Needle cases seemed to be a pretty important piece of kit for Viking Age ladies. There are finds in lots of mediums, from bone to precious metals. I've got a link to one here but google and pinterest have loads more. While metal tubing is easily available and ships prime, I'm going to go with bone as it'll make for a more unique and definitely not mass produced gift.
The bones of large birds seems to be the material of choice as they're a good size and, conveniently, pre-hollowed. Large birds in Scandinavia would have been geese, swans and maybe raptors. I've no plans on being THAT authentic, so I'm going with clearance turkey drumsticks!
Step one is getting to the bone. Cooked bones are a good bit more brittle and splintery than raw bones, so I sadly don't get to have roast meat on the bone like I'm in a bad medieval cartoon. (Although the meat and bone ends and marrow do make for an excellent soup).
Yum, right?
YES DROP IT DO IT DO IT
Anyways, step one is getting to the bone and if you can manage it, stripping off the membrane that separates the bone from the meaty bits. Makes things way easier to clean up later. Once that has happened, it's saw time.
If you have one of those rubber grippy things for opening up stubborn jars, it can help to get a grip on slippery bone. Safety first, or at least first-ish!
This first cut is a bit long in case of chips, and also so I can see what I'm dealing with on the inside and can make smarter trim decisions. Need to get rid of the marrow first, though. My technique is to stab around in there a bit with a chopstick and then (this is really gross) blow it out (rum kills raw turkey cooties). Do that in the sink or over the garbage if you don't plan on using it, but towards the soup pot if you want to make broth out of the bone ends and meat.
Now that your bones are cleaned out, take a look inside. There's a bone filament matrix in there that hides a lot more marrow, but you're going to have to scrape it out. I use a half-round file and a lot of running water.
Once your interiors are clean, it's time for the hurry-up-and-wait part. Some water, a couple squeezes of dish soap and time. I'll replace the soap and water every few days, and maybe do a round of hydrogen peroxide too (but only for about an hour soak).
The pink ones are the fresh ones, the others are leftovers from a previous batch. I wasn't very diligent about cleaning out that bottom one the first time around, and that brown coloration is from marrow grease. We'll see if it soaks/leeches out. Science!
The bones of large birds seems to be the material of choice as they're a good size and, conveniently, pre-hollowed. Large birds in Scandinavia would have been geese, swans and maybe raptors. I've no plans on being THAT authentic, so I'm going with clearance turkey drumsticks!
Step one is getting to the bone. Cooked bones are a good bit more brittle and splintery than raw bones, so I sadly don't get to have roast meat on the bone like I'm in a bad medieval cartoon. (Although the meat and bone ends and marrow do make for an excellent soup).
Yum, right?
YES DROP IT DO IT DO IT
Anyways, step one is getting to the bone and if you can manage it, stripping off the membrane that separates the bone from the meaty bits. Makes things way easier to clean up later. Once that has happened, it's saw time.
If you have one of those rubber grippy things for opening up stubborn jars, it can help to get a grip on slippery bone. Safety first, or at least first-ish!
This first cut is a bit long in case of chips, and also so I can see what I'm dealing with on the inside and can make smarter trim decisions. Need to get rid of the marrow first, though. My technique is to stab around in there a bit with a chopstick and then (this is really gross) blow it out (rum kills raw turkey cooties). Do that in the sink or over the garbage if you don't plan on using it, but towards the soup pot if you want to make broth out of the bone ends and meat.
Now that your bones are cleaned out, take a look inside. There's a bone filament matrix in there that hides a lot more marrow, but you're going to have to scrape it out. I use a half-round file and a lot of running water.
Once your interiors are clean, it's time for the hurry-up-and-wait part. Some water, a couple squeezes of dish soap and time. I'll replace the soap and water every few days, and maybe do a round of hydrogen peroxide too (but only for about an hour soak).
The pink ones are the fresh ones, the others are leftovers from a previous batch. I wasn't very diligent about cleaning out that bottom one the first time around, and that brown coloration is from marrow grease. We'll see if it soaks/leeches out. Science!
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