The end of an era
In 2010, I launched Punk Domestics with a vision in mind: To celebrate the wealth of experience, knowledge, and passion for home food preservers and DIY weekend warriors everywhere. I wanted to create an engine for discovery and inspiration.
Within just a few days of bringing the site into the world, contributions came in not just from fellow blogger friends, but a rich community of people far and wide who educated, enlightened, and entertained with their exploits. It was exciting.
Though the community and the site grew for a while, I was never able to make it better than a self-supporting venture. For years now, contributions, traffic, and (let’s be real) ad revenue have been in sharp decline. Costs of maintenance, both monetary, temporal, and emotional, have become too great.
Things change
Everything has changed in the eight years since I first launched Punk Domestics. Many, if not most, of my contributors over the years are no longer blogging. Heck. blogging isn’t blogging in the sense it used to be, though it has seen a resurgence in the form of Substack.
The archive of the site has become so broken with dead links as to become useless, so I am letting it go. I also no longer have the energy to the support social channels. This chapter has come to a close.
However, I leave you with a few excellent resources I still refer to with great frequency:
Food in Jars Marisa McClellan has been blogging about, well, food in jars for over 15 years, and still going strong.
Ferment Works Kirsten and Christopher Shockey have written several highly recommendable books on fermenting, and their Substack Fermenting Change is a worthwhile subscribe.
Sandor Katz Sandor is the OG of fermenting gurus. His research has taken him around the globe, giving him an encyclopedic perspective on the world of fermentation.
Gratitude
Being at the helm of Punk Domestics has enriched my life immeasurably. I have met literally hundreds of amazing people, online and in person, at home and around the country. Many have become close personal friends that I will always treasure.
I have written on food preservation for multiple outlets. I’ve even brought groups to Italy for hands-on foodcraft classes, including breaking down a 200-kg hog into all kinds of salumi.
I mean, who gets to do that?
We still can
I have developed and still maintain many strong relationships within this amazing community. We still can … and pickle, and ferment, and cure, and dehydrate, and perform all the minor miracles that make food preservation positively magical. I can’t wait to crack a jar with many of you again.