Yesterday was cooler so I tried to spend some time inside doing interesting inside jobs as opposed to the drudgery inside jobs that I do At Speed. So I packaged up more postcards to be sent. 
Then I worked in my new Cave. John calls it the Cellar. The local word for this room is the Fruit Room. As you know one of my goals is to be self sufficient. One day I would like to try and go a whole year just eating from the farmy and buying dry stores like rice and flour and beans four or five times a year. I suggested this to John and he said he would go and live with his mother for that year. 
I said You do know that it will not be long and we will be building your Mother a Nanny Cabin down the bottom of the garden. She is in on this you know! He shook his paper and remained behind it. In my cave I have room for all the vegetables preserved in jars. The pickles, chutneys, honey, vinegars, jams and oils. On the right of the image above you can see the cheese cupboards, there are three along one wall. There are three parmesan wheels in them now. I shall fill it this summer. My cheeses will age much better in there. 
It is all very well to preserve the summer produce for the winter but it needs to be stored in a designated space. And all the jars as they are emptied need to be stored somewhere other than the bottom of my wardrobe. This is a lovely old fashioned idea. A beautiful store-room. A whole winters worth of food is quite a lot of food. The cave is 8×12 foot. It is made entirely of recycled barn timbers. And the scent from the wood is just sublime.
Naturally one wall is for the wine. This room is on the North side of the basement and it is very cool down there. It has a solid door. The floor is the concrete of the basement and the ceiling is also sanded tongue and groove old barn timbers. There is one tiny window, that looks out into the feet of the plants in the garden above. 
This is the magnolia I planted to shade part of the verandah in the summer. I think it is called sunburst. But I am not good with the names of plants.
I am now on the hunt for a door for the root cellar so I can store potatoes, onions and pumpkins, etc. Though the old people say to put the apples and pears in the well house because they will ripen and rot everything in the root cellar and if I cover them in burlap sacks above the well they will be fine in there. So much to learn.
I hear of people going off the grid and filling their houses with batteries and gadgets and generators to make the electricity they previously pulled from the grid. Solar that fills a bank of batteries. Wind turbines that have components made all over the world and shipped across to us. I wonder whether this does not leave just as big a carbon footprint. I sense that I am wandering off into a life that will eventually only need very little electricity and fuel to run it and I do not want to leave a huge pile of rubbish behind when I am gone. A little is OK. A little electricity and fuel is OK. Sustainable.
Imagine if there was no dump and no garbage trucks and all the rubbish and debris we throw out each day was piled like an exclamation mark in our own back yards where everyone could see it. Over the years it would be bigger than the house. I tried to explain this to my visitors last week when they were hunting for store bought water in convenient plastic bottles. I tried to do the maths for them. I tried to explain that water in throw away bottles is a very new phenomena and we should be careful. They just looked blankly at me and said well where do you get your water from then. I handed them the water jug and a glass.
Good morning. It is cool now but fine and will get warmer. The sun is up and I will be outside again today! I love this weather!
celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
94 responses to “The cave”
I love this weather too. I kid you not, Mike and I just had a very similar talk about garbage and piling up. Eek. Love the cave – ours would be full of wine as I haven’t attempted canning just yet.
Full of wine sounds good to me!! c
Good morning C; I do believe I am suffering root cellar envy….:)
Jess
Yup the root cellar is next, maybe I will go and take a shot INSIDE it today! I have no idea what is down there.. c
The store room is magical – I’m so impressed. Beautiful post.
Thanks Roger, tho i am still thinking of your friends little cellar bar with the gorgeous little french sink and wine stashed between the rocks! That shot reminded me that we do not need much really.. c
It all looks so neat and organized. Any home project I work on imposes lots of its own left-overs and added garbage to the mix: I need better coaching. So I will not do any more home projects and take cues from you as my guide.
Thanks, Celi. For all your great ideas. ..and did you receive my order for a set of postcards?
Ronnie
Yes I did Ronnie, you are on my list to email today..to swap addresses! talk to you soon,, c
You must be thrilled, what a wonderful room! I’m SOOooo with you on the bottled water thing. When our visitors arrive at the BandB, more often than not they are accompanied by several of the bloomin’ things, which all get left behind for me to dispose of. I keep trying to explain that what comes out of our tap is HIGHLAND SPRING WATER – and it’s FREE! They don’t seem to believe me however, what’s the answer I wonder?
Christine
Tell them it is filtered! Fill their bottles up with it and return them as they leave! People will eat anything then only trust water in a clear bottle, and really who knows where it came from! c
I’m envious of your store room, it is fab. So civilised! It is our intention to build a storeroom this Autumn.
Oh you will love it Bridget.. I am already loving mine and it has nothing in it yet! I will do asparagus first tho! c
A book that first got us dreaming about this life was John Seymour’s Complete Book of Self Sufficiency. On the back of the book, there’s a quote about how a good small-holding will generate next to no waste. Oh, what a long way I have to go. Still, it’s something to aim for, whether I get there or not.
We are working on it too, and always there is room for improvement, but we would have no goals if wee could not improve ! I have made a note of that book too thank you.. c
I hope you’ve read Barbara Kingsolver’s “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,” a lovely saga of actually living for one year only from the production of their own and a few neighbors’ farms. Recipes are included, as well as the occasional interjection of a few paragraphs by the Husband.
Your cave is beautiful and will be even more gorgeous when fully loaded!
Oh mary.. thank you, what a gift, this looks like the perfect book for me, i shall order it! In fact i was hoping to write that book myself!! c
All caves should be as cozy! Morning, Miss C. t
Morning Miss T, hope you have a good day at you know where! c
Your cave is amazing – it looks so beautiful and a perfect place to store all the food. I had to smile about the water – we are on the mains here but the water is foul. We go to a local spring every few days and fill up containers – most visitors are shocked at first , then they think it´s quaint. Then after we´ve sat down and talked about the water they drink which has been sitting around in horrible plastic bottles on supermarket shelves versus ours which has come up from a spring fresh and clear and cool..they soon stop feeling sorry for us!
we used to do this in portugal too. There was a spring out in the middle of a meadow, we would drive then walk with our containers through the long grass, down a little track, the water was beautiful. How awesome that you can do the same.. c
Oh your cave looks wonderful, just say it with a French accent darling and it will be even more glamerous! I’m imagining your cheese and the wonderful scent of wood ….
It will be interesting to see how the wooden structure influences the cheese, morning Claire! c
Hi C. Great cave. The magnolia is stunning.
Regards Florence x
Morning florence, i just wrote to tanya about your postcards, they will be on their way this week!! c
Would you look at your cave – AWESOME x 1 000 000! I (as much as possible) use rain water. Our tank is quite empty at the moment as we have not had much rain – it sprung a bit of a leak while Pete and I were in Mauritius and we just can’t seem to get it to stop so we do have a bit of wastage.
🙂 Mandy
how sad to lose your rain water, rain water makes the best cup of tea!! c
Really brings back memories of all that canning of fruits and veggies I helped with when I was little. (Oh, those hot steamy kitchens – even early in the morning) Everyone did that ‘way back then. It’s encouraging to see some of that wisdom from old farmers and their wives being utilized. (Marketing has really created a demand for items that create more problems – like plastic bottles!) You’ve very impressive!
Morning mouse, when we all do our little bit it does make a difference.. and I love a challenge! c
Reading this post and seeing these images reminds me of the dirt-floored cellar in the old farmhouse where I grew up in southwestern Minnesota. Mom would pull up the trap door in the kitchen and send one of us children down the creaky wooden steps to retrieve a jar of sauce (preserved fruits) as dessert for a meal. I remember burlap bags of carrots and potatoes and heaps of squash stashed in the corner. Such fond memories.
Recently I penned a poem, “Her Treasure,” about preserved fruits and vegetables lined up, like yours will be, on shelves in a cellar. That poem was selected for a Poet-Artist Collaboration with artists creating art based on the chosen poems. I cannot wait to see how an artist interprets my poem comparing the preserved fruits and vegetables to gems.
So this, dear C., is what you brought to mind for me this morning with your lovely post. Your cave is sure to create many memories for you.
what a fantastic memory, a trap door in the kitchen. Huh, I love these old farmhouse stories, they had rooms and spaces for everything.. morning Audrey! love the idea of art from a poem.. c
and poems from art, both poems and art from music. I love the look of your cave. Do you need toi monitor the temperature? Our rubbish amounts to about half a 30litre bag per week plus recyclables.
My sewing ladies were here today and we sat and nattered in the sun all afternoon. Glorious. Talk was of sheep and the failure to teach grammar and spelling properly which is only now being redressed.
I know, and handwriting, kids can’t write so i can read it anymore!! i don’t think i will have to adjust the temperature in there, it is cool down there summer and winter as I do not heat the basement in winter. We will see! c