Fellow BRHS listers,
I apologize for the length of this post. If it doesn't apply to you just
delete!
After all the discussion and suggests a couple of weeks ago regarding HO scale
sugar beets, I decided to experiment a little. After all, you can't model
lines west in Colorado, western Nebraska, or Wyoming without sugar beet trains.
Here's what I came up with and I think they look pretty good. For freight car
loads I glued them to the top of foam block, cut to fit the car. For beet
piles, I glued them to blue foam shaped like a stack of beets, using a white
glue, rubbing alcohol, and water mix
Recipe for HO scale sugar beets
Take about half a pound of anise seeds and half a pound of fenugreek seeds and
mix together. Both are available on-line at www.americanspice.com for about
$8.00 per lb. Put them into a quart jar to which you add about a half cup of
rubbing alcohol and some water-based hobby paint (Polly S, Modelflex, etc.). I
used about a tablespoon of roof brown, rust, gray, and dust. You want a dirty,
brown-gray color. Shake this for a few minutes until all the seeds are coated.
Poor into some container you don't care too much about. I used an old
cool-whip tub. Put outside to dry (the aroma is quite strong). After they've
dried spread them onto a cookie sheet or pizza pan and heat to about 250.
Watch them closely as they will slowly roast to just the right color.
You might want to do this when your wife is out of town, as anise seed has a
strong licorice smell and will fill your kitchen and any other rooms near it.
As it bakes, the smell dissipates (I suspect it is cooking the aromatic oils
out). In any case, it doesn't even come close to the smell of real beets
cooking! When your "beets" are the right color, again set them outside to cool.
There you have it, You're all ready for the next beet "campaign."
Rick Patterson
Worland, Wyoming
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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