heating | mysite

HEATING AND COOKING WITH WOOD

Whilst living off-the-grid in our tiny house, we collect wood from the forest and burn it in our tiny wood stove to provide heat and fuel for cooking. We use an axe, maul, wedge, and saw (or hatchet) to cut the wood into pieces small enough for our stove.

We have a few differet tools for cutting the wood:

large hand saw: cuts quickly though thick tree branches to make make pieces of suitable length.

small hand saw: cuts through thinner tree branches. light and easy to use. stiffer plate is good for beginning a cut.

hatchet: used to cut off small, thin branches from a larger piece.

felling axe: sharp, thin blade is meant for cutting into the wood rather than splitting it. can be used to cut tree branches of medium thickness. can also be used to cut small pieces out of logs (for kindling).

splitting maul: for spitting logs that have no knots and that split easily.

splitting wedge: for splitting logs that have knots or are particularly hard to split. used when a splitting maul fails.

We use the maul to initially split the wood. Oak is a very hard wood.

We then use the sharp axe to further split the wood and make kindling - small peices of wood used to begin the fire.

Kindling (small pieces of firewood) catches alight quickly to initially begin the fire. Kindling is also best used in the biginning of cooking as it burns quickly, producing high temperatures that are ideal for bringing water to a boil. Small tree branches and twigs also make good kindling material.

Larger pieces of wood burn slowly and are best used to keep the fire going through the night.

We also cook our food ontop of the wood stove. We use enamel coated cast iron pots that can tolerate high heat.

To adjust the temperature of the fire, simlply open or close the vent of the stove. The more the vent is open, the more quickly the fire burns and a higher temperature is produced. The less oxygen the fire is exposed to, the slower it will burn.

Changing the vent to either make the fire burn quicly or slowly

"The best fuel for cooking, Prabhupada said, was cow dug; wood was second, gas third , and electricity last."

-Srila Prabhupada Lilamrta

Satsvarupa Dasa Gosvami

Bhagavän: Petrol they also use for heating. And electricity.

Prabhupäda: No, heating. Heating we can do by wood. By nature.

-Morning walk

Rome, May 27, 1974