Garden Kitchen/Processing Room

[EddieWalker]

Sheetrock is up and taped with the first coat of mud. I was hoping to get a second layer on today, but there are a few spots that are still not dry, so I'll do the next coat another day. Nice thing about doing projects for myself is that I don't have a deadline or any need to rush.

Today I finished off the beams. Seemed like a good idea considering it's Valentines Day!!!

 

[s219]

Nice work as usual Eddie!

 

[TnAndy]

Ed,

The lift is awesome. I remodel homes for a living and usually just do sheetrock repairs, or small jobs like a bathroom. Every now and then I get a job where I need to do a big ceiling. I will only use 5/8's sheetrock on a ceiling because of the 24 inch span of the joists. I also work alone. With the lift, I can place the sheetrock on the lift, wheel it into position tight next to the previous piece and then take my time screwing it in. It is easy, fast and simple. I rented them a few times before realizing that it's something that I needed to own. This one is from Northern Tool, and I highly recommend it.

I'll 2nd the recommendation on the drywall lift. I bought a used one from a rental place (they sell off used tools at some point) relatively cheap because I was going to build some rental houses and do my own drywall. Since used to to do my shop, and several remodeling projects. If it involves more than a sheet or two, I get it out. The ceiling work is especially nice....no more 2 people straining their guts out to hold a sheet in place while trying to secure it.....one guy can load, stand right on the ground and maneuver into place, then fasten easy as pie. Don't use it a lot, but when you need one, you'll REALLY appreciate the guy that invented them !

 

[TnAndy]

Our room addition I call the Auxiliary Kitchen. Added a 12x22 room on the back of the garage, and it became the Primary Kitchen for several months when I remodeled the kitchen in the house.

I cut a hole in the back wall off the garage to start, and cut my garage floor concrete to tie in new drains. Also built a block flue for a wood cook stove I couldn't work out space for in our house kitchen. Door opening is for a pair of 30" doors to make it easy to roll freezers in/out, or a cart with pork halves to hang in cooler, etc.

Property on the back of the garage drops off sharp down into a wet weather creek, so I had to dig a footer and lay a few courses of block on the lower side to pour the slab onto. I'd already extended the deck around the back of the house a year before when re-doing it in anticipation of this addition....that is Geo-Deck artificial decking.

Poured the floor, built the outside walls out of 2x6 cut from white pine off our place on my sawmill. Inside ceiling height to be 9'. The hole framed in the back wall between the 8' and 10' stepladders is for the window AC unit that will provide the cooling in the walk-in cooler that will go in that corner. The other outside corner will be a U shaped pantry for canned goods.

Roof is 2x6 rafters with 1x6 decking tied into the back side of the existing garage.

Walk-in cooler framed to the left, pantry to the right. Cooler door is a used commercial pre-hung unit (Craig's List). Also put a 60amp subpanel in here to run my branch circuits for this new room.

Left side of the room now finished. Tiled the floor, sloped to a floor drain in the main room as well as the walk-in cooler. Tiled the walls halfway up so I can take a water hose (stored in the cabinet with the 30gal electric water heater) and hose the whole place down with hot water. Wood cook stove installed. (Bought it used years back, kept on a pallet in barn).

Walk-in walls are 4" foam with white fiberglass panels interior, all easy to hose down as well.

 

[TnAndy]

Continued.....

Pantry inside shot:

The other side of the room. Homemade cabinets (didn't have doors done in this pic, but are now). Sink is a 2 compartment commercial job (CL). Dishwasher is out of the main kitchen, still worked fine, but she wanted all SS to match in there, so I simply moved it out here. Great for jar washing. The tops are Corian knock off (Samsung). I bought slabs at a local salvage building supply, and made my own counter tops. Very easy stuff to work with, as it turned out....but sand OUTSIDE if you use this stuff....the dust is finer than any flour you'll ever see, and gets into everything in your shop.

You can see the WH, and the hose (buy hot water rated hose if you do this). Window is an Andersen casement pulled out of the main kitchen, wife wanted a bigger one there, and there was nothing wrong with this one other than being 20 years old. My All American 943 canner (holds 19-20 quart jars at a time) sitting on the counter. We use a 30"x60" stainless table in the center for work space and meat cutting.

One eastern white tail deer in jars. Bought a small meat bandsaw, seen in corner. Things like this store in the walk-in when the cooler isn't being used, so it does double duty as storage most of the year.

Just outside the door into the Auxiliary kitchen in the back of the garage, I built a cabinet to store empty jars (this one for quarts), the second for pints. Door to the right goes out of the garage to the deck. One of our 5 small chest freezers, all of them on caster bases. We'll keep two in the AK when the room isn't being used for work, then roll out the double doors into the garage to free up room in the AK.

 

[EddieWalker]

Thanks Andy, you posted this before and it was my inspiration to do the same thing. I was originally planning on using that space for a guest bedroom/apartment, but realized that we don't really like having guests stay over and we already have two empty bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs that are never used. Making it into something useful sounded like a much better idea!!!!

I found a similar sink like yours on FB, except it has 3 bays. Otherwise, I think it's the same thing. I plan on having a garbage disposal on the far left bay. I also want to make it an under mount sink so that we can just wipe what's on the counter into the sink. Have you ever had to change or replace your faucet? In my brain, I'm thinking that the sink needs to be able to slide out so I can get to the faucet if I need to. I'm planning on installing some 90 degree brass fittings to the back of the faucet, and then attach my water supply lines to those brass elbows so I can get the sink as tight to the wall as possible. I installed my hot and cold water valves down low so I can get to them easily under the sink.

Do you cook the meat before you put it in the jars? How do you cook it and what do you do to it before eating it out of the jars?

LOVE LOVE LOVE all your storage ideas. I showed my wife your pics and she wants the same thing!!!!!

 

[GPintheMitten]

Why didn't you put 5/8" drywall on the ceiling for a fire break? The beadboard looks nice but no firebreak.

Nice touch on the beams.

 

[TnAndy]

Eddie,

Yeah....you've already got about 2 extra bedrooms too many.....ahahahaaaaa....

The sink faucet 'guts' are all out front....I have two 1/2" MPT copper adapters sticking out the holes in the sink, and the faucet mounts to them....so unless something happens to the supply, there isn't a need to pull the sink out.

Deer meat I do cook, cutting it down to large sections of bone, and boil them in a turkey cooker pot on a propane burner. I do this so the meat is easy to debone (boil it until it's falling off the bone), and stick it in the jars, and process 60min/pints, and 90 min/quarts. The process time could likely be cut a LOT considering the meat is fully cooked, but that's the recommended time for anything with meat, cooked or raw packed.

I use deer meat for my dogs. Boiling makes it easy to de-bone, plus they get the fat, bone marrow, joint gelatin, etc....everything BUT the bones.

IF I were using it for us, I'd de-bone with a knife, and raw pack in jars...being more picky about which cuts went to us and which went in the dog food pile. That's exactly what I do with beef and pork....keep a meat lug on the bottom shelf, and cuts that maybe have some hair still on them, or dryed out too much in aging, or whatever reason I'm rejecting them for human consumption goes to dog food, mostly canned like the deer meat (even though we're freezing most of our cuts).

We don't can a lot of meat in JUST meat form. Ground beef we make taco meat (add the seasonings, etc), spaghetti sauce, beef stew, chili, whatever, then can THAT. Most of it calls for browning the hamburger meat, or stew cubes, then add what you add to it.

Stew, for example, I brown the meat which has been rolled in flour, then add my veggies/spices, heat it some (but not the 'all day slow cook' that stew usually is), and can it. The 90min process time gives you beef stew that is just like it cooked in a crock pot all day.

I thought I had posted the above before, so for those that have seen it, sorry for the re-run !

 

[EddieWalker]

Why didn't you put 5/8" drywall on the ceiling for a fire break? The beadboard looks nice but no firebreak.

Nice touch on the beams.

Not real sure how that would work. If I have a fire inside there, wouldn't it just burn up the cabinets and walls anyway? I guess the answer is I never thought of it, and don't see how it would change anything if I had a fire.

 

[EddieWalker]

Andy,

Thanks again, you are so far ahead of what we want to do!!! We've started making our own dog food in a crockpot out in the shop. As soon as this kitchen is done, the dog food will be made out there. We never thought of using wild game. We have hogs here and it wouldn't take much to bring more of them in. I stopped using the deer feeder because we where overrun with hogs. I'm thinking that they would make great dog food!!!!