I was fortunate to visit Joshua Tree this weekend. I met up with friends made at the Water Woman Festival in October.  During the festival  I didn’t really take any photos… to busy plerking ( play-working ).  This time I made sure to take some!

There were 4  building projects during the festival.  A temple led by Sun Ray Kelly; a cob bench and shade structure led by Kata Polano; Ray Cirino’s cob bench with built in rocket stove cooker; and a pond built by Gregory Glenn or the “goddess dipping pool”.  The temple and pool are complete, though the two cob benches are still under construction.  We were working on that this week end.

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“Joan” the lizard cob bench sits on the side walk tucked into the front yard of the Los Angeles Eco Village ( LAEV ), in Korean Town.  Where they have transformed the lawn into gardens growing fruit trees and edibles.  The lizard bench was conceived by Ray Cirino, LA  resident, artist and Water Woman Project visionary.  Who has a knack for blending art and ecological design in inventive and playful ways. This bench was built in 2006 by Ray, eco-villagers and friends.

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Since 1993, the quarterly journal The Last Straw has been sharing news and developments from around the world about straw-bale construction and natural building.  You can now find selected articles available online!  How great is that?

The Last Straw Blog »

What are you doing October 1 – 4, 2009?
Why not come to the Water Woman Festival in Joshua Tree, California…
The Water Woman Festival is an interactive ART and Ecological Experience featuring Eco-Artists, Green-Architects, Top Natural Builders, Permaculture Designers, Inspirational Eco-Leaders, Soulful Musicians and Sustainable Lifestyle Visionaries.
Water Woman Festival »

Have you ever heard the expression “I’m a builder not a baker”?  It’s funny,  until recently, I’ve made more cob ovens than loaves of bread.

My friends Kevin and Kristy ( KK ) came for a visit and we reconstructed the Oasis cob oven.  The size was a little too small and it had seen a years-worth of weather, so I destroyed the dome.  That’s what I love about cob… you can start over, with ease, creating a whole new form.  This time made it a little taller inside and added a chimney stack just for fun.  So, it took a while to  get all the elements in place…  remodeling the oven, gathering ingredients, and researching recipes.  But then one day, it was all together, and it was time to bake.

Artisan Bread in 5 minutes?

Artisan Bread in 5 minutes a Day By Jeff Hertzberg and Zoë François

Preparing the dough

Makes 4 1-pound loaves:
3 cups lukewarm water
1 1⁄2 tbsp granulated yeast (1 1⁄2 packets)
1 1⁄2 tbsp coarse kosher or sea salt
6 1⁄2 cups unsifted, unbleached, all-purpose white flour
Cornmeal for pizza peel

That’s it! So simple. What have I been waiting for all this time?
Mix all the ingredients together and let it sit for 2 hours.  The dough rises and you can use it right away or set it in the fridge for later.  The dough definitely is  easier to handle if it has been in the fridge for a while. Letting it sit in the fridge for a week gives a touch more flavor, almost like sour dough.  I start the fire and form my loaves so they can rest as the oven heats up.

Baking the bread

I’ve been burning my oven for 2 hours or so, which consumes about a wheel barrel of wood.   After the fire is spent I remove the embers from the oven.  Then wash down the baking surface ( fire bricks ) with a wet rag until the  surface is clean.  This is important, since bits of coal and grit aren’t the texture I’m after.   If your planning on cooking pizzas all night you may want to leave some embers around the sides of the oven to keep a high heat.   Though the cob absorbs the heat from the fire and radiates it for hours.  For baking  I add a small metal dish full of water, which creates steam and a nice crust.

After about 25 minutes at 350º the bread is done. Golden brown.   After a two hour burn the bread seems to take about 20 minutes and sometimes less.  Perhaps I can burn less wood and leave the bread in the oven for longer… Still fine tuning.

Let the bread sit for at least 20 minutes, and bon appetit!  Melted butter with a little honey on fresh bread. Mmmm… bliss.

What a joy such a simple thing can bring – baking your own bread.  Not to mention it’s better bread than you can buy at the store for pennies on the dollar.  Also baking  bread in a outdoor cob oven can keep the heat out of your house in the middle of summer.

I was surprised at the quality of the bread, and from such simple and minimal ingredients.  I’ve been baking a few loaves on Sunday and if kept in a container will last all week.  Of course friends always like to receive fire baked cob-oven-bread too.

Do you have any recipes I should try?

It’s been super fun to watch the process of Ziggy and friends building his cob house, dubbed Gobcobatron, over the last year or so. It’s a new installation on the land of Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage, a ecological and socially minded intentional community in northeastern Missouri. Ziggy has been busy working on a spiral designed cob house with a reciprocating living roof, a rocket stove, earthen floors and interior finishes. Now it seems that he’s ready to move in!

I’m gracious to Ziggy for documenting the process as he works step by step through building a cob house. Sharing insights and taking the time to document his experience, which is no small feat in it’s self. Congratulations!

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Explore the world of natural building and meet some of its pioneers who are creating beautiful and inexpensive houses out of earth and straw, houses that you can make, too. This is a way of building that can transform how you see the earth and yourself.

I’m fascinated by new ways of making cob.  Especially ones that take some of the back-breaking labor out of the equation.   Years back I visited HUG, or Hunt Utilities Group and produced a  short video of the experience.  Ryan Hunt gave us the tour and explained their vertical auger mixer. Which can make quick work of cob creation in mass quantities. Recently I checked in with HUG to see if there were any new innovations with mechanical cob mixing.  The following is a email I received from Ryan…

The magic to it is the vertical auger.  Tumble mixers make balls of it.  Mortar mixers and others with blades running through the mud catch the straw on the leading edges where it builds up huge sometimes.   Horizontal augers can compact the material against the side.  Skidsteer or tractor mixing is inconsistent.  And feet just get tired by the time you get a couple tons done.

We started with the big, blue Patz vertical Auger mixer.  It’s called a TMR mixer (total mixed rations) and is usually used for cattle feed.  We bought the small one made to be run by a 100hp tractor.  It mixes up to 7000 lbs of cob in about 30 minutes.

Then we bought and modified a little orange mixer hopper meant for spray-able, fibrous mixes.  We modified it with a vertical auger to replace the paddles and added a variable speed motor.  It has been used extensively to make small batches for the cob sculpting on campus.

With those two, we decided we needed something of an in between size that could be more portable than the big one, but make enough cob to be useful on a job site.  So we commissioned the construction of one about 1/4 the size of the big blue Patz.  That is now powered with a small tractor.
These are all successful, but are now underutilized.  We may be willing to rent some out.  Last year, we made several tons of cob for a local builder.

Then we have a gravel screener to get the rocks out of the sand and the clay (somewhat).  Cob with only small rocks works well for being pumped and trowel applied or spray applied on a wall.  We have a nice little pump and air compressor set up that can do that job, too.

We’d love to have some help documenting “commercial” cob.  It’s not the main direction we are headed at the moment, but there is a lot that we can share with people.

-Ryan Hunt

Cob as a sculptural medium is realized when Miguel Elliot of Living Earth Structures is at the helm.  Miguel is an artisan and builder who offers cob construction services and workshops. Creating whimsical structures, ovens, cob saunas, and sculpture.  I was particularly impressed to see Miguel’s work in an urban setting at the Butterfly Social Club, in Chicago, IL.  Miguel transformed a night club with lively cob sculpture. If your ever in need of some inspiration stroll over to Miguel’s site!

Living Earth Structures »

I wonder if it could be used as a replacement for sand? Pulverized caliche could add color or brightness to your finish plasters; kind of a natural lime or whiting.  I haven’t experimented too much with this material as an additive to cob.  I doubt it would have a negative affect.  Let us know if you have experimented with caliche and cob!

Update:

Thanks to Jim for pointing out The Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems, Caliche Report [PDF]