The Stone Grain Mill we’ve been waiting for! It arrived in Montreal from Austria last week. It’s all set up except for the motors that we still need to buy. This mill has a sifter attached to it with five different options for fineness. The stones are made of Naxos, which is a special volcanic stone that self-dresses (or sharpens). The whole mill is made of wood and is beautifully hand-crafted! The mill is going to be an amazing step in grinding most of my own flour to bake bread with. Can’t wait to use it!
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Winter Living
We are not off grid, but using a small propane tank hooked up to an oven and cooktop. We have to bring in our water from a farm house close by so we heat our water on the woodstove to save propane. Also cooking, is some delicious chicken stock with the bones of our pastured chickens from this summer.
Even with the -20C weather we had all December we can get our place roasting! Twenty-five to 30++ degrees C sometimes if we aren’t careful!
Finishing Cob Oven #1
The last phases of construction. Last week I took the sand form out from under the first layer of cob. It took forever! I had to tape a trowel to the end of a stick to reach the very back of the oven. The second layer went on very quickly-clay, water and sawdust for insulation. Today I lit my first small fire to start drying the oven out. I can’t wait to bake in it!
Heat mass layer on Cob Oven #1
Finally the first layer of cob goes on. Now it feels like the oven is really on its way after lots of preparation work. The mixture that goes on first is made of 1 part clay, 3 parts sand and enough water to mix, but not too much so that you have a good working material. We got the clay and sand from generous neighbours, literally three minutes away! Now we just have to wait for it to dry out enough to dig out the sand form and put the next layer of insulation on. To be continued…
Rock foundation for Cob Oven #1
The oven foundation! We dug about two and a half feet into the ground and then started building up from there using field stones and gravel. We hauled rocks out of an old fence line and brought them by wheelbarrow load to our site! The ground was too wet to use any of our modern conveniences such as a tractor or truck to bring the rocks over.