Build This Outdoor Cold Cellar

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A cross section of the cold cellar. Note that the earth piled up around the edges is of the box is slanted so that water will run off the mound and away from the wood.
A cross section of the cold cellar. Note that the earth piled up around the edges is of the box is slanted so that water will run off the mound and away from the wood.
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Diagram shows the dimensions of the box that will serve as your cold cellar.
Diagram shows the dimensions of the box that will serve as your cold cellar.

Our basement, like many with furnaces in ’em, is just too dry and warm to store root vegetables for the winter. So a few years back my husband and I tried an old-time storage method that my father (who used this same technique himself many years ago) told us about: the underground vegetable pit.

We’ve used our outdoor “cold cellar” for three winters since then, and it really does the job. In fact, during that third January the temperature dropped to 30 below! Once the brutal cold had let up a bit, we went out to our belowground storehouse to check its contents (no one ventured out during that freeze). Believe it or not, we carried a basket of fresh unfrozen vegetables back over the squeaky snow–produce that would have cost us several dollars at the market, if it were available at all!

And, as “a final frosting on the cake,” the little pit that made this winter bonanza possible is as “easy as fallin’ off a log” to put together.

Our storage bin is nothing more than a box of one-inch lumber (use hardwood, since pine pitch can ruin many vegetables) that measures five feet long, by three feet wide, by three feet deep.

You can divide your container into several compartments if you want to. We partitioned ours into three 20-inch “cupboards.” And you’ll want a lid (which doesn’t need hinges, a board covering will do) that extends an inch or so past the edge of the box on all four sides so your cold-numbed fingers will have something to hold on to.

  • Published on Sep 1, 1978
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