[Homemakers] A Prep Challenge - Take Two

[A.T.Hagan]

I want to continue in the theme that GingerGirl started.

Same deal as the first one EXCEPT for the following changes:

- <b>NO</b> grid power
- <b>NO</b> flow of natural gas in the pipeline
- <b>NO</b> water from the municipal water system
- <b>NO</b> municipal sewage system function
- <b>AND</b> it's the fourth day of the centralized utilities failure <b>IN AUGUST.</b>

<i>Okay Homemakers, TSHTF and the next meal is up to you. Dig into your preps and see what meal you can put on the table.

Test your pantry, your skills and your creativity.

A real meal, one night this week.

Nothing fresh unless from you own productions: garden, dairy, and such.

Share your menu, weakness and strengths discovered, how well your family liked the meal, tips for other homemakers.

GOOD LUCK</i>

The meal must be something your family will willingly eat and hopefully look forward to having. Menus please, cooking methods, clean up methods, and if you care to, the recipes.

.....Alan.

 

[Deena in GA]

Hmmm....the first meal I posted on the other thread would still stand under these conditions, although being in GA and the scenario is August, I think I'd go with something that didn't require cooking - like tuna fish. Can't say that I've tried this, but someone I know never refridgerated their Miracle Whip and they ate it for many years. So tuna and Miracle Whip are staples in our preps. Serve with crackers or on previously made homemade bread and some homecanned fruit.

Or for a meal with minimal cooking mashed potatoes (have some in storage that require nothing but some water) and some of the canned roast beef and gravy. Fresh corn on the cob from the garden - only boil for one minute. Canned applesauce.

I have a propane stove so can still cook for quite some time.

This is a good scenario for me to think about because it would be so incredibly hot here that I wouldn't want to cook at all. I'll have to put my thinking cap on and come up with more cold meals.

We also keep paper plates and styrofoam cups (although I hate them) along with disposable forks, etc. as part of our preps so we would burn the plates and save the cups. We use styrofoam cups turned upside down and bottoms cut out to place over our corn when it first comes up in the spring. This protects it against crows and other predators.

 

[ChainedLightning]

On the fourth day we won't be heavy into our preps - we'll still be using up stuff in the fridge and freezer. So, we'll likely be cooking out on the grill - gardenburgers and tater tots or something along those lines. The gas grill has a regular cooking eye on it as well as the normal "grill" area, so cooking outside will be easy.

We have a 25,000 gallon inground swimming pool and plenty of bleach (without the filter the pool will turn pond-like in less than a week), so water won't be an issue, either. Drinking and cooking water will get bleached and possible run through a very good ceramic hiking filter.

Once water becomes "gray" water (in other words, after it's been used for washing dishes or brushing teeth) it will be used to "flush" the toilet.

Now, if you want to know what we'd eat one month after the power goes out - THEN we can talk about rice with seitan, or oatmeal, or mashed potatoes from flakes with some fake chicken-in-a-can.

CL

 

[A.T.Hagan]

I'll get to the two week or maybe one month, thread in a bit, but wanted to start with a more likely one first.

In most of the nation four days into a power failure in August without some sort of auxiliary power to run them with would mean that anything in a refrigerator or freezer would have to have been consumed, preserved, or thrown away, most likely the day before.

At that point for a lot of folks the easy meals are over. Now we get down to the nitty gritty.

.....Alan.

 

[Just Plain Mom]

Ok, I'll bite.

First off, my main weakness is water. No electricity, no water because we're on a well. (The other quiz...the one *with* electricity...that would have been easier! ) My busy and skeptical husband bought a small generator from a friend (to appease me)--but I have no idea if it will work on my 2hp well pump...well is 260', water was found at 25', but I'm not mechanical enough to know how all of that works and he's too busy right now to try it. We share this well with an elderly couple who...um...has no clue (a nice way of putting it). If the genny works, I'll use it once or twice a day for a few minutes to fill up the water tank...we're down hill so we can use the faucet to fill up containers. And yes, I have some gas stored...told husband it was to buy it before the price goes up again.

We live outside a small town, so I'd work on the premise after a day or so that we would be living for quite a while without electricity--we're dead last on the priority list (experience has proven this). We have drinking water stored for a while, but I'd start the kids hauling water from the nearest river (about 100' away) for hygenic purposes (or to boil if need be for drinking water). I really don't want to have to go into town and beg it from the National Guard. I want to put the lock on my gate and leave it there for a while. I'd also set up every bucket we have under gutters and wherever else I can because in August we're usually enjoying rain in the afternoon due to the monsoonal flow that comes through here. So I'd be praying for rain.

As far as cooking goes, I have my (normal) propane stove inside--the oven doesn't work without electricity, but I can light the top manually and have plenty of matches. We have a 500-gallon propane tank, and in August we'll have just filled it for the year...but even now I've still got about 200 gallons left. (In August it stays light until after 8:30 pm...and I've got two nice skylights in the kitchen, too. I'd prefer to cook outside in the summer and save the inside propane for winter, but I'd have to test the sheeple climate before making that decision.)

I have a propane BBQ outside that I can bake on--I used to do it all the time when we lived in the desert and didn't want to heat up the house during the summer. I can probably bake a couple of loaves of bread in there at a time, and I'd probably try to leave most of that propane for that purpose. And I have a firepit--cleared of brush and complete with grill, which we use when we don't have fire restrictions--and wood enough for two winters of heating at least. So my cooking abilities aren't really limited in these respects.

I have a freezer that I'd first have to attend to--so for the first few days, we'd be eating out of that (the kids would make the sacrifice, I'm sure, and eat all the ice cream ) and I'd begin to can some of the meats--light up the fire in the fire pit and boil the meat with bones while canning the meat without. Depending upon when in August we experience this, I'd be looking forward to frost around the 10th of September and looking at my garden to see what I want to use up and what I want to can. Frost would be bad for the garden, but good for the freezer since I could make ice at night and keep things cold during the day. This is a fine line that I can't really plan for because of weather idiosyncrasies.

So I'd be using up the meats, having salads (lettuce, spinach, tomatoes)...we have some wild stuff around (verdolaga, lengua de vaca if the horse doesn't get it all), got dressing in the pantry...

Aside from those things, and aside from the canned soups and other things (open can, warm up...or even eat cold if you have to)...I also have:

LOTS of beans and flour, manteca, salt and water to make beans and tortillas--which are a staple in our household. Add a bit of onion, tomato and chile from our garden (or from the 35# bag we usually buy some time in August...) and everyone's happy. (I'd miss garlic. Hmmm...maybe I could trade for it when my supply runs out.) I've also got masa to make corn tortillas, and I make them all on cast iron comales so they can be placed directly on the grill over the firepit. By then I'll probably have canned some salsa, which we'd eat last.

Noodles and the ability to make more noodles--cheese or tomato-y sauces, canned beef, chicken, turkey, tuna and ham, canned mushrooms...I'd have green beans, peas and zucchini from the garden to put in them, too...

Flour, yeast and the rest of the ingredients to make bread, which I could bake in the BBQ...

Rice, dry bouillon, asceptic packed chicken and beef bouillon and the ability to make gravies from scratch...

Asceptic packed milk and powdered milk, eggs from the chickens...

For breakfast, oatmeal, some dried cereals, quite a lot of fruit canned--it looks like it will be a good year for it, and by August I've canned some; we'd eat fresh, then start on canned as usual, eggs and ham, pancakes....got quite a lot of coffee.

Some time in August or early September (depends on the farm) we usually buy a 50# bag of potatoes...

There are quite a few things I could make, but I know that especially with kids you need some comfort foods and favorite recipes--so I've got the chicken enchilada casserole that I listed under freezer meals (separate thread); I could make chicken or beef crepes--another family favorite; lasagna (especially with the spinach...the cheese is a problem, so this would maybe be one of my first dishes, while my cheese isn't moldy yet);

...and desserts--I've got a lot of canned fruit that can be made into pies, chocolate chips and bittersweet to make cookies or brownies--I'd do this sparingly because they'd have to be baked and I'd want to save the baking propane...

Hmmm...now I'm hungry.

 

[A.T.Hagan]

Well, as with Deena, Florida in August is hot and muggy.

Exactly how I'd proceed would depend on the nature of the emergency that took our power. If it looked to be a short-term thing that would resolve itself in a few days or weeks I'd pull out the LPG gear and use that. Faster, cleaner, and not as hot as using wood. If the problem looked to be long-term I'd simply go with wood and conserve the LPG for as long as possible.

By day four of a typical August the refrigerator would be cleaned out and we'd probably have polished off the freezer the night before though it's possible with the normal ice load I keep in it we might get another day of chill. Cheaper to keep ice in a freezer than to chill air that will be lost when the door is opened and the extra ice will keep the food colder for longer.

But eventually it runs out so this means we're now down to non-refrigerated foods and importantly no air-conditioning. Soo....

The midday meal would probably be something I didn't have to serve hot. Sandwiches of peanut butter or canned meats or left-overs if I could. I would cook breakfast though, probably in the pre-dawn hours when it was coolest. This is also the time I'd make our bread so that it could rise during the day (I like long, slow cool rises) and bake it in the later afternoon or evening.

I'd also put together a haybox for insulative cookery. These things are dead simple because all they are is a nest of some sort of insulative material that you can set a heavy pot of boiling hot food into then cover the top with more insulative material. The retained heat will slowly cook the food over the course of the day. This way you can have your hot meal in the evening without having to stand over a fire. Most any food that has a lot of water in it to retain heat can be cooked this way.

Certain foods I may actually just bring to a boil at the noon meal then put into the haybox as they don't require a lengthy cooking time - rice, for instance.

I would have to take pains not to cook so much that we have a lot of leftovers. Holding over food from one meal to the next might be OK, but after that it's time to toss it to the chickens. Too wasteful to go that route so best not to end up with a lot of leftovers.

Making meals would be somewhat more challenging than if we had electrical power, refrigerator and the freezer, but only moderately so. My daughter actually likes Spam, grits, peanut butter, refried beans, tortillas, and so on so it would mostly be a matter of maintaining nutritional balance. Rather than try to cope with keeping liquid milk from spoiling before it was drunk up I'd just incorporate the dry milk powder into the bread like I'm already doing. Or we may eat more yogurt than we already are so that I could get it into them that way. I've been slowly expanding the "comfort foods" in the food storage as well. Not necessary for myself or my wife, but could make a suddenly more challenging life easier to cope with for young children.

Water would not be a problem only four days into the scenario. Our on-hand potable water storage is sufficient for two weeks and come this weekend it'll go to three weeks. I'm in the middle of changing over to new containers. If I had any warning the crisis was coming at all (not something to be counted on) I'd have two months or more of water storage on hand. In another couple of weeks I'll have it on hand at all times regardless.

Sanitation. One of the advantages of living in the country is that we're on a well and use a septic tank. The toilet doesn't care where the water comes from or if it's clean or not - it'll flush it all down just the same. Bathing would be standing in the tub with a pan of water and a wash cloth or maybe using a pump garden sprayer. Dish washing would probably be still in the kitchen with a slight modification. Have to boil water for the wash side, the other side would be the rinse side and a pan of bleach water off to one side to dip each one in. I have a portable generator but it's for the well pump and the freezer and not for the water heater. I'm not including it in this scenario because I'm thinking worst case.

Had a five and a half hour no-apparent-reason power failure last night so had a chance to re-experience trying to get to sleep on a warm, humid Florida evening again with no air conditioning. Given a couple of days to re-acclimate it wouldn't be a problem, but for one night it was a long time getting to sleep.

Does anyone make a battery powered air conditioner?

.....Alan.

 

[Deemy]

Lehmans has something called a galvanized well bucket.# 550-202 ...would this work in a regular well that is in use or do you have to dig another well?It holds almost 2 gal of water... does anyone has this tube type bucket?

 

[Deena in GA]

I've been thinking about this scenario off and on all day. I'm glad y'all came up with these questions as it's really helping me think through some stuff. I honestly had never thought about something major happening in the horrible heat of late summer - although it's certainly a possibility. I can't eat when I am very hot so at least maybe I'd lose some weight. Nevertheless, the food issue would have to be dealt with. In thinking this through, I've decided that bread would probably end up being tortillas as they are easy to make, even on a grill using my cast iron griddle and don't take long to cook at all. (gotta go, be back later)

 

[Gingergirl]

Wow, you all are chomping at the bit.

First, Deena...a 2HP pump is impressive. Ours is 1HP and the well guy was impressed. However, our well is only about 90' and we don't share. After the ice storm of '96, we got a genny that would just handle the surge for the pump.

Having been raised in the South, I do know about Summer in August down there. But up here, it's usually only for about two weeks.

Still, my family would be awfully cranky without the A/C.

Day 4... with the genny, we can still pump from the well, refresh the chest freezer and one of the frigs. Septic is passive (gravity feed). Propane for the camp stove for two weeks and charcoal for the grill...well my husband and I both bought a summer's supply when it was on sale last Fall.

So its paper plates and foil on the grill. Salad and vegs from the garden. Trying to eat up what's in the frig and freezer. Not going to touch the dry and canned stuff yet, not till I have to give up the freezer. (Block party maybe?)

But, in August, the breads will be quick, like biscuits.

And iffen its not looking like power's back up soon, need to start pulling out the plans for the hand pump for the well.

So, how about Steaks, green beans, salad and cormbread? Can do them all on the grill. (Not sure I like the canned butter for the cornbread but DH does.)

 

[Freeholdfarm]

We would have canned everything that was in the freezer by now. If we are talking about August this year, my chicks won't be laying yet, but hopefully I'll have a goat milking, and the garden will be producing. Also I'm planning to get a hand pump to put in the well alongside the electric, so we will only have to haul water a short distance.

So, dinner will be one of the spare roosters, slow-cooked in a solar cooker (lots of sun here in the summer, so can pretty well count on that) with an onion and some carrots. Salad. Fresh yogurt with some canned fruit (our berries and fruit trees won't be producing for at least another year).

Hay box is something I knew about but had forgotten -- thanks for the reminder. Might use it for breakfast cereal -- heat the water with the solar cooker and then put in the hay box overnight. Could boil eggs the same way when we have them again.

Bread isn't much of an issue here, as the majority have celiac disease and we eat more rice, potatoes, corn bread, and corn tortillas than bread. But Grandma would be wanting her toast for breakfast, so I would experiment with baking in the solar cooker. If that doesn't work I'll build an outdoor clay oven, and go up to the Nat. Forest a couple of miles away to scrounge wood.

Kathleen

 

[Libertarian]

It is 88F with 51% humidity. All I have going is the window fan to move air and a small fan to blow directly on me. I'll need to get some battery fans if I expect to be comfortable without AC or A/C. I think I only ran the A/C tweeks last year. I like the heat.

I have a white gas grill and a charcol BBQ so I will be able to cook until my stored gas and wood runs out. After the fifth day the freezer will be bare and I will be on canned foods. Mostly chili with rice or spaghetti sauce with noodles.

I have tuna and salmon too but that is for after all the rest is gone and I am down to just rice and fish.

I only have 20 gallons of water stored right now so I will be hurting if I can't get a well dug.

 

[spinner]

Please excuse me for going OT.

It is interesting that the haybox cooker was mentioned, I am in the process of redoing an old one that was in my Mom's family. Nothing fancy, just a homemade one that was made from a crate. It had some pretty fabric on it to make it look nice. I am planning to use wool fleece in it instead of hay. I don't have hay and I do have wool. Can't wait to try it, does anyone have any (vegetarian) recipes they would recommend? I am planning to cook beans for my first attempt.

Perhaps this should be a separate thread.

spinner

 

[Green Co.]

I enjoy reading these threads, as I might get some different ideas.

We live rural now. Approx 1/3 acre garden. Home is propane heated, used for cooking (don't have to use camping equipment) We have two 250 gallon tanks (only one tank open at a time, if I get a leak in a line, I don't lose it all, and 250 gallons runs us for a year)

4th un-powered day in August...fridge would be empty. The freezers would keep (rather substantially stocked) by running the big generator a couple hours every other day (as we did after Alicia) This gen-set is actually a Miller welding machine, puts out 8kw ac @ 1800 rpm. Utilizing it for a few hours every other day, I have enough fuel for a couple months, (discounting other fuel uses) then would have to can what we could. Wife already uses our outdoor cooker for canning, keeps the heat out of the house. Have five 20lb bottles of lpg.

Water..I drove a 60' well in the garden, powered by an air-lift system, into a 500 gallon plastic tank. It gravity feeds the garden watering system. In a pinch, I have a small gasoline powered compressor to pump the water. Takes about an hour & a quart of gas to get 300 gallons. But, we would have to carry it into the house, use bucket bathing & toilet flushing (septic system)

Meals & such else would be pretty much the same as now. No hardship, yet.

Well, except for the wife...must have cool air for sleeping, so I would have to use my little Honda camp genny, 1000w. Powers a 5000btu window air unit in the bedroom, for 5 hours on 1/3 gallon fuel.

Weak point, fuel. To maintain the above uses, approx 11 gallons per week. My 150 stored would be gone in a few short weeks, so would have to empty the freezers, curtail bedroom air, in order to run the well. Need to get some deep cycle batteries, then can use the inverter from the truck. The little Honda also puts out about 6amp @ 12v dc. for battery charging.

 

[Tweakette]

My meal:

Sesame noodles with fresh vegetables from the garden, cooked either on the gas grill, on the camp stove, or on the wood stove.
Noodles are boiled in water retrieved from either the bottles in the freezer that are now thawed, the spare buckets we have, from the well by running the generator just enough to fill the pressure tank, or the old stone well at the bottom of the gully or the river behind the house with the water run through the camping filter and then boiled well.

Recipe:

1 lb linguini
about 1 cup hot water
about 1/2 cup peanut butter
about 1/3 cup soy sauce
about 1/4 cup sesame oil
1 clove of garlic, cut up into chunks
1 slice of ginger peeled and cut into chunks (if around) or about 1/4 tsp of powdered ginger if no fresh root available.
shot of tabasco
Whatever vegetables are around. In August here it would be broccoli and green beans I'd choose.

Boil noodles in large pot of water until done. Take the noodles out of the water (don't drain, you need the water), put in colander, and quickly rinse with a bit of cooler water, then put in a large bowl. Take 1 cup of water from the pot and in a small bowl dissolve the peanut butter in it. Then add the rest the listed ingredients except for the vegetables and tabasco. Whisk well and let stand.

Cut up the vegetables and quickly blanch in the rest of the boiling water. Remove and add to noodles.
Remove garlic and ginger chunks from sauce (you want the flavor but don't want to bite into them). Pour sauce over noodles, stir, and let stand, covered with foil, for about an hour in a cool place (our basement is cool even in August).
Season with tabasco to taste, stir, and serve.

If no fresh vegetables are available use canned water chestnuts and bamboo shoots (I have some of these set aside as well).

I like this dish because it's got carbs, fat, protein, and vegetables in it, is made mostly out of dry goods, take a long time to go bad (they're fine after standing out overnight - the vegs would go bad first), and taste really good. Plus they're made pretty much in one pot and one bowl.
If you eat them out of the bowl (shared) you only have to clean up the pot, the colander, 2 bowls, and 2 forks (for us, there's just the 2 of us).

Clean up would be easy - scouring with sand to get big chunks out, then boiling a little more water and washing them out with soap.

Tweak

 

[Christian for Israel]

we could fix anything we normally eat now. our kerosene fired fridge and gasoline fueled stove will replace the ones we use now.

 

[driveshesaid]

Nahhhh, this is still too easy.

Oregon in August can get pretty warm, 100 degree weeks aren't unusual. Good part is, it's dry as a bone. Bad part, brush fires and wild fires start waaaay too easily.

Anyway, we don't have AC, so we've already figured ways to cope. Eat outside, have table and chairs already. Use BBQ or propane stove outside (do all my summer canning outside already. Working on summer kitchen). Make burgers, from cow in freezer, and fresh corn on cob from garden. Fresh salad from garden with canned fish, or left-over BBQ'd meat sliced thin over top. Lemonade, limeade from dehydrated juice, sugar in storage, water from storage, or if not long-term outage, genny-powered well. Fresh fruit from trees or garden. Don't touch canned stuff until fresh is out of season.

Four days we've done repeatedly. In the summer is easy, it's in the winter that it's harder. It's when it gets to 8 or 10 days that it starts getting harder. I'm working on four-season gardening so we can have fresh greens year-round. But, the longer-term outages are the ones that I'm more worried about.


drive

 

[Deena in GA]

One thing this exercise is pointing out is what a difference it makes where you live. It would be much easier for us to deal with something happening in the winter than in August.

As I've been thinking this through, I want to go back and redo what I've said we would eat. Y'all are right and we should eat up what's in the fridge and freezer first. I also need to dry some of the upcoming blueberries rather than freezing them like usual. And, instead of continuing to use my stove and, thus, my propane, if it looks like it's going to be a long-term problem we need to start using a solar cooker. That's the only way to cook that makes sense down here during the summer. In the winter I can switch to my regular stove, cook on top of the wood heater or in the fireplace. The haybox is a good idea too and I do have directions for that. I'm allergic to hay though.

In thinking about all this I realized that I have probably the perfect thing to use for a solar cooker right now in my front yard. I don't know what they're called. but years ago my husband brought home these long metal (silver) tube-like things. When the open end is placed on the ground they look like tunnels for the kids to crawl through and that's how they've used them. However, if I flip it over and position the open end facing the direction of the sun, then cover with a storm window (that hasn't been put back on the window where it belongs, lol) and put sides on the ends it should work great as a solar cooker. I'm going to be experimenting with that.

As I've said before, I love this thread because it's really making me think and consider things I've never thought of before. I hope more people will chime in, especially with recipes.

 

[A.T.Hagan]

<i>The haybox is a good idea too and I do have directions for that. I'm allergic to hay though. </i>

It's called a haybox because that was the traditional insulating material that was used. But it can be anything really that will get the job done.

I've either used myself or seen used by others such things as blankets & sheets, dry leaves, Styrofoam packing peanuts and/or sheets, coolers, clothing, dry paper & cardboard, fiberglass insulation, and some I've probably forgotten.

The best one I've ever seen the fella put together a box made from paneling. Lined the inside with sheet Styrofoam, and then carefully greased the pot he'd be using and filled in all remaining air space around it with spray foam insulation. Let it sit long enough to cure, took out the pot, cleaned it, lined the interior cavity with fabric that he glued into place and had a damn fine insulated cooker.

I've never gone to such lengths, preferring instead to make them as needed. Usually this means a cardboard box with dry newspapers folded/wadded to fill the space. Making sure you have plenty of insulation over the top is key.

.....Alan.

 

[Gingergirl]

Deena


A.T. beat me to it.



Do like the spray foam idea!

 

[Kathy in WV]

Wow, 4'th day w/o power, in August.We would almost definitely be having some kind of deer for dinner because most of ours is in the freezer and by the 4th day I'd be outside canning it either on a stove or open fire. So, deer steaks, instant potatoes, tea, something green from the garden (whatevers doing good). We live along a river so unless they poison the river we've got water and we have a British Berkefeld filter to clean it up for drinking so hopefully waters not the issue. I can tell you that August in WV is pretty hot and humid and during the daytime we will be downin the basement where its cool. This is fun (doing it for real is a different story!!)

 

[A.T.Hagan]

It is 88F with 51% humidity. All I have going is the window fan to move air and a small fan to blow directly on me. I'll need to get some battery fans if I expect to be comfortable without AC or A/C. I think I only ran the A/C tweeks last year. I like the heat.

This is why I chose August for the exercise:

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 09:40 am
Temperature 78 °F
Heat Index 87 °F
Relative Humidity 100 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 10:35 am
Temperature 81 °F
Heat Index 91 °F
Relative Humidity 90 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 11:05 am
Temperature 83 °F
Heat Index 94 °F
Relative Humidity 85 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 12:00 pm
Temperature 85 °F
Heat Index 96 °F
Relative Humidity 78 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 12:40 pm
Temperature 86 °F
Heat Index 98 °F
Relative Humidity 76 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 12:55 pm
Temperature 87 °F
Heat Index 101 °F
Relative Humidity 75 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 01:30 pm
Temperature 88 °F
Heat Index 101 °F
Relative Humidity 70 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 02:00 pm
Temperature 89 °F
Heat Index 102 °F
Relative Humidity 67 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 03:30 pm
Temperature 89 °F
Heat Index 100 °F
Relative Humidity 64 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 04:00 pm
Temperature 90 °F
Heat Index 102 °F
Relative Humidity 62 %Rh

Current Weather Conditions as of 05/27/04, 04:30 pm
Temperature 89 °F
Heat Index 99 °F
Relative Humidity 62 %Rh

That is for here in Gainesville, FL. Still two weeks or so until our rainy season should start so it's not as humid now as it will be in August. Yesterday's high peaked about three degrees higher.

Nothing that cannot be adjusted to, but for the first week or two it's going to be a hot, sweaty time of it. Certainly take a lot of the joy out of food prep.

.....Alan.

 

[Libertarian]

Alan, thank you for reminding me why I never moved back to Florida. I lived near Cocao Beach for three years in the early '60's That near to the Beach we always had a breeze but the humidity was a real killer.

In '71 I used to go visit a friend in Monticello. I would lose a few pounds each week I was there just from sweating.

 

[Freeholdfarm]

So, when do we do the next scenario?

 

[night driver]

AH lets see.. the last day and a half the kero-wick stove has been running for ever canning, so I have to deside which coleman I want to use, so I'll use the newer 2 burner, and use Coleman Fuel in it, rather than the propane addapter....


dinner will be which ever meat I haven't canned yet, so prolly beef, with whatever green beans I haven't canned, done in the second burner sauce pan, and a can of mushrooms done on the griddle with the beef. i should by now have canned the chicken, and whatever in the lower fridge won't keep.

c, who really covetted mom's 3 burner coleman but it has gone to wind...

Oh and water has been going thru the terracotta berkey and the carbon filter, coming out of the 60 gal drum. got 4 more in teh basement...

 

[Charlie]

With our gennie and 1,000 gallons of propane to go with it, I would still be eating like normal. No trips to the grocery store would mean I would start using powdered milk and using greens from the garden and lake for fresh salads.

I would have to simulate a two generator failure, the primary one and the back up gas one to make my hinder pucker.

Then we would be canning like crazy because we have two freezers full of meat, fish and shellfish that I would not want to see wasted. Canning equipment, lids, jars, etc. are all clean and on standby just in case. Plenty of fuel for our stoves as everything here is on propane. Plenty of wood for fires and can outdoor cook like mad here at the resort. Shore lunch city.......just like on vacation.

 

[WalknTrot]

Hi Guys,

This is fun!

Well, willl have closed down the fridge by now (4 days) but not a problem! How about my favorite jambalaya for supper!

#1.) Drag the propane camp stove out so I can cook on the picnic table in the shade

Rehydrate a couple tablespoons of dried garlic.

Open a can of chicken breast chunks (save the broth) and brown in a BIG fry pan with a dash of olive oil, a sprinkle of sugar and Tabasco to taste. Set aside.

Open a jar of home canned sausage, drain and brown. Add black pepper and Tabasco to taste. Set aside, too.

Cut up big wedges of onion or garden scallion, and either rehydrate dry or cut up fresh big chunks of green pepper from the garden. (This is August. The garden should be good now!)

Add a bit more oil to the pan and dump in veggies including garlic. Stir fry 'til the onions are getting cooked a bit, then throw in the meat (and maybe a little more Tabasco to taste?

Pour in about 6 cups of chicken broth made from dry jar stock and 3 cups rice. Simmer on low heat until the rice is almost done, then cover pan with aluminum foil to steam and soak up juices.

Dang good eating, and only one dirty pan. BTW, water isn't much of a problem here. My well is 90 ft. deep, but the well casing stays filled to around 16 feet below surface, so a hand pitcher pump works just fine. I have on of the new PVC hand pumps from Lehman's. It's very efficient...no leathers and sealed so rain water can't leak in.

 

[Taz]

Does anyone make a battery powered air conditioner?

Not that I know of, but in Mexico they have some nice ones that run off of propane/butane.

So far this scenario doesn't throw me because we still have access to our old hand pump well across the road. We have a 5kw Onan gas and a 5kw Onan propane genny. The heat and sleeping would be the problem. We would no doubt move into our 39ft 5th wheel where we have two Fantastic Fans that run on 12 volt. Between the solar panel and the jenny we would get though the night. Also depend on if we were in Mexico or Fl. In August we would probably be in Fl. And if push comes to shove we could sleep in our old house across the road where the 40 kw diesel genny is.

We eat a lot of beans and tortillas and corn bread. Knowing that fresh veggies will run out, I have lots of vitamens, esp C. We are still eating canned beef from y2k. Chicken is gone and I want to do about 100 pts of it when things settle down a abit at our house and after Chubby Hubby has surgery.

A very good thread. For y2k we were really prepped having spent thousands. Its been hard to get back into prepping again and I am also going at it in a different manner. No boxed foods at all. Just the basics and make it all from scratch.

Taz

 

[oops]

hum...I'm at a MAJOR advantage...we have gravity feed water on our own private system...as well as the septic system being grav. feed and private...candles and candle lanterns are used regularly soo...that starts me out with 3 already handled...

welll...we'd start the smoker grill... and then...

peel potatoes and get them started boiling...then

while that was heating up...I'd use my traveling mix...(it's a basic mix that has flour, b. powders, crisco, and salt already premixed for convenience sake...I admit to cheating and mixing this in 2 gal batches...) and mixing out biscuits by adding water...then get them on the grill to start baking in a cast iron skillet...

then...I'd open a homecanned jar of chicken...pick it off the bone...then put it on to heat along with the broth ...add in milk (canned) thickened with cornstarch ...to make creamed chicken...

most should b done close to the same time...

or...really cheat and head to the garden n fix cold salads...with herb vinegar dressing...carrots, cucumbers, radishes, lettuce, green peppers, onions and all kinds of herbs...

oops

who does rendezvousing for more than the camping...

 

[Albuburbia]

Well, I have plenty of propane, but what if I can never get more? If I was on top of my self discipline, I'd fire up the kitchen stove, and I'd cook enough rice for 3 meals for 2 days.

Divide the rice into the 2 days, and since it's hot out, I'd dry one day's worth of cooked rice on a cookie sheet. That can be rehydrated with just boiling water later, instead of using a longer flow of propane to cook it from start.

We'd have some sort of sweetened rice for breakfast, maybe toss in some protein powder to fortify it, because we're going out to cut firewood and we need the strength.

For lunch, rice with gravy of some sort. I stashed lots of gravy mixes. Meat has just become little more than a flavoring, because the starches I have stashed are so much more abundent.

For dinner, we'll get a little fancier, but keep it kind of light, too. If my lettuce grew, we'll have salad, rice pilaf with rehydrated veggies (or canned), and maybe throw in a little canned meat.

Meals will be very boring during the week, to make Sunday dinner seem more special.

The next day, we'll do something with noodles or bread, or maybe instant spuds. Comfort food will be saved for celebrations or stress abatement.

Now in reality, I might actually use more propane and inject more variety into the plan. I think if we start out on strict rationing, meals with more complexity will be more special, more of an event.

That's what I see, anyway. Won't know til I go there.

 

[Meemur]

Really hot, hazy, humid -- no power?

I wouldn't feel like eating much.

In the early morning or late, late evening (when it's somewhat cool,) I'd boil water and fill a thermos with rice and one with oatmeal. I haven't had great success with this method -- they tend to come out soggy, but when I'm hungry, I don't care.

Eat the oatmeal for breakfast.

For lunch, mix the rice with some canned tuna. Eat cold.

Dinner -- rest of the rice, with some canned veggie mixed in. I might add some dried cheese to that mixture. Can be eaten cold or re-heated for one minute on the Coleman stove in a fry pan.

Or, if I made the oatmeal in the morning, I might have it for dinner.

I'm assuming that I'm not doing heavy work in the heat. I would need more protein (which also takes drinking more water to process)

Another meal I make in the morning at camp is two-three of those Raman noodle packs. I steam hard veggies at the same time. After they cook, I put the noodles & veggies in a plastic bag or plastic container. I want to keep them a little moist.

I might add tuna to them for lunch (can be eaten warm or cold) and/or something else for dinner.

If the noodles are consumed within 12 hours, they aren't too bad.

If you're hungry, hot, and tired enough . . . they taste fine.

When it's really wretched out, I've been known to live on plain water, plain water with Tang, and pork & beans, directly from the can.

 

[booger]

I haven't read through the replies yet because I don't want to cheat.

The only thing different from our current lives in your scenario is no electricity. So...

I'll assume everything in the fridge is now toast (hopefully eaten) but there will be things left from the freezer if we properly insulated it and only opened when necessary. I would hope that what we weren't going to eat in the near future, I would have spent the past 4 days canning to preserve.

Whatever I didn't get canned (we have a propane tank that the stove runs off of) from the freezer, we'd eat. Most likely, chicken.

Chicken on the grill (who wants heat in the house in August?? plus save the propane for more needed things) with baked taters (storage from our garden) also on the grill. Some fresh slice tomatoes and cucumbers from the garden would go nicely with that.

We have a big store of paper plates so would probably be using those. Other clean up would be accomplished with a damp washcloth (stored water) and wiped dry. Between the paper plates and outdoor cooking, there wouldn't be much clean up.