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Category: prepping

Wed. July 7, 2021 – inflation, not just for grades and resume’s

Maybe a little cooler, still rain in the forecast though. Yesterday was a mixed bag of rain, sun, overcast, and sticky heat. Today probably will be too.

Spent part of yesterday doing an auction pickup. This was entirely books about my non-prepping hobby, so a pure waste of time :-p Took youngest, and stopped for a lesson in what I do for a living. Got her a nice piece of fabric in a cheetah print, which she loves, and we’ll use in a craft project. FWIW, thrift stores are a great place to get fabric very cheaply. Every one I frequent has draperies, linens, and other fabric, perfect for small projects, or big.

Then home to puppy love, yard care, cleaning, shopping for groceries, and cooking dinner.

I went to the HEB store near my house or what we call the “little” HEB. It doesn’t have the selection or the quality of the “big” HEB store in the better neighborhood, but it’s been getting better since we moved here. Some stuff I don’t want to get better. Corporate sends prime grade meat there, and it doesn’t sell, so when I’m lucky I get to buy it cheap!

I have some observations.

There were still gaps on the shelves. The staff was blitzing the aisles, facing product and cleaning up stock, but there were still gaps. Many products had reduced shelf space, or they were only one unit deep on the shelf. Some stuff is still in limited varieties, where there would have been more choices before- canned veg is the best ongoing example. Staples are there, but some of the tasty combinations aren’t. Ice cream flavors are reduced. Charmin red was on the shelf, but no blue, and not much red for that matter. No frozen chicken in the ready to eat section. I haven’t seen anything but wings in months.

Eggs were the weirdest thing. They normally have a whole cooler full of one dozen cartons, all different “special” kinds of eggs, one cooler with plain HEB branded eggs in different cartons, and one cooler of bulk cartons. The “special” eggs were half the normal display, and the HEB eggs were only available in 36 egg cartons. Two full coolers of 36 egg packaging, and severely reduced choices for the rest.

Soda was still hit or miss, with more flavors in stock but open shelves too. Diet ginger ale was back and several flavors of Dr Pepper. On the other side of the store, the apple display was 1/3 or less what it normally is. Avocados were crazy money. Potatoes and onions were there, but with reduced choices. Green beans and asparagus were horrible quality. Locally grown corn on the cob was only 6/$1 though.

On the other hand, HEB shelf coupons for in-store deals were back. Rice and potato box sides were on sale this month. I bought some of both. Pasta was BOGO, so I got another 10 pounds. They had a loss leader deal on meat- half off some cuts if you bought $10 of other stuff, limit two packages. I bought select grade ribeye steaks for <$6/pound. (We ate half of them for dinner, and they were delicious, far better than select usually is. The rest got vac sealed and frozen.) Milk, cream, fresh veg, and fruit rounded out my cart. For the first time ever they had marked down milk (for short time) in the cooler. It was the pricey organic gallons, 2 days left on 'sell by' and a dollar a gallon cheaper than regular whole milk. I've never seen that before. Through some luck and smart shopping I spent $250 but saved $68 on the cart. That's better than I used to do, when I averaged a 12-15% savings on the cart. The meat and pasta were the biggest contributors to the savings. It was nice to see discounts again. Prices for some things are definitely up. Lays potato chips used to be $2.50 a bag, they were $2.85 and the bags seem smaller. Canned veg was up slightly, meat has been way up in general, although I still paid the 24c/oz I've been paying for house brand thick sliced bacon. It's the best deal in the meat section. The breakfast sausages the kids like are up about 10%, and they never go on sale anymore. I didn't see any spiral sliced hams in the cooler, just like I didn't see them at costco last visit. Turkey was still the $1.28/lb it's been for 3 years (for their house brand whole frozen birds.) It's nice that coupons and deals are back, because prices are higher in general. This article is worth the read.

America stockpiles: Supermarkets buy up to 25% more supplies as they predict inflation will soar and cost of essentials like bacon and milk rising by up to 14%

Supermarkets are trying to protect their profits amid higher costs
Shoppers are buying more with grocery sales up 15% in June compared to last year, leaving shelves depleted
Food prices are surging as inflation rises to its highest level in 13 years
Associated Wholesale Grocers is buying 15 to 20% more goods while SpartanNash up to 25% more stock including frozen meat
Consumer price index for grocery store and supermarket food purchases was up 0.7 percent in May compared to May of last year

Food is pretty important. In general, I’m seeing higher prices, limited choices, unusual brands and suppliers, and I’ve been either skipping purchasing an item, or buying something that wasn’t my preference. I expect this to continue and worsen.

Save money where you can, you’ll need it elsewhere. If you see something you need or want, buy it now because it might not be available later. Get used to the idea you might not get your first choice, or be able to just buy something whenever you want to. Prepping and stacking will help with all of that.

Stack it up. Keep it secret, keep it safe.

nick

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Tues. July 6, 2021 – not much to say

Hot, rainy, humid, and more humid. Yesterday was typical Houston, depending on where in town you were, and when, you could have had sun most of the day. Or gully washer thunderstorms. Or both. I was driving around and most of the east and south east of Houston were sunny while I was there. Most of the west and NW got hammered.

Stopped in at my ‘industrial’ auctioneer, and he had left a few items off my last auction. We got that straightened out, and they are in the current one. I’ve got a huge pile of stuff for him, and I can’t even talk to his scheduling person until the 12th… I think I might have to try another local auction house for some bins of stuff. In person contact seems to work much better than anything else for the auction guys in town. Meatspace, it’s important.

Speaking of weather, it looks like TS Elsa is slowing? The last track I saw had it hitting Tampa later than I thought. I can watch it come in on my sibling’s newly installed Nest cam, if I want to… but I don’t think it will be too interesting at this point.

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Lot’s of violence reported this past weekend. NYFC, Chicago, the numbers are getting so high that MSM can’t ignore them. Even my wife made a comment in disbelief about the Chicago numbers, and she’s been purposely avoiding current news lately. Keep your eyes open if you are moving around in the wide world. Go armed if you are able. Have some trauma response first aid nearby.

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There’s a lot of stupidity going around too. More reason to keep your eyes open and your head down. The polarizing elements in our current situation haven’t gone anywhere, they are just getting ready for the next phase, and the next incident.

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I don’t know if we’re having too much water, too much heat, or too little of something else, but I read in different places that there are issues with food production and crop growth again this year. Previous years ate into any stores, bad crops will increasingly have a more immediate effect on the US and by extension, the world. Remember that there were food riots when US producers switched from food production to ethanol production. We still export a lot of food, but every farmer knows that no crop is guaranteed.

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I am seeing a bit of ammo hitting the market, and even a few guns. Prices are still crazy high, but I’d be sorely tempted to buy anyway, because there are a number of things that can cause prices to rise and supplies to decrease, and little that would cause them to drop.

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I think you know where all this is going. We’re already having floods, famine, storms, and plagues, war is next – in some form or another. Keep stacking. Or end up lacking.

nick

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Sat. July 3, 2021 – no title for you!

Still forecast to be hot and humid with possibility of rain… and yesterday was hot and humid, but sunny too. There was a little overcast, but no rain.

I did some kid chauffeuring, got one quick in person estate sale in on the way home from that, cut my deadbeat neighbor’s grass because I couldn’t look at it any longer, fed kids, ate, and just lived my life.

I did sort through a bin full of medical supplies, and organize them. I still don’t have a good system for storing stuff I’m unlikely to need, but if I do, I’ll need it in a hurry. A lot of my medical stuff is really just to have a deep larder if things go very pear shaped, and as such doesn’t need to be ready to hand, but does need to be safe. As I was sorting this bin I was thinking about just HOW pear shaped things would need to get for some of it to make sense. And then I saw the article about Venezuela knocking 6 zeros off its currency, and I remembered that we got through the very unlikely pandemic without much disruption because I’d taken the chance of a pandemic seriously and prepared for it.

We have been lucky that drug supply lines weren’t more seriously disrupted, and that we didn’t see widespread shortages of critical meds in the US (there were shortages, and some suppliers had to look outside their normal vendors). I don’t want to depend on luck. So I stack stuff that I’m unlikely to need, and that I fervently hope I’ll NEVER use. There’s plenty in the stacks that I do use and that does get rotated too. And as has been pointed out here and elsewhere, wound care, and caring for the sick, will eat through supplies like Rosanne Barr at the Shakee’s pizza buffet. There are alternatives to toilet paper, there are fewer alternatives to meds and medical supplies.

Don’t forget simple soap and AB ointment. They are both cheap and both are literal lifesavers.

Hygiene and cleanliness are topics for whole books, but the short version is – a stitch in time saves nine. Don’t let infection get started, and you won’t be wishing you’d bought some fish meds… or that all the Drs didn’t die off in the first wave of the zombie plague. Ditto for keeping moist areas of the body clean and dry. Kilts were good for that at least, but I don’t see them coming into fashion here… and clean hands will prevent a whole host of ills.

With that cheery thought, I’m off to do more stuff around the house. ‘Cuz it ain’t gonna do itself…

n

(stack something)

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Thur. July 1, 2021 – more running around today

Still rain in the forecast, and heat, although not as much. It wasn’t actually unpleasant yesterday, although it was wet. There was a lot of regional rain, and areas of town that didn’t get any. As I was driving across town it would go from downpour to dry and back again. The bayous are filling up though.\

Today I’ve got another Dr appointment for oldest, a vet appointment for the pup, and youngest is having a play date and sleepover at a friend’s house. I’m chauffeur dad today.

Yesterday I took the kids to the doc for camp physicals. Freaking GS form was just bizarre. There was a whole section of body parts and the doc was supposed to select “satisfactory” or “not satisfactory”. No other explanation. Heart, lungs, teeth, genitalia. F me. Genitalia, not satisfactory. WTeverlovingF? Why is that an option, what does GS’ing gain from the exam and paper record, and WTF is the criteria? We got neither the exam nor a comment for that section, just a vague line drawn next to the body part in the listing. People want too damn much information that they have no business even asking for. ONE line would be sufficient– “In my professional opinion, after examining the child, I find her healthy enough to participate in GS camp activities, with the following exceptions or modifications….” That is all GS needs to know.

It’s probably too late, but take control the amount of information you reveal to third parties. Have a set of answers you can use if you like, possibly transposing digits “by accident” or shifting dates or other numbers by some set amount. Start pushing back, ask if the info is ‘requested’ or ‘required’ and push for privacy and retention policies. Refuse to answer questions that aren’t relevant.

Yeah, I know, there is a certain amount of irony in me saying that… given the nature of blogging. Still, Nick is a subset of me, and I do try to obfuscate and especially to not “out” people who are unaware of what I do here, like my siblings. The resulting prose can sometimes be very awkward, and unnatural, and I try hard to smooth it out, usually with only limited success.

Anyway, with that said…

Dinner last night was home made fried chicken and southern fried veg– green tomatoes and onion rings. Youngest child wanted to make fried chicken and even though it makes a mess and the whole house smells like fried food for 3 days, it was a lot of fun. Green tomatoes were fresh from the garden, and were delicious. I used a batter mix, cast iron “chicken fryer”, and peanut oil. Biscuits were from a tube, for time and simplicity’s sake. Good stuff. Older child thinks she’ll be able to learn cooking “just before she needs it”. Yeah, good luck with that. Like gardening, it’s both simple and hard. Unless you count the soup kitchen, post SHTF you’ll be doing your own cooking. If you don’t already have some knowledge and skills, it’s time to start practicing. There has been much discussion here about the subject, the keywords are on the right… or ask in a comment.

Maybe you can survive on re-hydrated Mountain House, or microwave popcorn alone, but most of us will need more than that. Either way, stack what you need, don’t forget the tools, and practice the skills.

nick

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Wed. June 30, 2021 – summer is flying by

Hot and humid, chance of rain. We did get rain yesterday, and sun, and heat (but not terrible heat). Today should be more of the same.

Spent the day mostly indoors, doing a bunch of stuff I’ve put off too long. Paid my toll invoices for driving around without toll tags in my new truck. Put the toll tag in the truck. Did a bunch of other paperwork stuff. Played with the puppy.

Today should be a bit more active. I have to do an auction pickup, and take both kids for their Girl Scout Camp physicals. I’ve got other auction stuff to do too. I was sorting through some stuff to sell in one of the local auctions last night. She’s got a guy who buys all of one particular item that she lists, and I’ve got a bunch of them. She’s waved me off on general items since she has a huge listing backlog, but maybe I can squeeze a dozen of these in. While going through that box of stuff, I might also have found a really good score. I’ll share with the guy who gave me the box though, I’d feel bad taking it all, it’s that good a score, and there were other things in the box that should bring good money on their own.

Part of the fun of thrifting/estate/garage/yard sale hunting is the treasure hunt aspect. You literally don’t know what you will find, and sometimes you do find the treasure.

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Got my FCC license for GMRS about 10 hours after I applied. It’s a “pay the fee and get the license” application, and the license covers your whole family. The FCC isn’t issuing actual hard copies anymore, they just send a link to a pdf. I guess there is very little intrinsic value in the paper, that would make it worth forging. In any case, I’m current for GMRS again. FWIW, I got a new license rather than renew my lapsed one. There were two additional hoops to jump through and a huge fee ($210) to bring my old one current, so I just got a new one ($70 for 5 years) instead.

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There are a lot of people that would make arguments against paying for the GMRS license, working from at least 3 different points of view. Don’t care. I don’t want to give them (.gov) that handle to use against me.

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There are a lot of lists out there. My radio stuff puts me on one or more. My CERT training put me on another. My previous work clients put me on yet more lists. I’m a blogger, which probably puts me on a list. I am on lists with HPD and our Constable’s office, and the associated alumni groups. Purchasing certain items with background checks put me on a list. Visa and Mastercard probably maintain lists based on my purchase history. Amazon certainly does, and likely collaborates with .gov by compiling and selling lists. My school district has me on at least 4 lists. I’ve been to China twice so I’m on lists there, and I’m certain the US State Dept. has me on lists because of my travel to the middle east and the middle kingdom. I’m on a list in Canada, I had a work permit there for several years. I was working on a project subject to ITAR and had to go through that paperwork – that’s another list. At one point in my miss-spent youth, I’m sure I was on some other agencies’ lists as a “known associate”. There may even be criminal enterprises that have me on a list, if they do that sort of thing.

Don’t let the fact that you’ll end up on a list keep you from doing something. There are lots of us on lists, and the more there are, the more noise there is to get lost in. Use the lists to your advantage. I have access to more training activities now that I’m on a vetted list with HPD and the Constable’s Office. The CERT training is very broad based, and definitely worth trading for a spot on a list. So is ham radio. Medical training likewise.

If everyone’s the ‘biggest risk to the US’ then no one is.

Of course, be aware of when you really DON’T want to be on the list, and try to conduct at least part of your life so you don’t get on lists. Especially when it comes to stacking, you don’t want to be on the list of resources to be plundered. And since local is the new hotness, be very careful about getting on your neighbors’ lists… and consider making a few of your own.

You can think of the lists while you’re stacking.

nick

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Tues. June 29, 2021 – reduce, re-use, recycle…

Hot and humid, with rain in the forecast for the next few days, possibly followed by a hurricane. Hooray. Rained all day yesterday, off and on, but mostly on. Grass did not get cut.

Did office and auction things all day.

Grabbed the younger child to help with dinner, and we made pork roast, smashed cauliflower baked with cheese, and baked carrots with brown sugar and marshmallows. And crescent rolls from a tube. Along the way we talked about cookbooks, measuring, spent time with proper knife handling, and worked the math so that everything was ready at the same time. And it was all delicious. She was very proud of herself, and I was too.

I mentioned that I would have some observations about traveling last week, but that would be original content, and this post is recycling what I wrote in a comment at Bayou Renaissance Man. It was half about wuflu, and half about what comes next. That’s the part I’m recycling because, I needed to get to bed.

I asked the commentors there —

If you* haven’t made changes in your life because of the last 15 months, WHY NOT? What does your pantry look like? Your medicine chest? What about your gun cabinet? Have you evaluated the sources of information you expose yourself to and then made conscious choices about which are reliable? What about the people you share your precious and fleeting life with?

If you believe the lockdowns were political and coercive in nature with no medical benefits, how has that changed YOUR LIFE? What are you doing with that information?

If nothing has changed for you, if your estimation of what the next couple of years hold for all of us hasn’t changed, you are going to be just grist for the mill. If all you’ve done is mutter and wear your mask under your nose in protest, you are so far behind the curve you might not be able to catch up, but I think you should try.

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Prep so that the restrictions, shortages, and price fluctuations have less effect on you. Order your life so that you aren’t dependent on .gov, or your single source of income. Reduce your dependence on outside income period. Build relationships that will sustain you and limit the ones that will drain you. Reduce the number of ‘handles’ your enemies or just those who would manipulate you, have to pull on. Stop wasting time and energy on things that don’t improve your ability to get thru the hard times that are already here, and will continue to get worse.

Looking backwards, past the point where it provides you with guidance to move forward (ie. learning from mistakes), is not a survival trait. Focus on getting thru what’s coming.

* general ‘you’
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And that’s it boys and girls, moms and dads, children of all ages. Learn some lessons from this past year, and ACT. Even if it doesn’t get worse, but only stays exactly the same, you should be doing some stuff differently than you were. Hopefully, you have some stacks of stuff, some skills, and some friends. If not, get going. If so, keep going. Stack it high.

nick

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Mon. June 28, 2021 – if you don’t practice it, you will never learn

Hot and humid, possible rain, and surely some sun. Or some variation on the theme. If you guys are getting tired of the repetition, imagine me living with it 🙂

Yesterday was mixed rain and sun, with plenty of humidity and heat. I did get a bit of work done outside anyway, namely most of the grass cutting.

A quick look at the garden had more tomatoes ripening, lots of green still on the vines. The potted lime has 5 nice fruits on it. The blueberries are still ripening, with at least another half cup of berries ready soon. I harvested the one tennis ball sized onion out of what I planted last year. The grape vines died back almost to the root stock, but one is sending out new growth. It’s about 3-4 feet so far. I need to prune out all the dead grapevine sometime in the future. The herbs are flourishing.

It didn’t take too long to harvest the few things, and pull a couple of weeds.

Really I spent most of the day catching up on my online reading. There is plenty going on in the world and little good in the news. There is continued progress in the new race to space, and that is good, but it’s not something I follow. Of course the news is rarely full of ‘good’ news. Even accounting for that bias, there is a lot of stuff going on. For example, someone in south Chicago shooting up a car in traffic with a full auto rifle and a 100 round Beta magazine, in broad daylight. That is an escalation in the security situation in the city. Likewise, there was yet another daytime shooting in NYFC Times Square.

Nationally, we’ve now got the sitting President telling us rifles aren’t enough to keep the FedGov from killing us, we’ll need F-15s and nukes. It was bad enough when some nobody jerkoff from Cali said almost the exact thing, but now it’s the President? The president who seems more bizarre every day? Who does some sort of scary whisper voice during press conferences and talks about getting in trouble if he doesn’t do what ‘they’ say? THAT president? The same president who’s own party doesn’t trust him with nuclear launch codes?

Nationally, in big cities, and locally we have bad things getting worse. Yeah, doom and gloom. The end is nigh-er… but. Can you make the case it’s not?

And if not, then I hope you’re stacking it high.

nick

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Wed. June 16, 2021 – already running out of week

Maybe a bit cooler, what with the rain and thunderstorms and all… yesterday was hot and muggy, and bright sun until afternoon. The sky got a bit overcast, and by 5:30 the storm was rolling in. Temps dropped into the low 70s and the wind was whipping around. Parts of town got hammered, but here at the house we only got about a quarter inch by the gauge. Seemed like more.

Spent the day doing paper work. Finished late last night. Now it’s off to the CPA for tax filing. I also caught up on some other stuff I’d let slide, like renewing some memberships, canceling one of our TiVo boxes, messing around with the linux NVR, and filing paper. Threw a bunch out too.

Of course I took a break to play with the puppy, and the kids gave him a bath. He didn’t care for that much… but it sure gave him the zoomies, just like our other little guy.

There are more and more articles about inflation, and high prices, every day now. We’ve talked before about how quickly Venezuela went from “we might have a problem in a while” to “we are having a problem” to “tasty zebra, tasty rat.” Basically two years, and at no point was there a clear break with the past, so that you could say, “holy cow, it’s time to act.” We’ve also talked about why some people think that couldn’t happen with the US. Assertions don’t make reality though. What would you do differently if you KNEW we were in the first upward part of that curve? How much of that can you do without irrevocable changes? Think hard about doing it. In two years, runaway inflation can take it all, all your retirement savings, all the kids’ college money, all your savings, all of it. I don’t have a crystal ball, but no one else does either, and I don’t want to find myself saying “man, I wish I had just covered that bet, at least a little”.

Gold, durable goods, affordable everyday luxury items. Guns, ammo. Staples, especially ones that people don’t normally have in the cabinet, anything you need for yourself. Food. Repair and maintenance items. First aid and drugs. Those are all traditional good performers in an inflationary time.

Stack it high.

nick

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Sat. June 12, 2021 – non-prepping hobby day! Meatspace baby

Hot and humid but should be clear. Yesterday the humidity was lower than “dripping” so it was nice in the shade. Plenty of breeze too. Today should be similar. Still, it was over 80F when I went to bed.

Did some errands. Picked up some stuff. Did some work for my only remaining client. Petted his dogs. Played with mine. Had chinese food for dinner courtesy of FIL, and will go out for dinner tonight.

This morning I’m going to my non-prepping hobby meeting. It is nice to be getting together again to celebrate our shared interests. I should also see some of my ham lunch guys there too, and learn the fate of our in person lunch meeting. We might finally get that back up too.

Things around here aren’t ever going back to “normal” but they are getting closer. Lots of masks on people still, and I usually wear one when around crowds indoors, but plenty of people without masks too. And I’ll probably just wear a ‘medical’ mask at my meeting, and will remove it at some point, when we’re not shouting in each other’s faces.

I admit I won’t feel comfortable in a shoulder to shoulder crowd for a while. Of course I’m never really comfortable in that kind of situation anyway.

Still looking for a getaway spot. Still priced out of the market. Looks like my next door neighbor sold his house though. The sketchy renters will hopefully be the last for a while. That makes the house across the street, and the house next door into wild cards if things get sporty. I will just hope for the best, and keep my eyes open.

I got another 6 blueberries today with a whole bunch still on the bushes. Baby steps. If only the peach would start to produce. The apple needs to grow in a couple more years but it is growing well this year. At some point I will have to pull out the dead lemon, orange and grapefruit, but it’s really far down my list at this point. They look like alien sculptures after all the pruning I’ve done over the years.

Tomato plants are still huge tropical jungles of foliage, but they are not producing as much fruit this week as last. It is finally too hot. New grape vine died, and the old died back almost to the rootstock. While it is recovering, it hasn’t been very vigorous this year either. Herbs are going gangbusters, far more than we need or could use. Funny, I just realized I didn’t plant any peppers this year. I think this is the first year I haven’t since I started the garden experiments. Ebb and flow.

Well, I’m off to see some people and share a common interest, in person.

Stack your reference library, and your apocalypse library too. They are not the same thing. Stack all the things!

nick

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Fri. June 11, 2021 – a third of the way thru June already…

Hot and humid with very little chance of rain. Yesterday was hot, humid, sunny, and generally a nice day, with some overcast in various parts of town. That is one of the features of Houston weather, lots of variation depending on location. Some is consistent enough I call it a micro-climate, although the pros would likely take issue with that. Since the pros can make stuff up without ever paying the consequence for being wrong, I don’t particularly care what they would say in this case.

It’s funny that the same thing can be said about economists and financial pundits. Even investment advisors and financial pros always have a good reason why they didn’t get it right. And yet we LIKE the idea of hidden knowledge and revealed secrets. We keep going back to them for more. It must be part of our genetic and memetic heritage, although I can’t see a benefit to it. At least with everyone but the weathermen, you can simply say “their goals may not be our goals” and that offers possible explanations for why they are wrong so often.

Anyway, keep in mind that if 80% of everything is cr@p, (and I believe that is a pretty good estimate, if possibly low), that includes any predictions about the future, or explanations about the present.

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I spent yesterday running errands and avoiding my MIL. Took eldest child and puppy to see my gun store buddy. A puppy brightens everyone’s day right? The mom and pop stores should be raking in the dough in the current climate, and yet they are mostly in jeopardy of going out of business. Two gun stores in one day, and the differences were pretty dramatic. If you have inventory, you have sales and income. If you don’t, you don’t. Having other income (from a range, gunsmithing, transfers) can help, but it is only part of the equation. Stores without stuff to sell don’t last long. And that might be the biggest irony and disaster to come out of this past year- the destruction of the mom and pop gun store by extreme demand for guns.

Today I’ve got some pickups if I can fit them in, household stuff again. Then I’ve got a site visit at my client’s house. There are a couple of questions that need answers that I just can’t remember even knowing, and that I can answer by going and looking. So I’m going. Sometimes you just have to be there.

The pot roast in the slow cooker was a success. The only side was a loaf of shelf stable sourdough bread, and the veg and gravy from the pot. Every ounce of 3 pounds of meat got eaten, and even most of the veg disappeared. For seasoning, the CrockPot ™ seasoning mix single use pouch is nice and savory without being particularly overwhelming. It’s one of my ‘goto’ meals when I know I won’t be home to make dinner, and I’m not sure when exactly dinner will be.

Stews and one pot meals are great to use up food that might be getting a bit older. In this case it was some potatoes, turnips, and carrots that had been around for just a bit long. On a plate, by themselves, they might not have been really nice (although very nice compared to Little House on the Prairie at the end of a long winter) but in a pot with 6 hours to stew and blend, they were awesome and indistinguishable from fresh.

This is one of the keys to economical cooking and meal planning, and a skill that you might have to learn or re-learn with hard times on the way. Use what you have, in a way that plays to its strengths. If you have more bread than you expected, make french toast, Texas Toast, or bread pudding. If you have extra milk, use it in a dish that calls for a lot of milk. Too many veg? Make a chutney or salsa. The goal is to get the best use possible out of what you have, and avoid wasting any of it. In an economy based on abundance, you can get exactly what you want. In an economy based on scarcity, you take what you can get, and if you are smart, creative, or prepared, you make the best of it. Most people lived this way throughout most of history, we can do it too. Old recipe books can be a big help. Any recipe book sold by Williams Sonoma probably won’t be.

Of course, one of the ways to mitigate scarcity is to have big stacks of stuff, so don’t stop stacking…

nick

(it pays to know what to do with it, and to have practiced too…)

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