Rotating emergency food stocks

Food, Nutrition and Agriculture
Bosworth
Posts: 266
Joined: Thu Sep 12, 2013 11:03 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by Bosworth »

itsybitsy wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 12:06 pm
jansman wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 11:28 am Everything seemed to have 5 to 10p extra on it.Cat food particularly.Interesting times ahead methinks.
Loo roll in Sainsbury, gone up from £3.50 to £3.85 in the past three weeks.
This has been a general inflationary trend for a long time. Initial price rises, then shrinkflation, now backnto actual increases as product packet size cannot credibly decrease much further in many cases.

Mostly currency related I think. Gold is your friend to offset cost of living increases driven from currency.
jennyjj01
Posts: 3429
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2017 11:09 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by jennyjj01 »

Bosworth wrote: Sat Feb 23, 2019 11:26 pm I’m probably going to make myself unpopular here but I hope all perspectives are welcomed...

My emergency food is not stuff we regularly eat. It’s crap. Tinned vegetables, dried pasta’n’sauce, plain rice etc etc. We normally eat fresh, organic, or go out many times a week.

For me, food preps are worst case. If starving, or bugging in, it will suffice, rather than part of our everyday consumption. Eating crap is better than eating nothing.

Don’t hate me :(
I don't hate you. I think we are pretty aligned in our approach and it's not universally agreed on.

I'm super impressed by the quantities that you have amassed and how long you've been doing this.

A few words about buying and storing 'crap'

I started out something like that, buying 20p pasta and crappy powdered soups ( how bad can it be ) and lots of everyday value ranges. And Milk was always going to be powdered, never to be used in normal times. But my thinking has changed. I don't know your financial situation, but for me, financially, there was no difference between spending £500 on 'crap' stock or £1500 on the same quantity of better stock. Come the day of the EMP and all cash machines are out and my Thousands in the bank are not available, I'd probably kick myself if all I had was crap, when it could have been decent.

So now I concentrate on value for money: Calories per £ and Calories per Kilo ... or per cubic Metre of storage space.

So my new mantra is very much "Acceptable Quality at Appropriate Cost'. That means that I at least sample everything before splashing out and if it's disgusting, it's not bought. For disgusting, think Tesco everyday value meatballs which I'd flush even if I was starving. For acceptable, think most things Lidl or Aldi.

One thing I'm definitely doing, for fun, is actually trying to make meals out of my non-regular stuff. It's enlightening in the extreme. A glug of lea and perrins and a dash of spice can turn rice and beans into a really pleasant feast. 29p Dried Mashed spuds can be a pleasant belly filler with just a spoonful of decent gravy powder and some dried onions. Etc Etc. It's fact that some of the stuff I stock BELONGS in my staple diet. I'm certainly embracing pulses etc that would never have had a second glance. And this stuff is SERIOUSLY cheap as chips, with meals costing between 50p and 2 quid.

So.... Now, I'm going to set aside some time to analyse your stock list, and I'll let you see and analyse mine. I bet we both draw some inspiration.

And to Jansman.... I am doing SOME stock rotation. I already rotated 4 litres of JD and 6 bottles of merlot.
Graceful Degradation! Prepping's objective summed up in two words. Turning Disaster into Mild Inconvenience by the power of fore-thought

Not Feeling Optimistic. Let me be wrong
Bosworth
Posts: 266
Joined: Thu Sep 12, 2013 11:03 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by Bosworth »

jennyjj01 wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 1:01 pm [I'm super impressed by the quantities that you have amassed and how long you've been doing this.

A few words about buying and storing 'crap'

I started out something like that, buying 20p pasta and crappy powdered soups ( how bad can it be ) and lots of everyday value ranges. And Milk was always going to be powdered, never to be used in normal times. But my thinking has changed. I don't know your financial situation, but for me, financially, there was no difference between spending £500 on 'crap' stock or £1500 on the same quantity of better stock. Come the day of the EMP and all cash machines are out and my Thousands in the bank are not available, I'd probably kick myself if all I had was crap, when it could have been decent.

So now I concentrate on value for money: Calories per £ and Calories per Kilo ... or per cubic Metre of storage space.

So my new mantra is very much "Acceptable Quality at Appropriate Cost'. That means that I at least sample everything before splashing out and if it's disgusting, it's not bought. For disgusting, think Tesco everyday value meatballs which I'd flush even if I was starving. For acceptable, think most things Lidl or Aldi.

One thing I'm definitely doing, for fun, is actually trying to make meals out of my non-regular stuff. It's enlightening in the extreme. A glug of lea and perrins and a dash of spice can turn rice and beans into a really pleasant feast. 29p Dried Mashed spuds can be a pleasant belly filler with just a spoonful of decent gravy powder and some dried onions. Etc Etc. It's fact that some of the stuff I stock BELONGS in my staple diet. I'm certainly embracing pulses etc that would never have had a second glance. And this stuff is SERIOUSLY cheap as chips, with meals costing between 50p and 2 quid.

So.... Now, I'm going to set aside some time to analyse your stock list, and I'll let you see and analyse mine. I bet we both draw some inspiration.

And to Jansman.... I am doing SOME stock rotation. I already rotated 4 litres of JD and 6 bottles of merlot.
Interesting thoughts. I guess my mentality is flawed - I expect never to use it so almost having a comfort blanket rather than seriously planning to dig in. You may be right.

I’ll happily post my full list of food for comment. Won’t be till tonight when I’m back from the Cup final :)
jansman
Posts: 13622
Joined: Thu Dec 30, 2010 7:16 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by jansman »

jennyjj01 wrote:

And to Jansman.... I am doing SOME stock rotation. I already rotated 4 litres of JD and 6 bottles of merlot

Great! I got through then? :lol: I think the difference in attitudes towards food storage between you and I is that yours is a stand- alone emergency supply.Mine is stored food,always there,routinely replenished when used.Vive la difference. :D
In three words I can sum up everything I have learned about life: It goes on.

Robert Frost.

Covid 19: After that level of weirdness ,any situation is certainly possible.

Me.
User avatar
Deeps
Posts: 5797
Joined: Sun Nov 09, 2014 8:36 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by Deeps »

Its very much what works for you, personally, I try and stick as close to the 'store what you eat, eat what you store' as I can. I've had to compromise on some bits, but I've also slightly changed what I eat to accommodate it, for a long time the only cans we had were beans and tuna really so now I treat myself to the odd 'bad' meal of beans and sausages with diced and shallow fried tatties, I'll throw in some dried onion and chillies, the same with some of the cheap chicken in white sauce etc, that for all intents it doesn't really go off it can sit in the stores until I feel like it. I have bought tins of tatties and other veg that doesn't really get used but again, it ain't gonna go off any time soon. We try and store everything we use, even down to things like extra oven chips, I'm only talking an extra bag stuff here rather than a freezer full but handy any way. We normally have a couple trays eggs too (15) and if we get down to one then we start twitching, a minor prep but 15 eggs means an egg a day for a week for the pair of us, we keep rolls in the freezer too... not very sexy prepping admittedly but in the unlikely event we're snowed in for a week its business as usual at Casa Deeps.

I've also got a rake of dehydrated, both meals that I take away hill walking and loads of jars of veg, if those pesky zombies eat the power station workers and the freezers don't work I've got Gawd knows how much dried veg to add to the noodles/pasta/rice/beans/spam to give us or 5 a day (standards must be maintained, even post apocalypse ;) )

There's no one size fits all, budget, space and time are some of the constraints on what you hoard and if you do stockpile stuff that you wouldn't normally touch, its maybe worth thinking about how you can tweak them (as Jenny has, thanks for sharing) to make them more palatable to you. I love the cheap chicken in white sauce, I do variations with different dried veg and I'm sure someone on here has used them for a curry too. Its not something I would normally eat straight out the can but with dried onion, leek, garlic, chilli and mushrooms its braw.
jennyjj01
Posts: 3429
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2017 11:09 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by jennyjj01 »

Bosworth wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 1:32 pm
Interesting thoughts. I guess my mentality is flawed - I expect never to use it so almost having a comfort blanket rather than seriously planning to dig in. You may be right.

I’ll happily post my full list of food for comment. Won’t be till tonight when I’m back from the Cup final :)
Cool. Please take my comments as a friendly kick up the ar5e :)
If you are going to spend good money on an insurance (Stockpile) then make sure that insurance is valid and not just a dodgy cover note.

There's a sub-forum here: Lists. It only seems visible when you log in. I'm going to post two images there: My summary worksheet and my more detailed complete stock list, including prices and expiry dates. They'll probably have to be attached as images, but if the hosts make it possible, I might upload as Excel.

FYI, I just did an update. Woah! There's 450Kg of scoff and a few non-foods costing just shy of £1,000 and it should feed 2 for about 300 days :tinfoil
That doesn't even feature what's in fridges, freezers and kitchen cupboards.

Also doesn't include the cost of certain equipment: Radios/Torches/Firestock/Hygene products/Dehydrator/Vac sealer/(Those things i'm not allowed to mention) which is probably another £300 or so.
Graceful Degradation! Prepping's objective summed up in two words. Turning Disaster into Mild Inconvenience by the power of fore-thought

Not Feeling Optimistic. Let me be wrong
Arzosah
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jun 22, 2012 4:20 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by Arzosah »

"So now I concentrate on value for money: Calories per £ and Calories per Kilo ... or per cubic Metre of storage space.

So my new mantra is very much "Acceptable Quality at Appropriate Cost'. That means that I at least sample everything before splashing out and if it's disgusting, it's not bought. For disgusting, think Tesco everyday value meatballs which I'd flush even if I was starving. For acceptable, think most things Lidl or Aldi."


That's a great resolution, Jenny, great to see you find an answer that works for you on here.
jennyjj01 wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 2:54 pm If you are going to spend good money on an insurance (Stockpile) then make sure that insurance is valid and not just a dodgy cover note.
Me likee. Lots :mrgreen:
FYI, I just did an update. Woah! There's 450Kg of scoff and a few non-foods costing just shy of £1,000 and it should feed 2 for about 300 days :tinfoil
That doesn't even feature what's in fridges, freezers and kitchen cupboards.

Also doesn't include the cost of certain equipment: Radios/Torches/Firestock/Hygene products/Dehydrator/Vac sealer/(Those things i'm not allowed to mention) which is probably another £300 or so.
Oo-er :? :cry: I've never costed what I've got in the house. You've scared me now :lol:
User avatar
Deeps
Posts: 5797
Joined: Sun Nov 09, 2014 8:36 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by Deeps »

Arzosah wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 3:13 pm
Oo-er :? :cry: I've never costed what I've got in the house. You've scared me now :lol:
Not long after I joined the forum there was a thread about how much you spent on prepping, at the time I could honestly say not that much as all I was doing was building up my food stores, I've always had loads of 'outdoorsy' gear. Now, I've spent a fair bit on prepping, my dehydrator/vacc sealer have paid for themselves not having to buy commercial dehydrated walking meals but other stuff.... This is where I see a hobby aspect to prepping, I know its not a universally popular view but I enjoy doing the research and getting 'stuff' that I think will be useful. Some I can sort of 'justify' for hill walking or whatever but its a cover really, I've no idea how much I've spent on prepping, both on food and other gear but I'rather have it and not need it than the other way round.
User avatar
itsybitsy
Posts: 8435
Joined: Sat Nov 27, 2010 5:51 pm
Location: East Yorkshire

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by itsybitsy »

Bosworth wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 12:10 pm
itsybitsy wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 12:06 pm
jansman wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 11:28 am Everything seemed to have 5 to 10p extra on it.Cat food particularly.Interesting times ahead methinks.
Loo roll in Sainsbury, gone up from £3.50 to £3.85 in the past three weeks.
This has been a general inflationary trend for a long time. Initial price rises, then shrinkflation, now backnto actual increases as product packet size cannot credibly decrease much further in many cases.

Mostly currency related I think. Gold is your friend to offset cost of living increases driven from currency.
I don't buy gold.
Arzosah
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jun 22, 2012 4:20 pm

Re: Rotating emergency food stocks

Post by Arzosah »

I agree about the hobby aspect, Deeps - I love researching stuff, for instance, and I love little bits of kit, though I'm not technical at all, sadly. For me, its sort of compensation for having taken a wrong turn in my 30s, when I really wanted to have some kind of smallholding, but let myself get talked out of it :( so having gear that enables a little bit of self reliance and self sufficiency, I'm a happy bunny. I won't spend money like water, but I will spend to fulfil perceived needs.