Where to buy food grade lime?

[Scarecrow]

Anybody have any idea where I can buy food grade hydrated lime (calcium hydroxide)? It keeps popping up as something needed for various preparations (eg. at the moment I need it for Betel nuts), but googling for a place it might be available at has yielded nothing.

Any suggestions of where to try?

Edited May 23, 2013 by Scarecrow

[coolname]

just use bicarb soda (sodium bicarbonate) instead. Or even mylanta should work if its just for chewing with stuff like betel nut. its alot safer. When i was younger and stupid, i got some lime and chewed it with betel nut and it burned my mouth. I was peeling dead skin from inside my cheeks for a couple of days after that

[paradox]

you can toast & grind up snail shells or seashells too

[gerbil]

sab webstore, dried herbs, page 2.

[Halcyon Daze]

Go to somewhere multicultural like the sunday markets etc and talk to a PNG national, or someone from SE Asia, many have a supplier or know someone who does.

For instance the old toothless Cambodian woman across the road from me actually sells it at the markets herself.

I even saw it for sale in an international food shop once.

By the way, betel nut is more enjoyable without it, but certainly packs more punch with it.

And just remember to use it with caution, it can burn the shit out of your mouth if it's first point of contact is directly on your skin.

[ballzac]

just use bicarb soda (sodium bicarbonate) instead. Or even mylanta should work if its just for chewing with stuff like betel nut. its alot safer. When i was younger and stupid, i got some lime and chewed it with betel nut and it burned my mouth. I was peeling dead skin from inside my cheeks for a couple of days after that

Totally agree. I actually find lime doesn't work anywhere near as well as bicarb because you will burn yourself before the pH gets high enough in your mouth. I chew tobacco quite a lot and always have a tobacco tin full of bicarb with me and it works great. Lime is nasty shit.

[Xenodimensional]

just use bicarb soda (sodium bicarbonate) instead. Or even mylanta should work if its just for chewing with stuff like betel nut. its alot safer. When i was younger and stupid, i got some lime and chewed it with betel nut and it burned my mouth. I was peeling dead skin from inside my cheeks for a couple of days after that

Forget lime*, antacids won't do it and you can get away with just a tiny pinch of bicarb if you follow Xenodimensionals guide to epic chewing.

Go to your favourite organic grocer or coop. Buy a tube of toothpaste containing calcium carbonate (aka chalk) and use about half the amount you'd use to brush your teeth with. Add a small pinch of bicarb for even better results. Auromere, Red Seal and Vicco are the best brands I've found but avoid the cardamom flavoured Auromere as IMO it tastes nasty.

I am all too familiar with what over chewing with bicarb does and lets just say you'd be doing well to not find out. Ever since I've used toothpaste for the chew things have been good.

Enjoy and watch your teeth, long term chewing is not good for them.

*you will burn your mouth with lime, it's not worth it.

[Halcyon Daze]

In case you're wondering, the usual way to chew betelnut with lime is like this. It is done like this so you don't burn your mouth.

First, open the greenish palm nut shell and remove the soft inner nut. Chew it on it's own for a short while and maybe spit once if you have too much saliva, chew the nut into a mush/ pulp.

Next break off a piece of Piper betel pod (aka mustard) and dip it in the lime powder (Get a fairly large amount).

Now place the whole thing in the centre of the mush and cover the entire piece of 'mustard' with the mush, so that all of the dry lime powder gets covered and mixed with the wet mush.

Now chew the whole lot, It'll really go a thick red like chalky paint. This is how they do it in PNG anyway, this is how they avoid burning their mouths.

If you want to increase the effects of the mix, push some up under your top lip and some down under your bottom lip while you chew. The increased surface area will absorb more faster.

But if you chew like 5 at a time you will get a major headache.

[Scarecrow]

okay, I'll give bicarb soda a try. I don't really have any extra ingredients to work with (eg. mustard) so I'm gonna have to keep it simple.

 

sab webstore, dried herbs, page 2.

haha, oh, wow. I wish I had seen that when I was ordering these.

[gtarman]

I know this question isn't about yopo, but where yopo is legal (or where it isn't legal and people do it anyway) I'm always astonished when I hear of people snorting it with bicarb soda.

Snorting bicarb soda would have to be the worst idea in the world - the stuff is highly micro-abrasive, that's why it kills cockroaches and other bugs as an insecticide: it slices into their tiny little skins and they bleed out. Just imagine what that would do to all the highly delicate and sensitive tissues of the nasal passage and sinuses. Mind you, I'd imagine lime isn't much better...probably why the natives used ash and charred bones (I think they did anyway).

Not in my nostrils, no thank you.

Edited July 27, 2013 by gtarman

[Anodyne]

Snorting bicarb soda would have to be the worst idea in the world - the stuff is highly micro-abrasive, that's why it kills cockroaches and other bugs as an insecticide: it slices into their tiny little skins and they bleed out. Just imagine what that would do to all the highly delicate and sensitive tissues of the nasal passage and sinuses.

Not to mention the seeds themselves, which would be something like fine sawdust.

Bleh. I know people like to do stuff the "traditional" way but hell, if you have access to solvents, why not use them?