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I grew up in southern California, raised by parents who are honestly more than a little disturbed by our lifestyle. The Practical Guide to Reloading Ammunition by Tom McHale ~ A great beginners guide to reloading, in an easy to read conversational tone. It doesn’t have all the information you need to get started, but it does explain the basic principles better than any other book I’ve found. A Year Without the Grocery Store: A Step by Step Guide to Acquiring, Organizing, and Cooking Food Storage by Karen Morris ~ I was sad to learn that the author did not actually go a year without going to the grocery store to write this book. She did, however, write a beginners guide to bulk food storage that’s a great place to start if you’re trying to put up a years worth of food for long term (25+ year) storage without spending a lot of money.
I’m just covering lacto-fermentation books here, I’ll cover home brew beer and wine making books separately later on.) Make Mead Like a Viking by Jereme Zimmerman ~ Techniques for brewing traditional meads with minimal equipment and no additives, as they were brewed thousands of years ago.
Self Reliant Homestead Books
The late, great Gene Logsden was known as a kind of a curmudgeon. He was pretty skeptical about modern agriculture and had quite a few strong opinions about how we should provision ourselves. But his writings are so accessible and inspirational that I always feel like he’s an old friend. The main difference is that self-sufficient people are more likely to grow their own food, raise their animals and provide for themselves in a more hands-on manner. In contrast, people who are aiming to be self-reliant are more likely to rely on their own knowledge to get them through tough times.
Preserving with Pomona’s Pectin ~ A specific guide to working with pomonas “low sugar or no sugar” pectin. A great resource if you’re avoiding processed sugar. I’m often asked how I learned to live as we do, foraging food, canning everything in sight, and maintaining a solar-powered homestead. For those of you just dipping your toe into homesteading, these beginner homesteading books are a great place to start. They don’t dive deep into any particular topic, but instead give you an overview that’ll allow you do do a little bit of everything. How to Brew by John Palmer ~ A really good basic intro, including all the steps. I love this one because it explains why you do each step, as opposed to other books that just provide the steps with no context or rational. It provides a solid foundation, that will allow you to design your own recipes later since you’ll understand the principles of brewing beer at home.I’m a bit obsessed with canning recipe books, and I have literally dozens of books on all aspects of home canning. Specialized books that cover how to make jam and preserves, as well as books that go through hundreds of different pressure canning recipes. Wind turbines capture the kinetic energy from wind and convert it into usable electricity that can be stored in batteries or fed directly into an electrical grid. They’re a good way to find new plants, and with recipes, they really inspire you to get out there and find the wild foods. While most people are familiar with grape wines, you can actually make old fashioned country wines out of just about any fruit (and some vegetables too). As the cold sets in and some parts of homesteading slow down for the season, I like to take mental vacations to other homesteads and farms through reading. Here are a few of my favorite inspirational reads for cold-weather that I hope will inspire you too!
The Vegetable Gardener’s Bibleby Edward Smith ~ The name says it all, this is the perfect beginner vegetable gardening book. Our local librarian handed it to me one day when she saw me in the gardening section, and laughed saying, “This is my favorite…but I’m biased, it was written by my husband.” Biased or not, she got me to open it and it really is a great resource. This can include providing for one’s own needs such as food, shelter, healthcare and education. Self-sufficiency is important because it allows individuals and communities to become more independent and resilient in the face of social and economic challenges. Second Edition. Mimeographed on Carlton and Mustang paper with an ivory Plastisheen cover; 185 copies finished April 10, 1974.The HAM Radio License Manual ~ A study guide with questions that’s specifically designed to help you study for the HAM radio test. It doesn’t do the best job of explaining what’s going on, see the book series above for that, but it does go through all the possible questions to help you learn the right answers (like an SAT study guide). The Herbal Apothecary: 100 Medicinal Herbs and How to Use Themby JJ Pursell ~ A large herbal apothecary book, covering the preparation and uses of, as the name says, 100 different herbs. Comprehensive, but perhaps overwhelming for a beginner. Naturally Sweet Food in Jars ~ Canning recipes using maple, honey, agave and coconut sugar instead of refined white sugar. He had multiple roles as a writer, broadcaster, environmentalist, agrarian, smallholder and activist; a rebel against: consumerism, industrialisation, genetically modified organisms, cities, motor cars; an advocate for: self-reliance, personal responsibility, self-sufficiency, conviviality (food, drink, dancing and singing), gardening, caring for the Earth and for the soil.
Whether you’re interested in growing mushrooms at home, or foraging wild mushrooms, these are particular good guides. People who aim to be self sufficient are usually aiming to improve their own lives and the lives of their families. They are working towards a more stable future.
Homestead DIY and Craft Books
It also helps us understand which areas of the world are most vulnerable regarding essential goods or service shortages. While the world has been growing increasingly more connected through trade, we still have many countries that are self-sufficient in their own personal resources. This could involve investing in solar panel arrays and wind turbines to generate electricity locally, improving existing heating and cooking systems, so they use fewer fossil fuels; or developing new technologies that capture more efficient forms of renewable energy. Alternative Energy Sources: Solar, Wind, Hydro I am slightly obsessed with the French culture since I spent a lot of my early adulthood hanging out with French chefs and farmers, eating like the rich and famous, while living on a working-class budget. So, when I stumbled upon the video about Le Ferme du Bec Hallouin and saw how incredibly productive and beautiful it was, I had to buy their book too.
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