Preparing for Winter V

maryjane87

I have been using my dehydrator recently to make chard powder. A lot of leaves goes down to a really small amount of powder, I plan to fill a big kilner to add a spoonful of green goodness to various soups,smoothies stews etc in winter. We are overrun with chard, the leaves are over a foot long, and there's more than I can reasonably try to feed to toddlers unless it's disguised! 

Floss

Boazu, I'm surprised that you don't have much success at freezing...I used to freeze a lot of my allotment produce - french beans were blanched & frozen; tomatoes, peppers,  courgettes & onion were chopped, cooked into sauces or soup bases & frozen; main crop potatoes that weren't eaten fresh were cooked, mashed & frozen either as duchess or piped into tops for pies in single portion pots; spinach was frozen & squished so it took up little space. 
I appreciate that you live in a semi-rural area where there may be the occasional power cut, but I would be very surprised if power was out long enough to completely ruin a freezer full of frozen veg, soup & sauces.

GreyQueen

The I have a tiny tabletop freezer and get very good use out of

GreyQueen

Oops, scuse butterfingers! Meant to say, very good use for allotment produce and batch cooking and odds and sods. Freezer Tetris. Lots easier than drying things, IMO. Not that I’d have anywhere to fit a dehydrator in my silly small apartment. I do dry broad beans, or rather allow them to dry out on the haulm and keep them in jars. I soak, cook and eat as required, hauling some out to plant in the garden as necessary.

What can I say? I have chronic illnesses and am always looking for the easiest way to do things.....

greenbee

In the 1970s & 80s my mum used to feed us all from the veg garden which was probably about the size of an allotment, with a massive fruit cage covering most of it. That, fruit trees and chickens (and briefly guinea fowl) kept us well supplied. In the 80s she also made yogurt in one of those French electric yogurt makers with individual pots ☺️ Living in the countryside, with farming neighbours and relatives we also ate a lot of game - pheasant, partridge, wild goose and pigeon. So the odd cockerel making it into the freezer, or meat from the butcher was a treat! She did this with a large chest freezer in the back porch that used to be wrapped in blankets when the power went off, and a tall upright. 

We weren’t entirely self sufficient but nothing was wasted, and we never lost the freezer contents. I do remember we were lent a generator in a couple of occasions when the power was off for a long time. And when they moved a few years ago, my dad did buy one and install it, but it doesn’t get used much as power cuts seem to be fewer and further between (probably due to the power companies doing a lot more tree work in recent years).

My parents lived in a very isolated rural community, and my mum is still in a small village, as am I, but I think power and communications are much more reliable now, as are supply chains, and they have learnt a lot from lockdown), so the chances of being cut off from supplies are minimal. Prepping for quarantine/isolation and not being able to go out for 2 weeks makes sense, but even then, online deliveries should still be available now the retailers have adapted. 

MingVase

What a lovely post greenbee, reminds me of how we lived when the kids were young. I miss those days now.     Longest power cut we've had was almost 6 days but that was a while ago - as you say, they have improved things a lot and we don't get many at all now.

greenbee

MingVase said:

What a lovely post greenbee, reminds me of how we lived when the kids were young. I miss those days now.     Longest power cut we've had was almost 6 days but that was a while ago - as you say, they have improved things a lot and we don't get many at all now.

I used to grumble like mad about having to pick fruit and veg. Especially blackcurrants, which I didn’t really like. I now love them stewed with lots of cream!

Floss

I used to grow fruit too - 2 apple trees, 2 plums & a pear tree, red & blackcurrants, strawberries, rhubarb, raspberries, goosegogs & blueberries but the former husband used to make wine with a lot of it, or it was jammed for gifts.

Nowadays I am on my own, eith a smallish garden that has potted courgette & tomato plants, a new clump of raspberry canes and plenty of foliage & flowers to enjoy. I did consider digging up part for growing but decided I would rather be able to enjoy it rather than be faced with jobs every time I look out of the windows or step outside.

silvasava

I grow a lot of fruit, mainly because when we first moved here the ground was/is heavy clay and not condusive for growing root veg. I now have a couple of raised beds for veg. I have 2 1/2 freezers and can't remember the last time I lost any food from a power cut. I have enough fruit frozen to last us to the next harvest and the veg is ongoing at the moment. I've only one blackcurrant and blackberry plants as they both provide more than enough for our needs. The quince, plum and apple trees surplus are always given to friends and neighbours as I don't see any need to overstock. Grandaughter visited yesterday with GGS and went home with tomatoes and cucumber for their tea and apples and greenbeans for baby to have after she pureed them. I tend only to grow food that we like and in quantities that we will use. 

Si_Clist

MingVase said:

... Longest power cut we've had was almost 6 days but that was a while ago - as you say, they have improved things a lot and we don't get many at all now.

Indeed, but when you look at the tiny amount of spare capacity that the UK has over peak demand at times in winter, you can't help but think it's not going to be long before we start getting brown-outs, if not actual power cuts.  Having said that, though, ever since being off the electric for a fortnight after the '87 hurricane, we've tried to get things so we can cope with pretty much any eventuality.

BTW, was talking the other day to a neighbour who had in tow a wench from the nearby ghetto select development of exclusive designer homes who was casually letting it be known that she'd just spent £27K on a new kitchen with a gas hob rather than electric.  Apparently the idea was that with that and her gas central heating, she's OK if the electric goes in the winter.

"Ah" says I.  "And does your new gas hob have a flame failure safety feature, so that if the flame goes out, it turns the gas off to save you blowing yourself up?"

"Oh yes" says she. "We're very safety conscious in my house."

Poor woman seemed a bit disconcerted to learn that both her gas central heating and her new gas hob pack up if there's no electric ...