THE LOST ARTS OF HEARTH AND HOME

A celebration of the new old-fashioned approach to living – from soap making to sewing to bread baking and much more.

The Lost Arts of Hearth and Home is not about extreme, off-the-gridliving. It’s for city and suburban dwellers with day jobs: people who like doing things themselves with a needle and thread, garden hoe, or manual saw; traditionalists who love to cook with fresh natural ingredients and use time-honored techniques for preservation.
This book offers projects that are decidedly unplugged and a little daring – readers will find more open fires than electric ovens, more jars on shelves than in the fridge, and more handmade soaps than store-bought ones. Intended for hobby and armchair homesteaders alike, it’s a guide for industrious crafters and cooks who aren’t afraid to roll up their sleeves. Readers will learn the history and how-to of everything from quilting and soap making to bread baking, all without the electric toys that take away from the experience of making things by hand.

Ken Albala is Professor of History at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California, and the author of nine books about food.

Rosanna Nafziger Henderson is a freelance writer in San Francisco.