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DK Preppers: Food [1]
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Date: 2022-12-20
I have a lot of jars, with extra food in them.
Alright, here we go again.
First, I will post the link, to the Red Cross basic checklist:
www.redcross.org/…
My poll, last week, got the most votes for food, to cover next, so, here we are.
I have a lot of extra food.
But, the way I have been setting aside extra food, is what I call, backwards prepping.
To explain what I mean, by back wards prepping, I will explain, first, what I feel would be forwards, or proper, food prepping:
Menu planning, deciding exactly what you want to eat, for each meal, for years to come.
Make a list, of ingredients, to buy (or get free) and add those carefully chosen items, to your prepper stash, of extra food.
Keep doing that, and rotate, always, so that you are always using the oldest foods, from your stash, and you are always adding new foods, to your stash, to eat years in the future.
Always buy more than you eat, for some years, until you have a few years worth of extra food.
Then, you can just buy about as much as you eat.
Always rotate, always eating the oldest food, first.
I feel that would be wise. I daydream about doing that. But, at this point, that is only a daydream.
Instead, I am doing mostly backwards prepping:
I get a lot of food for free, mostly from neighbors, who went to free food pantries, and gave me what they did not want. I am not choosing what I get. My only choices, in that process, is, any items I do not like, and especially, if they have a short shelf life, I simply throw them out. For example, I recently got a great deal of tortillas, and chopped salad greens, that I simply threw out. I have enough bread, and I have rice and pasta, if I want starchy carbs. And the greens only keep so long, in the fridge, and I have no teeth that match, to chew the greens. I would rather eat canned green beans, and canned peas. I have a lot of those.
A few years ago, I bought some dry beans, and rice, and flour, and corn meal. Not part of any exact menu planning, just figured they have a long shelf life, and now I have lots of those on hand.
So, I end up eating any fresh foods I get, quickly, before they go bad.
The last time I cooked some rice, was months ago.
The last time I cooked dried beans, was years ago.
For example, I got two spaghetti squash, recently, so I cooked them up, a few days ago. I just ate a few bites of that, before I started writing this diary. I loaded it up with butter, so a few bites, are very filling. I ate two slices of buttered toast, after that. It was cinnamon bread, that I had in the freezer, for a few weeks, and got it out, a week ago.
So, I am eating, most days, foods that must be cooked up, withing a week or so. I walk to the Dollar General, a block away, once a month, give or take a week, to buy butter, and I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter, for the toast, and melty cheese slices, and milk, and etc.
My dry beans and rice and pasta and etc., just sit there in jars, for some years, as a theoretical back up.
In theory, I do not like this method.
In practice, I am doing just fine!
Let me give you a list, of foods I have, in my bankers boxes.
I decided, in recent months, since my wife died, in March of this year, 2022, I decided to buy lots of bankers boxes, and put jars and bags and boxes and cans, of food, in the bankers boxes:
www.walmart.com/…
Bankers Box Smooth Move Classic Moving Boxes, Small 20 Pack, Kraft Brown, 20 Per Carton
and label them. My home looks nice and neat, that way. And, I can get up, out of my chair, right now, and start looking at the boxes, and come back to my keyboard, and type what I see:
Canned: beans, fruit, veggies, soup, stew, and meats, mostly chicken meat: 15 boxes.
Jars of dry groceries, especially, rice, beans, and pasta: 11 boxes.
Dried fruit: 1 box of raisins, 1 box of dried plums, blueberries, and cranberries.
Bags of potato flakes: 1 box.
Boxes of mac n cheese: 1 bankers box very full.
My chest type freezer:
One very large turkey.
Frozen dinners: 20.
One gallon of home made cream of mushroom soup, that I just made two days ago, from 7 pounds of mushrooms I got free. It turned out great.
12 pounds of sliced apples.
3 pounds of shredded cheddar cheese.
3 pounds of ground turkey.
2 loaves of bread.
My fridge freezer:
2 boneless hams, 5 pounds each.
8 pounds of strawberries and bananas.
5 pounds of frozen peas.
5 pounds of sliced apples.
3 pounds corn.
2 pounds broccoli.
1 pound cranberries.
I need to start making fruit and veggie smoothies, again. That is what I do with the broccoli, cranberries, strawberries, and bananas. I could also use the apples.
I like to put the peas and corn in the blender, (separately from each other, and separate from the smoothies.) That way, I can make soup, from the blenderized peas, and creamed corn, from the corn.
My fridge has:
Leftover home made cream of mushroom soup (the portion I did not put in the freezer).
Leftover spaghetti squash and butter soup.
Leftover ramen with smoked turkey and cheese.
Leftover smashed canned peas and Ceasar dressing.
Squash and sweet potatoes I just got from a neighbor, that I need to cook, soon.
Butter, and milk, and margarine, and cottage cheese.
By the way, butter and oil and milk and cheese, these things do not have a long shelf life. So, in order to cook nice meals, that would be filling, and satisfy me, I need to buy butter and margarine and oil and melty cheese, on a regular basis, to add to fresh veggies I cook, and to add to rice and beans and pasta. So, I do not have a prepper stash, that I could survive on, if the grocery stores shut down. I am not that kind of prepper. I just have a stash, that I could live on, with only butter or margarine or melty cheese, from the store. No need to buy canned goods, or starchy carbs, from the stores, for some years to come.
Well, all that was fun. I think I missed a few items, but, the two main goals have now been met:
1. Giving all of you some idea, of what a person might have on hand. You can call it great, or pick it apart; say you are green with envy, or say most of it is garbage.
2. I now have a fairly accurate inventory, of what I have on hand, so that I can make my cooking decisions, in the weeks and months to come. With this diary published, on the Daily Kos servers, I can go back, and look at it, any time.
Okay, your turn:
If you want to do so, post in the comments, what you have on hand.
I am eager to read and compare.
Hugs.
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