Stocking up on tinned stuff?

[katie]

OK - my freezer is useful for now as we can be stuck for days in the winter. I freeze milk & bread as well as meat, home made soups etc. so we wouldn't starve. We do have a petrol generator which would run the freezer & fridge freezer in short term emergencies. I do have a lot of bottled water stored in the base of my chaise and have water purifying tablets & a jug filter for emergencies. I have a well stocked herb garden and a greenhouse for growing tomatoes, peppers and other salad veg as well as raised beds to grow other veg. I do have dried yeast bicarb & baking powder. I have paracetamol & antibiotics, soap & other toiletries, kitchen rolls, toilet rolls & wipes, cling film, loads of plastic Bags salt & cooking oils. I have a wind-up/solar radio, wind-up torches, candles, lighters etc as well as charcoal for the BBQ. I have a camping gaz stove and spare bedding quilts & sleeping bags. I hadn't mentioned these in my other post as the OP was asking mainly about tinned goods.

Katie

[adam2]

Katie, although I am certain that many of us could think of prudent additions to your stocks, you sound very much better prepared than most of the population.
A petrol generator is not suited for long term backup power but is fine for short term use, and again is better than what most people have, which is nothing.

[katie]

Katie, although I am certain that many of us could think of prudent additions to your stocks, you sound very much better prepared than most of the population.
A petrol generator is not suited for long term backup power but is fine for short term use, and again is better than what most people have, which is nothing.

My son got me started on all this a couple of years ago warning me about the economy & how the prices of food etc. would soar & become more scarce eventually - as well as the oil depletion scenario.

Katie

[vtsnowedin]

I'd like to throw in a plus one on having a chest freezer well stocked. Sure it is not the basket to keep all your survival eggs in as the grid may well go down one day and your back up generator or solar panels might not keep it viable, but in the mean time as long as the grid is up more then fifty percent or so the utility of a freezer is worth having for anyone that has the floor space. It lets you stock up on food items when they are in season or on sale (I think you call that" on offer")And provides a way to store meat and fish you have raised or caught as well as store the surplus from the garden for the winter in a form that I find much more palatable then home canning the same produce.
True you may some day lose all that is in the freezer due to a power cut you are not prepared for , but as long as it is only a third or a quarter of the total calories you keep on hand it would not be a disaster and the utility you can gain from it year in year out more then covers that risk.

[DominicJ]

My Freezers a bit, iffy, and the computer sometimes gets confused and refuses to turn the compressor on.
A full freezer takes a LONG time to defrost.

Not weeks obviously, but mines been off overnight and my ice cubes were just starting to deform.
Stick a couple of bottles filled with water in any spare space if your worried, buys you a bit more time.
Hmmm, could you rig up a direct drive cycle powered freezer?

[adam2]

Hmmm, could you rig up a direct drive cycle powered freezer?

In theory it is just about possible, in practice it is not feasible.
All modern fridges and freezers use a hermetic motor/compresor assembly that can not be driven from an external belt or shaft.

A special comprssor intended for external mechanical drive would be needed, AFAIK these are no longer manufactured in small sizes.
Any such comppresor would be vulnerable to the refrigerant escaping via the gland by which the externaly driven shaft connects to the compressor.
Friction in this gland or seal would waste considerable power.

It is possible to work a conventional freezer from a battery and inverter, and if desired the battery may be charged from a cycle.
Many hours cycling will be required, perhaps 12 hours a day, maybe continually.

By use of an ultra high efficiency DC freezer, then the cycling could be reduced to a more reasonable hour or two a day.

[Layla]

I have been stockpiling food for about 3 years now, and by trial and error, have worked out the best way to do it for me and my family.

I don’t consider my stockpile separate from my everyday food supplies – there is just rather more of it than most people would expect!

I only buy things that I know we will eat as I add to and take from my stockpile all the time. Therefore, I buy the quality that we will happily eat in the next week rather than buying cheap stuff especially to stockpile.

I’m lucky enough to have space in the garage to keep a lot of this stuff and my husband made some shelves especially for it all.

The list of items I have lots of is as follows ...

Tinned beans (various types)
Tins baked beans
Tinned tomatoes
tomato puree
sugar
lemon juice
tabasco
salt
mustard
soy sauce
vinegar
cocoa powder
bread flour
yeast
SR and plain flour
Baking powder
Bicarb of soda
honey
peanut butter
jam
herbs and spices
sunflower oil
olive oil
stock cubes
coconut milk
rice
couscous
bulgur
pasta
baked beans
tinned beans
red lentils
green lentils
dried beans
tofu – long life type
seeds
oats
herb tea
tea
coffee

dog food
cat food

In the freezer:
cheese
butter
milk

The only thing I store that we don't use is bottled water as I don'tli ke to drink water that has been in plastic. I buy the 17p basic bottled water from supermarkets and just regard it as insurance against a cut in water supplies.

I work on the basis that you need to store items from each food group
• grains (wheat, rice, corn, rolled oats, pasta)
• legumes (dry beans, peas, lentils)
• powdered milk
• sugar or honey
• cooking oil
• salt
• water

[Kentucky Fried Panda]

Cracking first post Layla

No meat?

Pan fried spam will be the next best thing to bacon after an event. Corned beef tends to fall apart when fried.

[emordnilap]

Welcome Layla.

Very sensible stockpile there.

[vtsnowedin]

Layla I like your approach. I have to wonder why there aren't any frozen veggies in the freezer but perhaps you just don't count them as survival food? Do you have any idea of how long your stock could last if shopping or other inputs ended suddenly.
My own stockpile tends to cover nine months in the fall and drops to three months in spring as I stockpile garden produce in season and consume it through the winter. In a real emergency I could stretch that considerably with rationing and increased efforts of "acquiring" from the land and water.
Welcome also

[Catweazle]

Hmmm, could you rig up a direct drive cycle powered freezer?

How about a car aircon compressor ? Designed to be driven from a belt, you could rig it to a windmill. If you super insulated you could use a peltier effect heat pump driven from PV.

[adam2]

Hmmm, could you rig up a direct drive cycle powered freezer?

How about a car aircon compressor ? Designed to be driven from a belt, you could rig it to a windmill. If you super insulated you could use a peltier effect heat pump driven from PV.

Car air conditioning compressors are designed for cheapness, not efficiency. They take several HP to drive them, far beyond that available from a cycle.
Windmill drive is a theoretical possibility but unlikely to be viable in practice. Long refrigerant lines require a lot of costly refrigerant to fill them, considerable mechanical complications would be involved in obtaining a high enough drive speed, and of course windmills turn to face the wind, but the freezer does not.

Peltier effect fridges are available now, and have the merit of low cost and few moving parts, they are less efficient than conventional compressor technology.
Improvements are possible in peltier technology, but at present it is not efficient.

[DominicJ]

I now have a little under 16kg of dried beans.
2kg bags of 8 different varieties.
According to wiki, 200g of dried beans contain a days calories, no wonder I'm fat...

Most expensive was less than £3 for 2kg, which is 5 days calories for 2 people

http://www.natco-online.com/
But you cant order the bigger bags online, for most products.

[featherstick]

I now have a little under 16kg of dried beans.
2kg bags of 8 different varieties.
According to wiki, 200g of dried beans contain a days calories, no wonder I'm fat...

Most expensive was less than £3 for 2kg, which is 5 days calories for 2 people

http://www.natco-online.com/
But you cant order the bigger bags online, for most products.

Are you experimenting with recipes and cooking techniques now?

Also, be aware that beans harden up and become almost impossible to cook over time. Having said that, last week I cooked some yellow split peas with a BB date of Aug 2010 from a bag that had been open for 2 years. It took about 2 hours to cook 'em, but cook they did, eventually.

Have a look at retained heat cooking if you are going to do lots of bean recipes.

Edit: and remember pulses form a complete set of amino acids when eaten with rice.

Oh, and sprouting smaller beans is a good way to eat them too. You can even sprout dried chickpeas.

[DominicJ]

I am yes, well, mostly chilli and curry at the moment, but I can live on that.

I has assumed BBDs would be several years, due to them being dried, but hadnt considered they could become "too dry", I'll check, but I dont forsee it being a problem.

I am always careful to cook with a lid whenever I dont need to reduce something, once its boiling, it'll happily stay that way on the lowest heat if you leave the lid on.

I'd heard that about micro nutrients, no bean contains them all, however, I also read that the weightings were based on the amounts contained in chicken eggs, rather than any sensible "amount required".
Still, I have a veriety, that I intend to expand.

Need to get my slow cooker out and have another play with that, always seemed far far far too much liquid whenever we used it, might just have to tell the other half the behave and use her syns on food not sweeties.