Preparedness for when

westcoastscot

Evening everyone,
CTC the longest we went was 5 months over a very severe winter, however we were crofters so had the goat for milk and veggies in the ground, as well as meat on the hoof.
I still have around 3 months supplies here, although almost everything is brought in, however I use it on a daily basis. My shopping list consists largely of things we've eaten and I top up when I get the chance - usually every 4 - 6 weeks, although I do buy fresh milk every couple of days as we like it. We eat seasonably, so come January/February i'll start replacing eaten food with what we'll need in spring, and so on.
Works great for us!!
WCS

[Deleted User]

THRIFTWIZARD I'd certainly be up for a challenge like that, I'm always in squirrel mode as soon as we start to harvest the home grown produce, I think for a challenge like that I will have to revise what we grow a little and plan ahead to make sure we had enough variety and enough different preservation methods to stop us from either being vitamin deficient or bored with the food. It will be a very interesting experiment, Lyn xxx.

COOLTRIKERCHICK

thriftwizard wrote: »

CTC, I have friends & rellys deep in the Canadian backwoods and up in the mountains (Dad was born in Vancouver) and I can see one problem for most of us over here; we just don't have anywhere enough storage. They generally have huge walk-in larders, filled with preserves of one sort or another by late autumn, as well as several freezers & "root" cellars. I suspect if we tried it without months of prep & adequate storage of the different kinds that different foodstuffs require, we'd be limited to a very boring & possibly even nutritionally-inadequate diet. But at least we wouldn't have to worry about bears breaking in & stealing our goodies!

Might it be worth bearing it in mind for a challenge for next winter, though, so that anyone who chose to join in could think, research & get a head-start at building up the kind of supplies you'd need to ensure enough fibre, vitamins & minerals?

would def be up for this, I should imagine the 'prepping' for the challenge will start now, for the ones that can grow some or all their own food, work out what type of quanities and what to grow... even prepping down to meal planning for x amount of weeks/months of meals, which will help in knowing how much of stuff to grow..

GreyQueen

Morning all.

Love the idea of Canandian-style backwoods living but can't see me managing it in my teeny-tiny flat, teeny 3 ft wide bike shed and lottie shed. I'm already stretching the boundaries of the possible now.

Observations of growing both red and white onions is that the reds, despite being handled identically, often don't keep, and several have rotted away to nothing already and been wasted. Will either not grow them at all next year, or will aim to convert them into a preserve immediately after harvest.

I gave more of my potatoes to family than on previous years, as had spuds going wizened in storage from the last harvest. Potatoes lose their nutrients as the months in storage pass, and the potato you harvested in July is several times more nutritious in late summer than it will be in early Spring. I will get into Pasta Mountain when I have eaten all the HG ones.

Spuds in sacks need to be de-shooted regularly about now. Did mine about 3 weeks ago and will be checking them again soon. Do take off even tiny shoots, as they are using the stored goodness in the tuber, so you don't want them sprouting, or to leave them until they are inches long.

I'm letting some gone-to-seed runner beans dry out on the plant, and harvested the first lot yesterday, have podded them and will keep them indoors to make sure thoroughly-dried. Then they'll be paper-bagged and put in the meat safe with the other seeds in the lottie shed.

If we were eating no imported foodstuffs from warmer climes, we would all be coming out of winter in poor physical condition at the latitudes. One of the traditional spring tonics was fresh nettles, which are rich in iron. It's well worth knowing how to boost yourself up with wild plants in case you ever find yourself in a famine or even impoverished condition.

Will be going to the lottie within the hour (at this time of year I like to spend my 2-3 gardening hours at the warmest point of the day) and continuing to work towards next yesr's harvest. When I come back, I'll have a bath, which will include the water from one of the water carriers, which has stood indoors for 3 months and will be rotated out and refilled. I keep a note in my diary and there is also a strip of masking tape on the top of the container with it's last fill date.

Lots of little preptastic things which a body can be doing. And Liddly has Br*nston baked beans at 4/£1.25. Best price I've seen since my last mahoosive stock up late in 2012 at 4/£1 so have stocked up on another 8.

Keep on prepping, lovely peeps.

ginnyknit

Happy, I got some of the fairy lights the other day, wasnt sure which £ shop was near Dd's but it was the right one :j they are very good, am going to switch them on in a minute and see how long they last.

I think we could last comfortably for a month then a while longer with a bit of a boring menu but plenty of spices etc. Lets face it if necessary ie no income, we could stretch it and last ages just out of sheer bloody minded determination ! I invested in a lot of powdered milk from AF and find it very usefull, I hate going out just for milk especially as you always buying other things I have lots of cake mixes and instant custard so at least we will have nice puds - I also have soya flour which I believe you can use to replace eggs in cakes ? must google it, so can still make cake in a crisis :T

GreyQueen

Couldn't agree more about the going out for milk errand turning into other expenditures. Great way to blast the budget out of the water.

One of my favourite desserts is a bit of fruit, fresh or stewed, a slice of McV*ties cake (39p from F.Foods) and a bit of Tosspots Basics powdered custard. I have about half the 7p/pkt stash left but even at about 15p/ pkt it is very reasonable and just add boiling water.

Hard to feel down if you have a nice pud and a cuppa, I find.

This past 9 months, I've been on a monthly DD for my futility bills, as opposed to a quarterly variable arrangement. It was a criteria of being able to swop supplier. I gave them my annual gas and electric consumption and they worked out my DD at just shy of £24 a month (this is dual fuel but exc the CH which is on a block system and is a rent charge). So it shouldn't change much winter/ summer.

Current credit is about £60. Can anyone tell me how this works out, usually? I don't expect to eat into that credit much over the next 3 months and will be looking for another deal before I come off this one in Spring. Do they refund it to you automatically or only if you close your account with them? Their website keeps querying my leccy consumption at 2 kWh/ 24 hours but their own meter readings confirm it as well as the ones I submit.

[Deleted User]

GINNY yes, you can use soya flour to replace eggs for each egg use 1 rounded tablespoon of soya flour and 2 tablespoons of water, Lyn xxx.

mardatha

I'm the same GQ, we've got £140 credit with Co-op energy and I wouldn't mind some of it back for coal ! They set our DD at £20 a month but we said we'd pay £25 until we saw how it would work out.

GreyQueen

mardatha wrote: »

I'm the same GQ, we've got £140 credit with Co-op energy and I wouldn't mind some of it back for coal ! They set our DD at £20 a month but we said we'd pay £25 until we saw how it would work out.

:rotfl:I'm with the same outfit; I call it my Co Op savings account.

I'm going to be off this deal about Feb so will be shopping around for another one before then. I heard something in passing about an outfit called Equigas which doesn't have standing charges, not sure if that's correct information, so will check it out in the New Year. As a very low user, SCs annoy me no end because I come out the worst on the deal.

From my POV, connecting me to a supply is a business cost. Same as shop rent and business rates is a cost of doing business and I think it should be built into the unit price. Heck, we wouldn't accept going into Tosspots (or wherever) and being told; That's £10.49 for your groceries, Modom, plus a £2.50 surcharge towards our rent. :mad:

Tell ya, if I ruled the world, heads would roll. Apart from the ones I'd put on pikes at the city gates as an example to the others......:p

Hokay, gotta go do some gardening. I disturbed a clutch of slug/ snail eggs yesterday in the feral strawberry bed............that's a batch which won't be making baybee gastropods next year, mwah ha ha!

Laters, GQ xx

nuatha

GQ and Mardatha you can phone your energy supplier and simply ask for the balance to be refunded. Generally they'll ask for an up to date metre reading and calculate the actual balance while you are on the phone. Usually they'll refund to the account that the debit comes from, though you can ask for a cheque instead if you wish. (cheque tends to take a week or two longer to arrive - bank credit is about a week from most suppliers)
Ginnyknit soya flour is my preferred option when veganising cake recipes. The cake will be a little heavier than with egg, but perfectly edible.
HTH

ETA GQ Equipower and Equigas (two arms of same outfit) don't charge standing charges, helped a friend move over to them recently, despite higher unit charge she's more than halved her bills (another low user)