07:42 – I’ve been working on science kit stuff all week, so there hasn’t been much time left for prepping activities. I did get email yesterday from a guy who wants to remain anonymous, so I’ll just call him Bill.
I guess I’m in the wannabe prepper category you mentioned in one of your comments today. Either that, or I’m just really slow at getting started. I’ve bought Fernando Aguire’s Surviving The Economic Collapse. I bought
some oxygen absorbers from Amazon, and collected 24 two liter soda bottles. I even have a Sam’s Club Membership so I can buy stuff to store in the two liter bottles. I just haven’t bought anything to put in the two liter bottles. It’s taken over a month for me to do this little. In my defense, I will point out that real life keeps raising it’s ugly head and distracting me from prepping.I have decided I’m going to start storing rice first rather than flour. My wife and I routinely cook with rice and use very little flour. I have started looking for recipes that use all purpose flour. It wasn’t clear from your list of iron rations whether you talking about all purpose or bread flour. I have assumed you meant all purpose flour. Julia Child’s French Bread recipe calls for all purpose flour and a video can be found on Youtube. The other common recipe for all purpose flour is egg noodles made from one cup of flour and one egg. Before I start stocking flour in bulk, I’m going to at least figure out how to make the tortillas in the recipe linked below.
To which I replied:
Real life always gets in the way.
Why not just stop by Costco/Sam’s/Walmart this afternoon and pick up some basic food? Keep it simple to start.
1. A few cases of bottled water. [Following added for this post. RBT] Rinse out those two dozen 2-liter bottles with dilute bleach and fill them with tap water. You can never have too much safe water.
2. A 50-pound bag of white rice, for probably $17. Don’t even worry about transferring it to other containers for now. It’ll keep just fine for at least a couple years in the original bag.
3. Two dozen cans of assorted canned soups. You can use these with the rice to make a simple but tasty meal.
4. A case or two of canned meats (chicken, tuna, salmon, Spam, etc.)
5. A case or two of canned fruit, jars of applesauce, etc.
6. A case or two of canned vegetables, whatever you like.
7. A dozen jars of spaghetti sauce and a dozen packages of pasta.
8. A large bottle of olive oil.
9. A couple large jars of peanut butter and a couple large boxes of Ritz crackers.
10. Big jars of onion powder/flakes, garlic powder/granules, cinnamon, and any other spices you like.
All of this stuff, including the crackers, keeps for at least a year in the original packages.
As to the flour, there’s really not that much difference between types of white flour, other than varying protein levels (gluten). You can substitute them pretty freely. For example, if you make bread with all-purpose flour, the texture of the bread won’t be as good as it’d be if you used bread flour, but it will work just fine.
To which he replied:
That is an excellent idea. You ask why not do it this afternoon? One of the instances of real life happening is three days in the last two weeks when we got 4+ inches of rain. As soon as we get the basement sorted out, I will get a sturdy shelving unit and stuff from your list from Sam’s Club.
And, surprise, I heard from Jen’s husband for the first time. I’ll call him Ben. Ben is not as prepping-oriented as Jen, but he says he’s coming around to her view of things, and has no real objection to most of the actions she’s taking and the stuff she’s buying. Like Barbara, he’s more concerned about the amount of space it takes and the clutter than the cost, and he asks a reasonable question: “When have we done enough to declare that our preparation is complete?”
Just about any prepping website will tell you that you’re never done, that prepping is a journey rather than a destination. And that’s fine as far as it goes. But Ben’s question is still valid with regard to purchases. Is a ton of food each enough for them? Two tons? Ten? When does it stop?
My attitude is that you can indeed reach a level at which you can consider your acquisition of food and other supplies complete, at which point you can consider that your supplies have reached steady-state, where you buy only enough stuff to replace what you’ve used, whether food, ammunition, or other classes of supplies. For me, that level is a three-year supply. Some people are comfortable with just a year’s worth, and I have no argument with that. Others keep a five or ten year supply on hand, and I have no argument with that, either. What should never stop is your acquisition of additional knowledge and skills.
So, what precisely did you do to prepare this week? Tell me about it in the comments.
09:07 – Everything appears to be working normally, with a few minor exception like the placement of bullet points midway down the paragraph rather than on the first line. The other weird thing is that followed links seem to remain the same color as unfollowed ones, which makes it hard for me to keep track of the last comment I read.
Otherwise, I’m happy with this theme. I showed Barbara the new theme when she was on her way out this morning, and asked if she wanted me to install it on her site. She said to go ahead and do it, but I think I’ll wait a day or two to let any problems show up before I chance breaking her site.