Designing the World’s Most Pretentious Garden Shed

September 13, 2016

...rplane” bungalow (a common type of house in our neighborhood). Next it was time to put the idea into Sketchup. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Sketchup rocks. All DIYers should know how to use it. With Sketchup I was able to come up with a framing plan that allowed me to cut all the pieces out of the hot sun in the comfort of my garage workshop. Then I just had to carry my stack of pre-cut lumber up the hill and hammer it together. Anot...

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Solar recipe review: Moroccan Chickpea Tagine (Works on the stovetop, too)

Mrs. Homegrown

August 12, 2016

Food, Recipes, Solar Oven Summer

4 Comments

...spicy that would have counterbalanced the sweetness. But at any rate, next time I will either leave out the raisins or sub them with something a little more tart, like chopped dried apricots. If you don’t have a solar oven all you’d have to do to adapt this recipe is start by sauteing the onions and garlic and carrots till they soften, then add in canned chickpeas and tomatoes and spices. Bring to a simmer and cook, maybe covered, until everything...

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How’s that Tomato Grafting Project Going?

Mr. Homegrown

July 21, 2016

Gardening, Vegetable Gardening

4 Comments

...o stagger the days I started my seeds rather than planting them all at one time. The healing chamber needs to be a carefully controlled environment. I improvised a greenhouse by putting my seedlings in plastic bags. This worked but I had trouble re-introducing light in a uniform way. Grow lights would make this easier. And it was a pain to open all the individual bags to mist the plants. Because of my lack of stem sizes to choose from I ended up w...

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The Return of the Apron?

Mr. Homegrown

August 28, 2018

Cleaning, Domesticus

12 Comments

...s and pencils. A quick perusal of the interwebs will show you that, at one time, all of the trades had their own aprons. In addition to safety and tool holstering, aprons are from a time before the cheap, disposable clothes we now wear. The decline of the apron could also be about our modern world’s distaste for visible signs of physical labor. We’re all supposed to be spending our days in front of glowing screens. Speaking of which, I’ve got to g...

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A Guilty Pleasure: The Mid-Century Menu

Mr. Homegrown

January 19, 2016

Food

5 Comments

Back in my time-wasting grad school days I made somewhat of a hobby out of thrift shopping. Along with the mandatory copy of Herb Alpert’s Whipped Cream, every thrift store would have a collection of post-war, space-age cookbooks. Recipes, in this period, are a kind of recombinatory matrix of industrial ingredients. You take some cocktail wieners, a dollop of mayonnaise, some ketchup and a surprise ingredient, say dried prunes and roll them all u...

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