Preparedness for when

Blue_Doggy

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

I think we've lost skills that even our grandparents had to have to make a good living, how many people do you know who could wring a chickens neck for food? then you would need to pluck the chicken and singe off the stubborn feathers, gut the chicken and dress it for the oven or pot, if you were using solid fuel for cooking you'd have to have wood chopped and the fire lit, in the old days the feathers would be put into a hot oven to clean them and used for stuffing pillows/eiderdowns/matresses, I don't know how long that takes, needs to be done to eliminate insects and their eggs, then with the chicken cooked if there was anything left you'd have to find a way of keeping it safe to eat if there was no fridge that would be a challenge, you could pound up the cooked leftovers with some seasoning and mace and make potted meat which you'd have to cover with melted fat to seal it from the air and that would keep a couple of days in a larder and you'd have boiled up the bones to make another meal when the flesh was used up. All this for something as simple as a chicken dinner? Life was so much harder before we had labour saving devices but because we DO have them all the skills to live without them have been forgotten!

I know how to pluck and draw a chicken (I asked to be shown), but I don't think it would be done so very frequently: I remember when I was a child that Roast Chicken was a special occasion meal, not a simple dish for everyday (before intensive chicken rearing).

The big question would be whether to eat the chicken (as you describe, food for a couple of days only), or to keep it for the eggs (many more meals) and dispatch the hen only when she was too old to lay - a tough old bird to be boiled. The male birds could be eaten of course, but would first have to be reared to a suitable stage - and of course would only be available if not all the eggs were taken.

(Male fowl used to be caponised - castrated - because they become plumper, so that's another lost skill to add to the list: who now could castrate a cockerel?)

Mojoworking

I left school at 16 and have an OH of 18 years but would consider myself capable of speaking up for myself, challenging people, listening to others. I do not believe that by being uneducated or being in a long term relationship hampers my thought or decision making processes. Maybe I'm wrong.

I am confident enough I feel, to defer to others who have more experience on the subject and have proven themselves as such. There are so many things I don't know and would welcome help and direction from others I've never perceived this as a negative ot weakness before it is interesting how other people view each other.

COOLTRIKERCHICK

A question re- tinned veg

They say frozen veg has more vitamin content than some fresh veg, as soon as its picked it starts losing its vit content, what about tinned veg??

[Deleted User]

Blue_Doggy wrote: »

I know how to pluck and draw a chicken (I asked to be shown), but I don't think it would be done so very frequently

There's always wild birds.

Frugalsod

Mojoworking wrote: »

I left school at 16 and have an OH of 18 years but would consider myself capable of speaking up for myself, challenging people, listening to others. I do not believe that by being uneducated or being in a long term relationship hampers my thought or decision making processes. Maybe I'm wrong.

I am confident enough I feel, to defer to others who have more experience on the subject and have proven themselves as such. There are so many things I don't know and would welcome help and direction from others I've never perceived this as a negative ot weakness before it is interesting how other people view each other.

I totally agree. I have my particular strengths and weakness and if it relates to one area that I am not strong on I defer to others skills and knowledge. Personally I could never kill or prepare any animal and prefer it ready filleted and almost ready to cook. So deferring to someone with the right skills avoids a lot of complications.

Many current events are outside our normal experiences such as the crisis, so we need to read up about past experiences of how it was coped with. Though I am much more questioning of authority as I can see that they are not always acting in our best interests. So my objectives in prepping are to cut my overheads down so that I have much more scope to cope with any potential changes in life. Secondly I am preparing for a potential events that will be disruptive and might need to actually bug out even though it is the last thing on my mind. You only have to look at Spain and Greece to discover what a mess the local housing market is like and it is about to get worse as they start mass foreclosures on millions in Greece. It could happen here as millions would struggle to pay their mortgage if interest rates rose only 0.5%. So what would happen to many parents whose children had help from their parents to buy are made homeless, and even guaranteed their mortgage thinking they had plenty of equity should anything happen?

thriftwizard

Another one here who can, has and probably will have to again, kill, pluck & draw a cockerel, and make it last 3 meals for 6 - roast, curry (with added veg) and pie, not to mention boiling up the carcass for soup. And can prep & spin fleece, bast & leaf fibres, and dye them, and weave, and make felt, and sew, make quilts (without 505 spray & polyester batting!) and various other skills that are perhaps less than useful at present but still rather interesting & even fun. Some, like preserving, are even money-saving. Most of my offspring can do most of these things, and many of the neighbouring kids, who've all "had a go" round here; some have been inspire to learn more. And that's who we should be passing our assorted arcane skills onto...

But there are loads of things I can't do, or am not much good at, which is why I think we do need to think about community in a long-term SHTF situation.

CTC, I have a feeling that canned goods are heated up to boiling point to ensure sterility inside the can. That'd probably do a few vitamins in? Not to mention the chemicals they line cans with... but canned veg would probably still be better than no veg.

Frugalsod

COOLTRIKERCHICK wrote: »

A question re- tinned veg

They say frozen veg has more vitamin content than some fresh veg, as soon as its picked it starts losing its vit content, what about tinned veg??

It is only marginally less but more depending on preservation techniques used. Some are ready cooked so will have many nutrients destroyed in the cooking process. Though some like kidney beans this is what you want so are probably a better way to buy.

Mojoworking

Frugalsod I completely agree. I think people got into politics very quickly realise it's a cut throat business that serves the few and not the many and it is essentially a game of thrones. I've no idea how to change this bar voting green which feels like a wasted vote. Maybe Corbyn y will get in and I can vote labour again. I can't currently as essentially it was a choice of 3 tory parties.

In my immediate location I'd welcome help from people. The local college has a game keeping course and I brought a sad looking pheasant. This was still sad looking after it has been plucked and prepared. They got better as the course went on I would happily pay for someone else to do it for as long as possible. Great skills though

COOLTRIKERCHICK

Thanks, I was just wondering, going to stock up with tinned stuff, also if electric goes out again then tin spuds, tinned carrots and peas can all be heated in one pot..


Don't forget no man( woman) is an island , we all need people's help and opinions. And we can't be right all the time....

Blue_Doggy

Bedsit_Bob wrote: »

There's always wild birds.

First catch your wild birds!

A common food for poor people in the south of England (probably elsewhere too) was sparrows, caught in a net while eating grain scattered as bait. When you think of the size of a plucked sparrow, you think how desperate the people were. I used to know an old man who had done this in the early years of the 20th century.

On the positive side, though, there's an end to type 2 diabetes and the obesity crisis!