if any chlorine detected. I did get another giggle. Back in the seventies there was a large 'drill your own well' using the hydro drillers movement, as advertised in Countryside magazine and the like. Did you know those are illegal in these parts? A neighor had to pull his pipe. Justice/.carma. Sarah of the Librum

Grandfathered. I pass one on my way to work. Same with 'spring boxes' and 'spring houses' and dug ins... I know that one because a certain mennonite dairy I know wanted to build a new 'horseshoe' house (where the spring runs around three sides of the room)(The cheeses float in the cool water.). They were 'coded', and construction permits refused. So they roman cemented in a spigot. Pass. Sarah

Ambergris, those are not chapters, those are ATOCIs of various works. Ascii Table Of Contents and Indexes. I said scroll down to the TEOCL entry. Here, I will assist... http://www.librum.us/atoci/teocl%20the%20encyclopedia%20of%20country%20living%201994.txt Sarah

Daelith, you are most welcome. To all: I did have a busy day, but did get about five minutes, and reloaded the ATOCI for the ninth edition into the search engine. To grab your own copy, visit the search engine fodder directory, http://www.librum.us/atoci/, and scroll down for the TEOCL entry. Click and enjoy the text file in your browser. Save if desired. Hoping it helps somebody... Sarah

??? I think some folks here are overlooking a mennonite tradition. If you have a standard cased well, then have a 'rope bucket'. Even if you do not have electricity, or it is a SHTF, your water is still available. I am not talking 'pitcher pump', but that is an option if your well is not too deep. This is water you know, and have trusted. No 'storage' needed. Now, if you have to use electricity to 'r-o' filter or 'i-r' your water from your well, well... You should have better water. You can find such buckets near any mennonite or amish community. If you have none such, then grab a Lehmans catalog. Here, let me look it up for you... "Lehman's Own Galvanized Well Bucket", page 126, Summer 2015, cataloge #1408e. $69.95. Ours are brass, not galvanized. Heavy minerals. Sarah

'The Encyclopedia of Country Living: An Old Fashioned Recipe Book' is the origional title, of earlier editions. But this title was reused with her passing, as a legal dodge, by the reprinting vultures, so it can be fuzzy. Carlas daughter won the court cases, and the '40th' is put out by her. The '9th' edition, supposedly, is the last 'true' self published version. I am not saying that later are not her's, but the ninth was the last she had full editiorial control. Yes, I knew her. And we (the Librum) have copyright permission to electronically reproduce the 9th edition. We didn't and I doubt ever would, out of respect for her and her daughter. Both have been guest researchers at the 'brick-and-mortar' Librum. Also, we had an ATOCI index for the ninth in our online search engine, but took it down. It is only the ninth edition! But if anyone needs, drop me a line at our guest book, I will get you a copy, or stuff back into the engine. The gardening book... Much of it's material is from the original, but updated. A spin-off. But I have been told it stands on it's own nicely. Wish I had more info for you... Sarah of the Librum

Punched zucchini into the search engine here at the Librum site. HCOOK THE BOOK OF HERB COOKERY 1941 Sweet Marjoram with Zucchini. HCOOK 143 Sweet Marjoram with Zucchini Salad. HCOOK 157 Zucchini, Fried with Marjoram. HCOOK 143 Zucchini Salad, HCOOK 157 So if you are on a PC, grab the 'check out' copy on the reference desk, it is an exe file, run and enjoy. No expiry. And don't skip out checking the cookbooks over at our DD site, icsarchive.org. Sarah

....wonder how much 'bandwidth' I'd be using up??? I'd like to 'read' some of his books I haven't caught free in Ebook. Instead of reading online, you can one time download if you use one of the youtube download packages. We use a registered/commercial one, as we are a library, but I am told that there are some very good freeware ones. Sarah

Twilight I think you will be visiting our link soon. Sarah

CGA, have you visited the cookbook archive at the paperback shelf at icsarchive.org?

Today is the weekly 'summer reading club' day for the school age kinder. We also have some elder-elders, who come in to read to the younger kinder. It is a Seuss day, green died scrambled eggs. Guess what book... This might be just the thing for some of the computer disadvantaged elder-elders. AH! Have already found one on the ILL request list, .Thanks. Sarah of the Librum.

I have always been an anti-perfume person, so that rant is right up my alley. I have been told I am a 'permone' person, so that makes sense too. I do see a trend against the modern perfumed products over the last year or so. One of our 'retired' works, meaning it payed out the restoral costs, and thus been moved to the Paperback shelf, is "A Practical Guide for the Perfumer. 1868", in the Paperback (free) section. As to removing such smells, if 'Zot' or liquid 'Ivory' does not kill it, it gets trashed.

Thank you! Now to figure how to label, without damaging them.

Go ahead, laugh, but I do not know. Spring cleaning, found a set of three measuring spoons. Obviously, these were relics from the late Goodwife Lee. But I had never seen ones like these. Obviously very carefully custom hand made, well used. All marked. Is there such a thing as an official volume measurement for a 'smidgen', a 'dash', and a 'pinch'? I do not know! Sarah.

Thank you. Sarah

OK, you folks have confused me again. Oh, I understand the salt vs health issue. But not all fermented's are vegetable, or salted. Syllabub is one example. 'Soft' drinks are yeast 'carbonated'. Etc. Jeepers, a BTW to you. When 'english' say sauerkraut we say salted. One can salt many vegetables, it is not only cabbage There is also fermented 'sweet'. I am sure you have had sweet pickles or relish. Ah, I have the ultimate female rebuttal. Hersheys original chocolate is a fermentation process. Sarah

(could not find an 'embarrassed' emoticon) Just saw the 'bar assed'. Appropriate?

This 'bedstraw', is that the same as 'beggerlice'? Triangular sticky things. As a girl, mother would pick them off my socks and dress bottom, dry them by slow low heat roasting, run them through a squeeze desheller, and cook them like oats. It was used like wheet germ. I do not remember as a tea. Anybody got a botannical name for me to cross reference?