Just one last post about the wonderful uses of lard. Today I took my lovely hiking boots out for a cleaning. They are leather and very cracked and dry, the snow beating them up for a few months now. I decided to try just rubbing straight lard on the leather and it has darkened and moisturized the leather really nicely. See for yourself:
Left: before, Right: after. Dogs love me!
I wrote previously about using lard for candles and soap. While you can make soap (what I hoped to do), it is illegal to purchase sodium hydroxide (lye, the stuff they used to burn their hands in Fight Club) in France. Lye and oil combine to make soap and Lard is supposed to make nice, soft soap. You can also make bombs with this stuff, thus it’s unavailability. Don’t despair, we can make candles instead. To make candles that are hard at room temp like normal wax candles, I would need to use something called Alum or another acid. I have no idea where to get this stuff in France, so I will instead make straight, lard candles.
Since the lard is soft at room-temp and melts very quickly when heated, we need a container for our candle. I use old glass jars, baby-food size for my first experiment. The theory is simple, fill a jar with liquid lard, insert a wick (I used an old sheet, torn into strips and twisted up) and let solidify.
Left: Lard Lamp, Right: Lard Candle
On the left you’ll see the lamp I made. I got the idea from Instructables. Simply make a wick by wrapping metal wire around linen, sheet strips or cotton balls. Make it so it can stand up on it’s own and place it in a shallow can. Pack the can with solid lard and good to go. Here’s my wick before I put it in the can:
Cotton/Wire Wick
The wick stays up and the flame stays at the top while it sucks up the liquid lard like a normal lamp. It works pretty well and I imagine will provide many hours of light for about one and a half cups of lard. The lamp is better than the candle since the candle wick has started to fall over from liquifying the lard holding it up.
While butchering with Jean-Luc I’ve noticed that he throws away a ton of decent looking pork fat. I’ve taken about 10 pounds home and will first experiment with making lard. He gave me the outer cuts, closest to the skin and about an inch thick with fat. There is fat in the stomach area, but this is lower quality for lard.
To render pork fat simply cut your fat up (no need to trim, all the non-fat parts will fry up and get filtered out) into small pieces and put the whole mess into a big, heavy pot. Set on medium heat and add a little water to keep from burning the fat. The fat will slowly melt and you will soon have a pot of clear, yellowish liquid frying up all manner of skin and meat. Filter this liquid into containers and voila, you have lard. It will turn white and solid at room temperature. The crispy bits can be eaten or given to animals as a little treat. The finished product is:
Lard! Still warm...
Lard might not seem all that exciting, but it’s a waste product turned useful. You can use lard to make soap, candles, grease baking pans and sheets and even saute. It’s probably not the healthiest to eat, but I wouldn’t sweat it in small quantities.
I set up a little Archery range today in expectation of getting my bow tomorrow. I’m pretty proud of my handiwork here:
The wooden stakes mark 10, 20 and 30 meters. Take a closer look at my target set up in the distance:
Professional
It’s a vegetable crate stuffed with hay and newspaper. I’m going to make some targets to put on it, but I think it’s just about the classiest backstop I’ve ever seen. The goal is to hit 10 out 10 in a 5 inch circle from 30 meters. As you can see, it’s pretty far away to shoot an arrow. I’ll start from 10 meters and back up slowly. I’m hoping this will also train me on distance, get me to recognize how far something is without a range finder.
When Obama took office my boss, David Goldstein, told me not to get tempted by joining the new administration. NRDC lost a few people who thought they would get more done inside the whitehouse than outside. Goldstein thinks operating outside the government offers more freedom and ultimately influence. Those working on the outside don’t have to bend to fickle public opinion or answer to the many private interests constantly lobbying your office. I agree, but I wonder where the boundary lies for this outside/inside dichotomy.
You could consider the boundary to lie between government employees and the rest of us. You could also consider the boundary to lie between those that follow the law and those that don’t. Consider the American revolution, Martin Luther King, Jr. and others who have made the decision to step outside societal norms in order to influence those in power. I don’t think anyone today thinks those revolutionaries should have been imprisoned and silenced. When, then, is it right to step way outside society in order to change the world?
Some might say that you have to be a fanatic to think this way. Many have broken laws (even their own) in the name of a higher power. These fanatics and non-violent protestors alike made the decision at one point in their lives that things were so messed up they couldn’t abide them any longer. Then they stepped outside; some for ill and some for good.
Let’s not get carried away with the concept; let’s start small. The first step I’m working on is taking money out of the hands that control us. DIY’ers and the like are doing just that by refusing to buy mediocre and over-priced products from mega-companies that make just about everything we consume. That’s what the whole ‘mad skills’ page is about. That’s my form of disobedience and if everyone who reads this blog does a little of the same, we might have some real influence.
I should have posted this two months ago, but there’s no time like the present! In July I took a class from TrackersNW on how to make your own wooden bow. Here’s how to do it:
Cut down a 5-6 foot length of Bay tree about 4-6 inches in diameter. Debark the tree with a small knife and be careful not to break the woody interior. Once debarked, split the length down the middle (this part is tricky but can be done with a board ripper if you want precision). Let that cure in a warm and dry place for about a month.
With the cured, halved length of Bay, begin shaping a bow on the interior of the piece. Never cut or take material off of the rounded outside. Narrow the ends and take wood out of middle while shaping a grip for your hands in the middle of the bow. Start bending the bow and checking to see that both ends bend the same and smoothly. If you see an area that doesn’t have a smooth bend to it like the rest, take material out there. Continue until the bow has a nice even bend to it from end to end. Once you get the curve sorted out, notch the ends to hold a loop of twine for the string.
With your shaped bow, lightly cover with any good grease or wood oil. Let dry and shellac for a nice clean finish. Now you just need to make or buy a bowstring and you’re all set. I suggest multiple attempts unless you have someone there to help tune your bow. When you’re done, you should look something like this:
At the Golden Gate Park Range
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