Photo: Great grandparents at their farm in Blandinsville, IL, with five of their six children .. my grandpa was yet a twinkle in grandma's eye. Stable boy and governess also pictured. Hodges farm, circa 1903-4
If you burn wood for heat, be sure to have your chimney or wood stove pipe thoroughly cleaned and inspected each year.
My father used to do this to his home .. I'll pay someone with expertise, agile limbs and a steady ladder to climb my steep pitched roof. Our stove needed a few new fire bricks and a ceramic fiber blanket replaced.
Properly seasoned wood burns best.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure ~ Benjamin Franklin
Have you taken measures to prevent a chimney fire?
So you want to be prepared for feeding your family should the power go out. If you have a wood heat stove and a cast iron Dutch oven, you're in luck. It just takes careful practice. You have to time the rise of your yeast bread with the glow of wood coals. If you use a bread recipe such as this one for no knead bread, your window of opportunity to bake is more dependent on coals than timing the dough.
This means that I start my loaf the night before I want to bake it .. at the very least ... making it early in the morning and baking before bed; I prefer making it the night before baking. You only need one bowl .. mix up the dough .. cover .. and set aside for 12-18 hours. I've even let the dough go 24 hours which gives it a little extra punch in sour flavor. Bread with a long ferment period is supposed to be more nutritious and easier to digest. Believe me, when you have lost the ability to cook conveniently you are more apt to eat what is available in your emergency supplies. Hunger takes precedence to proper diet.
So .. the planning part comes into play usually after dinner and my dough has been fermenting nearly 18 hours. This dough has just been sitting in the mixing bowl covered with a plastic bag and a dish towel to stay moist .. usually starting off by the wood stove .. and if that gets too warm, I move it to the kitchen counter.
My wood stove would have been burning all day and our home toasty warm. About 2 hours prior to actually baking the bread, I remove the dough from the bowl, shape it briefly on a floured surface and place it in a ball on a greased piece of parchment paper placed inside a glass pie pan or med. size skillet. It's covered loosely with the plastic wrap and clean dish towel .. left to rise in a warm spot for 2 hours. The coals in the wood stove will be glowing read and pushed to the sides and back of the stove.
Red glowing coals get broken apart with ash shovel and arranged along both sides and back of wood stove.
A few canning rings will be carefully placed in the ashes of the stove floor to support the Dutch oven.
Several canning rings are placed in center of wood stove's floor to support Dutch Oven.
About a half hour before bake time, with the fire out .. and embers are glowing red, the empty Dutch (D.O.) oven is carefully placed on the canning rings to preheat.. door shut .. and timed for approx. 30 minutes. I use heavy leather gloves to handle the D.O. After 30 minutes the D.O. is removed and placed on a trivet on top of the stove. The lid is carefully removed .. and a little smoke should come out.
Raised round loaf is placed inside hot Dutch oven using parchment as a sling.
Dough is lifted carefully with parchment paper and settled in the D.O. The top of dough is snipped and dusted with a little flour. Lid is placed on pan .. and carefully placed on the canning rings .. door gets shut.
A little fire is OK .. but watch carefully .. you really just need a medium amount of red coals.
If the stove seems too cool a few pieces of kindling can be tossed in to keep the stove heated.
Small pieces of kindling may be added to coals if the oven temp seems too low. Getting a feel for the temp with your hand is a developed skill.
It doesn't take much kindling .. if any. You don't want a big fire .. but a little flame is OK if pushed away from the D.O. Door needs to remain shut. Let the bread bake for 30 minutes .. rotating the pan every 10 minutes for even baking.
After 30 minutes carefully remove the D.O. and place on trivet.
I've only burned one loaf from too high of temp (from flames). This one came out perfect!
Remove lid. bread should be brown and well raised. Carefully slide an additional metal canning ring under the parchment to lift the bread off the bottom of the D.O. and cautiously place the pan back in the oven where it will bake for 10-15 additional minutes without the lid.
This bread is full of holes and has a crispy crust. Slices easily too.
Carefully remove pan at end of baking time transferring baked bread to a wire cooling rack for approx. 2 hours before slicing. Store cooled bread in a plastic bag.
I don't know the science behind this .. and I wouldn't substitute the use of burning potato peels instead of cleaning out the wood stove's pipe ... but whenever I burn potato peels, I do notice flakes of creosote on the patio or snow near the back door just adjacent and below the stove pipe. My friend from Norway said her mom would put potato and carrot peels in her fire and when it came time to have the stove pipe cleaned it was always fairly clean; we shall see when it comes time to clean ours next year.
UPDATE:
Here's a link saying to use dried potato peels. I've used damp .. and even burned dry bean pods with success.
You need to hydrate the indoor air of your home when you heat with wood. Fancy decorative steaming pots, kettles, etc. are pricey ranging from $50 to $100 dollars new. And I've been told that you shouldn't use the hot water because such devices are not food safe.
While browsing a thrift store recently, I purchased an oval enameled roasting pan (minus it's lid) for $1.50. It does a wonderful job of steaming and humidifying our air. Adding a teaspoon of white vinegar along with water when filling it up keeps mineral deposits from forming on the inside of the pot ... and doesn't in the least give off an odor.
You know, there's got to be 101 uses for wood stove heat:
heating
clothes drying rack placed near stove when weather is too damp to hang outside
toasting bread ~ place a piece of foil on top of stove, lay bread on top to toast
warming up the dinner plates
drying shoes and gloves by setting near the stove
yogurt and buttermilk set up perfectly when placed near the stove
emergency cooking
ambiance light
heating up your coffee
using ash in the garden and compost pile
using the stove top for dehydrating my sprouted wheat when the fire is med-low
