Wood ash OR.....?

[IdyllwildAcres]

Yes, though I would avoid burning shiny cardboard or even paper as that has a plastic coating.

You are such an environmentalist!
I love that about you You are the best, spreading the word about taking care of this planet, saying no to pesticides and burning plastic.

LG you ROCK!

Gary

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Hominy and hominy grits? I love grits so how does that work?

The wood ashes are compressed, usually in a wood barrel and water is drizzled through the ashes. This leaches out the lye that is naturally present in hard wood ashes. Then the lye is used in conjunction with heat to soften and separate the hull from the corn kernel which allows the starch inside the kernel to expand and presto you are left with hominy. Hominy once dried and ground rather coarsely makes hominy grits as opposed to the European version of grits called polenta. The Native Americans used lye to make hominy and corn flour. When Europeans took corn or New World maize back to the Old World they skipped the step of treating the maize with lye. This soon resulted in a terrible and debilitating disease called pellagra. Now over 500 years later Europeans have still not fully accepted maize as a human food.

http://www.cookinggodsway.com/the-history-of-corn-vitamin-b-deficiency-pellagra/

 

[Cryss]

The wood ashes are compressed, usually in a wood barrel and water is drizzled through the ashes. This leaches out the lye that is naturally present in hard wood ashes. Then the lye is used in conjunction with heat to soften and separate the hull from the corn kernel which allows the starch inside the kernel to expand and presto you are left with hominy. Hominy once dried and ground rather coarsely makes hominy grits as opposed to the European version of grits called polenta. The Native Americans used lye to make hominy and corn flower. When Europeans took corn or New World maize back to the Old World they skipped the step of treating the maize with lye. This soon resulted in a terrible and debilitating disease called pellagra. Now over 500 years later Europeans have still not fully accepted maize as a human food.

http://www.cookinggodsway.com/the-history-of-corn-vitamin-b-deficiency-pellagra/

Wow, I had no idea! I've eaten grits, cornmeal mush, and of course corn bread and corn tortillas. I've also eaten polenta. I always thought they were pretty much the same thing although I did wnder about the difference between corn meal and grits.
My in-laws are British. My father-in-law refuses to eat maize in any form whatsoever. Now I get it!
Thanks!

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Corn bread is made from corn meal and one of the ingredients in cornbread is baking soda. Baking soda is an alkali very much like the lye used to make homini. So we have treated the corn meal used to make corn bread so the nutrients in cornmeal are available for human digestion.

The yield of corn or New World maize was so much higher that the traditional European crops of wheat, barley, rye, oats, etc that New World maize was thought to be a miracle crop because it offered to end the recurring famines that plagued Europe ever since the first European first scratched the Earth with a sharp stick.

 

[imnukensc]

I've got a little over 2 acres with lots of hardwood trees. 'Bout this time of year I'm sick of blowing, mulching, and raking leaves. Y'all come get all the leaves you want. I've still got truck loads! And more still coming down.

 

[Smuvers Farm]

I've got a little over 2 acres with lots of hardwood trees. 'Bout this time of year I'm sick of blowing, mulching, and raking leaves. Y'all come get all the leaves you want. I've still got truck loads! And more still coming down.

How much to ship?!?

 

[Smuvers Farm]

This weekend we burned a ton of clean cardboard to make ash for the chickens. Our leaves are raked and dumped directly into the chicken run AND we also vacuum up and mulch leaves to bag for future run use. Our 20'x20' run is getting a nice DL and we will have a valuable compost once spring has sprung.