My Artful Winemaker kit arrived in the mail last week – the company claims that it will make an artful winemaker out of all of us, if we follow the instructions carefully. I have high hopes – sufficiently high that I plan to blog about every stage of the process as I muddle along. I really enjoy red wines with grassfed meat, so I chose the Cabernet/Shiraz grape juice concentrate for my first attempt. If all goes as planned, I should have drinkable wine in as little as 28 days. I’ve tried making homemade wine a few times in my life, but without exception my experiences were anything but artful – but I have a good feeling about the process this time.

My Artful Winemaker winemaking package ($99.99 until 12-31-2010) included a fermentation vessel (complete with integral thermometer), clarifier, yeast, disinfectant, 12 wine bottles with corks, foil cork covers, and labels, winemaking book, instructional DVD, assorted utensils and, perhaps most important, quality varietal wine grape juice concentrate sufficient to make 12 bottles of hopefully the good stuff.

Even though I am a guy, and even though I have a strong penchant to assemble things that need assembly without looking at the instructions, I decided to hedge my bet against yet another failed attempt at making homemade wine by reading the instruction booklet. I was pleasantly surprised by the instructions – they were clearly written by someone who knows how to write and how to make the wine thing happen. It took me about 10 minutes to get the Artful Winemaker assembled and disinfected. It took another few minutes to steep the giant tea-bag-like sachets of shredded oak chips in water and dispense the grape juice concentrate and water into the fermentation vessel. The last steps included tossing the steeped oak sachets, primary clarifier and yeast into the mix, installing the cover and airlock and placing the entire works where the sun won’t shine on it.

That’s it for step one of the process. It’ll be a couple of weeks before I proceed to the next phase of the process. In the meantime, I like to look in on the Artful Winemaker from time to time to see the yeast at work. So far the mudroom doesn’t smell like a brewery and the airlock isn’t foaming over (ask me about some of my early beer-making experiences). But there is definitely evidence of yeast doing what yeast does ….

Top and bottom photos courtesy Karen Keb.

When it comes time to paint the roof of something as cumbersome as a 50 year old Butler grain bin, nothing beats the safety and comfort of the Little Giant  SelectStep adjustable height stepladder. The Little Giant SelectStep adjustable step ladder comes in models that are adjustable from four to six feet and from five to eight feet in height. Our Little Giant SelectStep adjustable stepladder is the taller model, and when it’s fully extended it makes a perfect platform for painting the grain bin’s roof. For safety sake, we set the ladder so that it leaned slightly into the grain bin and adjusted its legs to be equal height all the way around.

I’ve been a huge fan of Little Giant ladders for years – I bought my first to use as an infinitely adjustable and incredibly stable platform for shooting machinery photographs. Needless to say, that ladder, which can convert from an adjustable step ladder to an extension ladder has been used for everything from building a mudroom addition onto our 103 year old farm house to pressure washing the house's siding, to wiring the barn. What I particularly like about the new SelectStep’s design is that it is lighter, has wheels that make relocating the ladder really easy, and it has super-ergonomic height adjustment levers – in fact for the non-climbing legs, there’s a single swivel latch that releases both leg-locking pins at the same time. The climbing legs are adjusted with a pair of easy to engage and disengage locks (one on each side) that are so well designed it’s virtually impossible to pinch your fingers while working them.

When we used the Little Giant SelectStep stepladder to paint the grain bin’s roof, we extended the ladder to its full height. To my delight, as the ladder was fully extended, a safety decal appeared to indicate that the particular setting was the highest that was safe. We also found the SelectStep’s AirDeck to be a fantastic addition. Finally, an adjustable stepladder with a tool platform and handhold that’s both large enough and secure. The AirDeck’s utility tray features slots for all standard-size paint cans, tools, extension cords, and even has a magnetic dish for loose hardware – this seemingly minor detail makes the SelectStep even safer than the average stepladder, not to mention much more convenient.

I’ll be the first to admit that painting 50 year old metal bins isn’t exactly my idea of a fun time – especially because there’s generally no easy way to get all the stuff you need right next to you up at the work end of most ladders. The last time I tried painting such a structure, I wound up with about as much paint on me as I did on the roof. However, with the Little Giant SelectStep, I found that my Partner In Culinary Crime was in competition with me for getting that job done – she likes to paint but not on ladders. So we shared the task – I painted the upper areas because I have a bit more reach than she does and she did the details and fine work that I totally detest. I’m happy to report that her brown Rosies coveralls came away from the task without so much as a spot of paint on them – my Dickies coveralls have a few spots on them and they all resulted from some drips caused by my slopping the Rust Oleum on too thick.

If you feel daunted by painting tasks such as this one, or any other kind of stepladder work because your rickety old wooden ladder just makes you anxious, it’s time to step up to an adjustable stepladder that’s designed with your safety, comfort and convenience in mind.

I've used a number of chicken plucker machines in my life, but none has been as efficient as the Featherman Pro chicken plucker. With the help of a chicken plucker, the toughest part of processing your own broilers (other than perhaps killing the birds) is a breeze. Last weekend, with the help of a few friends and a few pieces of equipment from Featherman, including the Featherman Pro chicken plucker, we managed to process more than 40 broilers from kill to chill in less than two and a half hours. If you are turned off by the thought of raising your own meat birds because you so dislike the prospect of hand plucking your birds, it's definitely time to rethink.

The first step in the process involved placing the birds in to the Featherman cones and stand for a quick and humane kill and bleed out. Once the birds are fully bled, they are ready for the scalder and chicken plucker.

The Featherman Scalder, with its 70,000 BTU propane-fired burner, makes it easy to scald four big broilers at the same time. The 40 gallons of water has sufficient thermal mass that the temperature varies only slightly from scald cycle to scald cycle. If in doubt about the length of scald, pluck a few thigh feathers by hand after 15 seconds of swirling in the scalder. Once the birds are scalded, it's off to the chicken plucker.

The Featherman Pro chicken plucker consists of a fixed drum lined with feather-grabbing fingers and a rotating platen. The platen is also lined with plucking fingers and causes the birds to be tumbled and plucked. Thanks to the hose fittings and sprayers, the feathers are rinsed out of the chicken plucker as fast as they are plucked and deposited in a neat pile on the ground.

After about 20 seconds in the Featherman Pro chicken plucker, we had completely clean birds ready for evisceration.

Processing your own chicken at home is the ultimate in keeping tabs on food safety and knowing just where and how your birds were raised and treated. The entire activity goes easier with a few good friends and if you are processing a large number of birds at one time, I recommend that you find some high-quality tools to help.

Today I received word from a couple of folks that have already roasted one of the birds. "Out of this world" and "delicious" were used to describe the birds. Perhaps it's time for you to take the broiler chicken plunge. I know you won't regret it.

Photos Courtesy: Karen Keb

  My friends over at Farm Collector Magazinehave just released their first special issue and it's devoted entirely to antique tools -- especially little known or difficult to recognize antique farm and homestead tools. This new book,  Field Guide To Mystery Farm Tools, caught my eye when it first arrived in the office and it turns out to be an ongoing distraction. I've been interested in antique tools for most of my life and I even enjoy working with some antique tools in my own shop and on the farm, but I had no idea there was even any such thing as a cow tail holder (used to hold a recalcitrant cow's tail during hand milking) or a pedal-powered sickle grinder. And though I've wondered how they kept the spokes tight on wooden automobile and truck wheels for most of my life, I had no idea there was a nifty little tool designed and patented in 1923 just for that task.

 Field Guide To Mystery Farm Toolsis a photographic compilation of more than 150 old-time tools that you just might come across in the local junk shop or at the next farm sale you attend. Where possible, the Farm Collector staff have also sleuthed out the original patent illustrations for the tools and have added some pertinent history to boot. I was kicking around the chicken yard not too long ago and picked up an interesting piece of cast iron with three square-headed bolts threaded into it. I knew it had to be good for something -- sure enough, right there on the book's cover was a photo of a nearly identical piece. After a little digging in the book, I learned that the piece of cast iron was actually a horn weight, once used to cause cattle horns to point downward. Mine was no doubt used by the farmer that kept a small milking herd at my place way back in the 1940s.

The Field Guide To Mystery Farm Toolsis positively loaded with photos and information on intriguing tools of our past. At $7.95 retail, it's a bargain for its entertainment value alone -- and you will likely learn some fun history at the same time. You can find your copy of the book at your Local Tractor Supply Co. store or online.