Old stew pot restoration

[nue2farm]

We had cornbread and sweetmilk as well with buttermilk when I was growing up. Freaked my wife out the first time I did it after we got married, 43 years ago. I still like it either way. Have fun and stay safe....

 

[bullbreaker]

by some chance did you stumble onto a syrup kettle anyway to post a picture

Don't know anything about syrup kettles but heres a pic of what I believe to be a sugar cane kettle. If that helps.

Boone

 

[mitch becton]

yes that is a syrup kettle also known as a hog scalder when i was growing up in south georgia. our old family kettle my brothers and i found awhile back while doing some work at the farm and as strange as it seems ours is broke almost like yours. please keep this in mind also those pots are quite valueable i have seen them go for a low of $200.00 to over a $1000.00. in the past few years there has been a big comeback in cane syrup making in the south a lot of people looking for these kettles and you can make a few gallons of syrup from a small back yard garden and seeds are available from for real feed and seed stores or can be ordered if any want to try a hand at it good lacuk

 

[RJJR]

Thanks to everyone for all the great ideas. It's a 10 gallon pot and will not fit in the oven so I'll clean it and put a fire under it and try the methods you describe. Will post some pics later.
RJ

 

[creekbend]

Are you kidding? That was sometimes the whole meal when I was a kid and we had our own milk cow so more milk than we could use.:laughing: And of course we didn't have air-conditioning, so Mother would bake a big skillet of cornbread and we'd eat it in glasses of milk out on the porch where it was cooler in the summer.

And now . . . yep, I'll eat any leftover cornbread in a glass of milk for an evening snack.

I've heard a lot of people talk about cornbread and buttermilk, but I just never acquired a taste for buttermilk. I prefer sweet milk.

Dear Sir: Our earlier lives are somewhat similar. I asked that question because I suspected that you were raised somewhat in the way I was. I almost called it "Sweet Milk" too, but I wasn't really positive that you would identify or relate to that connotation. I hate the taste or smell of Buttermilk. Everyone is my Family drank it, including members of my Father's Family. My Father, Mother and 5 of us Brothers and Sisters lived in a 4 room home until I was a Senior in High School. We were "dirt poor", but we didn't realize it, because we always had a roof over our heads, clothes on our backs and food in our stomachs.

 

[schoolsout]

Tallow is the best to use, but I've actually got 6 pieces in my oven right this instant (2 hours to go) at 200 degrees coated in lard. Not a fan of hydrogenated stuff, but it is what it is.

The Griswold on the stove top has about 60 good years of seasoning on it and it gets bacon grease in it before and after I use it (keep a tupperware full of it in the fridge).



You can also toss the pan in a hot coal fire and leave it there overnight...come back, wash it up and then start the seasoning process. Several light coats of grease done over a day or three in the oven are preferable.

 

[Bill 55]

Every year my neighbor buys 12 to 16 feeder pigs and raises them up to butcher. He invites everyone to come participate in and old fasioned butchering. There is always a big meal amd a lot of companionship.He has several large cast iron pots we set over an open fire to boil the meat off the bones then add cornmeal and flour to the meat amd broth to make Panhaus. I inherited all my inlaws butchering equipment and take it along. We used vegetable oil to season the pots for storage for several years, it ends up pooling in a puddle in the bottom of the pot that turns into a semi- hard glop that is nearly impossible to remove when wwe go to clean things up the next year. Last year I took a tub of lard and used that instead of the vegetable oil. My steel 35 gallon pot is smoother than Scott's cast iron pots, and it looks just like it did the day we seasoned them for storage. I talked to him last week as we are going to butcher 14 hog the 17th and 18th. He said his pots are in the best shape he has seen them in years. Lard is good stuff for cast iron. We have never rendered lard but might do a little this year. We both have old cast iron lard/sausage presses. Last year we ground and stuffed over 500 lbs of sausage that then were smoked in his great grandfathers smoke house. I look forward to this event every year. It reminds me of when I was a kid. You just don't see much of this anymore. I glad it is time to butcher because my wife told me we are eating the next to last pack of sausage for supper tonight. The smoked sausage has been gone for a couple of months, last of the ham went at Christmas, chops and bacon are long gone, so I am ready.

 

[DJ54]

MMMM.., Cracklins fresh out of the press.... :thumbsup:

 

[Bird]

Dear Sir: Our earlier lives are somewhat similar. I asked that question because I suspected that you were raised somewhat in the way I was. I almost called it "Sweet Milk" too, but I wasn't really positive that you would identify or relate to that connotation. I hate the taste or smell of Buttermilk. Everyone is my Family drank it, including members of my Father's Family. My Father, Mother and 5 of us Brothers and Sisters lived in a 4 room home until I was a Senior in High School. We were "dirt poor", but we didn't realize it, because we always had a roof over our heads, clothes on our backs and food in our stomachs.

Maybe even more similar than you know.:laughing: I can sure remember living in a house with 4 rooms and a path (the path led to the outhouse about 50 yards out behind the house. I was the oldest of 5; had 2 brothers and 2 sister. We thought we were really uptown when we got running water and later a bathroom in the house.

For some reason, my paternal grandmother liked buttermilk. I can't think of another person in my family that would drink it. The buttermilk went to the hogs and chickens. And "Sweet Milk" was a common term in my younger days, but as you said, you don't hear it anymore.

 

[Arkaybee]

I have asked for "sweet milk" to a young clerk at McDonald's and got this vacant look of "what's that . . ." I had to rephrase that to "WHITE MILK, please" and then recognition set in:thumbsup: You know, NOT chocolate milk.

Arkaybee