Wild in Style

What do you want?

Here at Wild in Style we build our yurts – we have played around with materials and techniques and so whilst I am not trying to reinvent the wheel… we will pass on our experiences and thoughts.

I would say there are some fantastic resources out there, 1 of which I would like to mention is simply differently as it some some cool stuff like calculators etc..  and there is alot more besides.

Your first task is to decide – What style of yurt will I make?

Traditional / Modern

Traditional – you will be steaming and bending the wood in both the roof poles (Uni) and the walls (Khana).. You might use wood ‘in the round’ in which case you will probably need a shaving horse..

Modern – A popular modern style is to have wood that has been through a lathe and so uniform dimensions.   Some (although more of an american technique) is to use steel rope for the top tension band.. the roof poles are then mounted on this without the need to place a roof pole into each cross section of the wall you can play around with the design a little..

Opinion is very divided on this subject and so it is down to personal choice, I have to say I like them both, they do have very different feels, but the skills and techniques used to build them are very similar..

What will I use it for?

What size do you need / want? I can say that if comparing a yurt to a bed(!) the same principal of space applies.. from double to king is only 6″ but actually goes along way. So relatively 2′ in the diameter makes a huge difference.

10′ – A camping yurt, can be packed into the car and taken with you.. Sleeps a small family

12′ – A large camping yurt but you would only want to take this when basing yourself somewhere for a while

14′ upwards – Multiple uses: a spare bedroom, a workshop, a spare bedroom, artist studio, classroom.. the list is endless. Unless you know exactly what you are going to use it for or are definatly going to be using it for camping and so needs to be mobile I would suggest a 16′ or 18′ yurt..

As they are such a beautiful structure from both the inside and out they are a pleasure to behold. Simple but very effective, light and airy (as much as you want given you can control the amount of light you let in), warm and cosy, ergonomically windproof (except when you leave the door open in a storm and the wind is blowing right in!), completely secure and elements can be fixed on demand with complete ease…

The various parts of the yurt that needs to be built or ‘created’ as it feels more like a craft..

Tono – Crown / Roof ring

Uni – The roof slates / poles that go from the top of the wall to the Crown

Khana – The wall sections which will be a many as you want / require

Door Frame / Door – The designs are endless.. stable standard, arched etc etc

Canvas – Roof / Walls / Tension Band

Tension Band – Worth special notice as it usually (on traditional yurts) is made of canvas holds the integrity of the structure in place. Very important bit of kit, not hard to make but just to note v.important.

So lets build.. ..or alternativly you could buy from us

It is now September and whilst some fruits are past their best, and some fungi are yet to take off, it is definitely a time where you can go out and collect, for your enjoyment, some of the fruits of the forest or hedgerow..

Here in Cumbria, in the North West of England, exposed to some harsh and often sustained weather.. the climate is different to many parts of the UK.  There are many microclimates in the Lake District and so most things do grow here; in most cases, in abundance, but the season might be shorter, later or potentially isolated only to that complimentary habitat.

Available now, available for free and good to try on your holiday:

Fruit

• Blackberry  - jam or a fruit Pie
• Elderberry – wine or cordial
• Rose-hips (either the Japanese or the dog rose variety) – a vitamin C boosting syrup
• Rowan – jelly
• Hawthorn – jelly or syrup
• Sloe – gin of course
• Damson (and all the variants) – wine, jam, chutney, gin or vodka
• Apples – from the tree to the mouth or cider, fruit pie, apple sauce
• Pears – likewise from tree to mouth, caramelised pear..
• Cherries – the wild ones are smaller than those you might find in the shops but tasty and used in many recipes.. I don’t eat cherries myself but my daughter loves them!

Nuts

• Hazelnut – those that the squirrel hasn’t yet got!  As good as a wild nut gets!
• Sweet chestnut – still a little early up here as yet, something to look forward to..
• Acorn – can be used to make flour, but have to process it to make it edible so probably best avoided unless you know what you are doing..
• Conkers – for some conker fun as also used in herbal medicine for piles / varicose veins or swelling of the lower leg..

Mushrooms

• There are also plenty of mushrooms at the moment – ‘flushing’ in quantity now that there has been a little (ok, a lot) of rain – but when picking mushrooms you should either know what you are doing or be with someone who does..

Being on holiday you can try a few things that you normally wouldn’t, so why not spend an hour breathing in the fresh Cumbrian air and trying some of the above?

Elder – Sambucus niger

A common sight in summer is the elder tree heavily laden with flowers, once you know what you are looking for it is instantly recognisable.

• 1] Take a non metalic container.. collect as many large flower heads as you need, by this I mean about 50% of the quantity you will be wanting to produce (e.g 1 pint flowers to 2 pints champagne – as if you would drink campagne in a pint glass )
• 2] Using a fork remove the flowers from the flower heads – the reason for doing this is that elder tree (bar the flowers) contains a chemical that can upset some people stomach’s.
• 3] Add lemons.. again this is dependant on quantity but using same analogy 1 lemon, throwing half of the lemon in as well (unwaxed)
• 4] Add about 3 dates
• 5] Seal the container
• 6] After about a week you can add a little sugar and place into screw top bottles for a few days to mature
• 7] Open and enjoy

Note: you can add some more sugar and yeast to add kick.. or even place into demi-john’s to turn into wine..

Experiment with raisins or adding ginger or mint for added kick and flavour.. for wild food additives – maybe meadowsweet or nettle?

** Go out and enjoy just be careful where you harvest your elderflowers from… not next to a busy road, the chemicals will do you more harm than the champagne will do you good!

Elder – Sambucus niger

Couldn’t be easier

• 1] Collect elderflower heads
• 2] Dip into pancake mix and fry.. delicious

* easy Pancake mix – 1 cup plain flour, 1 cup milk, 1 egg

Go out and enjoy just be careful where you harvest your elderflowers from… not next to a busy road, unless you like heavy metals!

Valeriana officianalis

Uproot… Zzzzzzz

A beautiful summer flower that will inhabit any waste ground, spread throughout Europe but does prefer damp ground.

It is very much a July flower although can seen a month either side.

The flowers are beautiful and perfect in a wild flower bouquet for the table – but they also smell nice and can be used in home made pot pouri.  They have a slightly pinkish hue to a white flower, the leaves are delicate and they grow around 60cm tall.

But it is really the roots that are the best bit about the plant.. they don’t go deep and are very easy to uproot – in tact.  Cut the flowers off for the table, clean the root and then finely chop.  Place a couple of teaspoons in a half pint of cold water and leave for at least 10 hours to infuse… then drink a few times during the day to have a relaxing effect.  In order to sleep the concoction can be made a little stronger (double).  Although I haven’t heard of any problems with an overdose of valerian root, care should still be taken not to make it too strong.

Relax and enjoy.

• a friend has recently started a new business… three red apples

Check it out if you like things stylish and comfortable…

Take :

900g of Rown berries..

900g of crab apples..  *note – used for flavour and because Rowan berries don’t contain much Pectin – the setting element of jam/jelly

1.8 L of Water *note – filtered ideally

Sugar

Prepare the berries by drying and then freezing – this helps to destroy the parascorbic acid.

Place the apples (free of any bruising) and thawed rowan berries in a heavy bottomed pan.

Add just enough water to cover them. Bring to the boild and then simmer for about 25 mins or until tender.

Strain the jelly.. either through muslin on a seive or make your own millbank bag (see bushcraft post for this) into a sterilised container.. this can take many hours, don’t be tempted to squeeze as this will make the jelly cloudy – hence the reason this can take many hours.

Might need to do this in batches; at the point the filtration seems to have stopped due to excessive build up of debris… squeeze the juice out BACK INTO the vessel containing the pulp. Clean the filter and then start again. The jelly is won and lost at this stage.

After you have collected the liquid – measure. For every 600ml of liquid take 450g of sugar.

Before adding the sugar to the liquid, bake it on baking paper in the oven at about 160C. This will crystalise it.

Add both juice and sugar to the heavy bottomed pan, make sure the sugar is fully dissolved and then boil hard for about 15 minutes.

15 minutes is a rough guide as you are really looking for the setting point… which is by placing a spoonfull of jelly on a fridge cooled saucer, give a minute to cool and test by running your finger through the mixture, if a ‘skin’ has formed then setting point achieved if not continue boiling for a few minutes..

Sterilise the jars and after allowing to cool for 10 minutes ladel the jelly into the jam jars

*note – To sterilise, either use a chemical: for example milton or a wine and beer steriliser or place jam jars into the over and allow to ‘bake’ for 10 minutes at about 150C. WARNING – remove with care and some oven gloves!

• For 1 gallon / demijohn of wine…

1] Sterilise everything!  Use chemical or heat (the oven or boiling)

2] Blend 1 gallon of filtered water in a container with 1.5Kg of fruit (without stalks) – don’t be afraid to throw a bit more in if you want..

3] Add 1/2 teaspoon of pectic enzyme

*note – this is an enzyme that ‘eats’ the pectin that make jelly set and coagulates elements in the wine making it cloudy

4] Add a campden tablet

*note – used to inhibit the growth of most wild yeast and to eliminate chlorine from the water.

5] Leave for 12 – 24 hours

6] Add 1/4 teaspoon grape tanin

*note – tanin is found in the grape skin, the darker the grape (if you were using them the higher the tanin content); tanin is one of the four ingredients that must be balanced in a good wine (alcohol and sugar against acid and tannin).

7] 1/2 teaspoon of acid blend

*note – acid blend is roughly a mix of 50% tartaric acid, 30% malic acid and 20% citric acid – so can add the relevant amount of these quatities if you have them seperatly, but would like to see you add accurately 20% of 1/2 a teaspoon!

8] 1/2 teaspoon of yeast nutrient

*note – feed the yeast – it isn’t only sugar that a happy yeast makes.. include yeast nutrient – (essentially nitrogen, but can be a lot more besides.. but trust in the word ‘nutrient’)

9] Yeast

*note - are all yeasts created equal? – Bread, beer, wine, athelete’s foot… I digress! They all create CO2 but their qualities are as numerous as their applications.. A beer yeast can only tolerate a certain % alcohol volume before dying off, so should never be used for wine – unless thinking of a drinking friendly bottle of plonk? But seriously a wine yeast will turn fruit sugars into alcohol to around 12% alcohol.. there are many on the market and those that sell them are better at that than me at doing so, so will leave it upto you – wouldn’t get too hung up on it though..

10] Grape juice – ok so it doesn’t make it a true country glass and so is an optional extra – but available to buy and does improve, I believe, so add a cheeky one into the demijohn and ….

11] Place into a sterilised demijohn, of course add a bunk and air lock

12] Allow fermentation to happen…. zzz…..zzzz….zzzzz….zzzzzzz……zzzzz…..zzz…..z

13] Finished.. Rack off into a secondary demijohn

*Note this doesn’t have to be demijohns can be 2 litre bottles ‘converted’: of course the above measures need to be adapted but just so long as the bottle has a bung cut to size with a bendy air gap like you would find in a toilet (but a lot smaller!) – possibly using straws, then all good.  Remember to sterilise!

14] Wait 6 months!  Yep and then rack off into bottles…

15] The boring bit – if 6 months wasn’t enough- Now wait a year!!!!

*note – probably worth remembering the time it takes to mature.  Some longer than others, but like growing veg, do it in phases so there is always something coming through.. I am not at that phase yet but see that the principal is sound!

With apples and time a potent blend will be made…

But of course can do it with a bit more..

Traditionally cider was made by taking the juice of an apple (or unless you are a horse eating a rotten apple – many apples!) and allowing the yeasts that exist in the air around us to ferment into cider.. You can still do this.  My only suggestion would be to fill the vessel you are fermenting in almost to the top and use a vessel that only has a relatively small air hole – supposedly a half filled barrel is a sure way of getting vinegar and not cider…!

However can be done by pulping and crushing apples for their juice or using carton’ed apple juice

1] campden tablet to kill of the yeast

2] 1kg of sugar

3] Cider yeast quantity dependant on the vessel you are fermenting in…

Fermentation can take a few weeks

4] Rack off if you can – i.e put into another vessel with such care as to avoid moving only the liquid and none of the sediment – easier said than done!  A tip is to siphon – suck through a tube from the original (on a chair) that is placed higher than the destination (on the floor)… and as it enters your mouth, transfer to the destination and watch it flow through (capillary action): can be a bit messy if slow or suprised!  As it flows through, keep the tube down the source container only a little lower than the surface.  As you start to get down to the bottom (about 1/3), tilt the source container and continue…. You will start to get to the sediment and you have to sacrifice a bit of cider for a lot of sediment so don’t stop too late!

5] Mature – yes you have to wait about 1 year!  But if you have a tap at the bottom of your barrel you can test everynow and again for this…

Make some cider (for next year!), take it with you on your next glamping adventure with ‘Wild in Style’ and impress your friends with how you stayed in a yurt and sipped home made cider..

Allium ursinum – wild garlic…

Be warned – when young – can be confused with Arum maculatum otherwise known as lords and ladies

A kitchen spice that is relatively unknown..

Beautiful in it’s taste and the way it can carpet an area in abundance.

There are 3 things to remember with wild garlic:

1] Unlike its hybridised relative, in cooking it’s flavour dissipates – so should be added at the end in hot dishes…

2] How much you take?  Basically take what you need and allow for propergation year on year – so don’t take it all and use a variety of sources..

3] Be careful where you are collecting from – don’t collect from anywhere there is regular passing traffic – it might taste good but the damage can be unseen!

4] A sneaky 4th is make sure you have land owners permission but as you can often find it by the road side this might not be necessary but see #3

Try potato and ramson soup… add a bit of cheeky chorizo if you are that way inclined!