Pioneer Tips: tea, cheese and more

More tips from the pioneer people book (edited):

The first tender leaves of the ordinary currant-bush, gather as soon as they grow, and dried on tin, can taste the same as green tea. (No info as to whether it has the same antioxidant benefit).

Do you make your own cheese? Have too much? Cover them carefully with paper (assuming butcher paper, but not sure), and fasten with flour-paste (white wheat flour mixed with water and sometimes salt). This will keep out air and probably pests. Keep in a dry cool place, for possibly a year or two, or maybe more.

Save your bottles instead of recycling them. Then, when you go to make wine or beer or cider or vinegar, you'll have a good supply of them.

Do not wrap your steel flatware, knives or utensils in wool. Wrap them in good strong paper. Steel degrades when exposed to wool for a long period of time.

Keeping lard is easy: place it in a dry cool place. Pack in tin rather than earthen. (Wonder how plastic fares?!?)

Pack your butter in a clean scalded firkin (a fourth of a size of a barrell), cover it with strong brine, and spread a good cloth over the top. If you have a little bit of salt-peter, dissolve it with the brine.



That's it for now. I have to stop these tips for a while. I'll try to get to them in the next few weeks. Try! Pg14

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