Building a Homestead Root Cellar

As a homesteader you might have some idea about storing your produce for further use. But, if you are looking for a solution to store your food in winter months or from the heat of summer or if self sufficiency is the only goal, then homestead root cellar is the solution.

Root cellars are the most reliable ways to store produce through winter that is absolutely safe, easy and fun too. You can store vegetables, apples, cheeses, cured meats and ferments with less effort, time, and money.

Let’s see step by step process of building homestead root cellar in your homestead for storing everything. Before that, learn something about the root cellar and how it is used.

Homestead Root Cellar For Fruits And Vegetables:

Long before the age of mechanical refrigeration, people often look for ways to store their food safely over the non growing months of winter.

Root cellar is the oldest method amongst all other, it is an underground room that acts as natural refrigerator maintaining temperatures of 30 degree Fahrenheit during winter and 50 degree Fahrenheit during summers.

Even in present days, this is a never ending process of storing food and many farmers and gardeners love to do the same thing for their grown vegetables and fruits.

Building A Homestead Root Cellar:

Check out step by step process of building a homestead root cellar in your space.

• Select the space where you want to create root cellar and dig storage space about four feet, make sure the temperature is around 52 degrees Fahrenheit.
• Once the space is dug and covered with insulated roof and walls, it’s better to cover the floor with gravel to keep ground moisture from creating a muddy mess.
• Install shelving in a dug root to keep produce above any excess moisture that creeps in.
• Make sure to maintain proper air movement within your space so that it will not become too moist or too dry. 
• You must monitor all those fruits and vegetables every week and feel around to check for spoiling produce, because one spoiled vegetable or fruit can spoil the whole crop.
• For example, apples can live up to year when stored in right conditions where the temperature ranges between 30 and 40 degrees of Fahrenheit and 90-95 percent humidity levels.
• On the other hand, winter squash need to be stored at 50 degrees and humidity ranges between 50 and 70 percent up to six months.
• Vegetables like carrots, beets, parsnips need to hold on to moisture in storage they are not shriveled after few months.

Apart from this information, Building A Homestead Root Cellar is a wonderful guide that takes you with every detail you need to know about building homestead, storing vegetables and fruits and recipes of root cellar. Knowing how to cook from root cellar is just as important of how to store one. When you don’t know how to cook, what is the use of keeping those all fresh things on your table? Get one and build your own homestead root cellar for your vegetables and fruits.