THE Prepping thread - a new beginning :)

Si_Clist

DigForVictory wrote: »

... I know, people get all dewy eyed about Puddleduck & Tiggywinkle. Shame on the education they have not had that explains in gruesome detail that tiggy likes catfood & bread & milk are in fact no use to the lactose intolerant animal...

I've just had to give up trying to find a good video about soldiering that I came across recently and was intent upon linking to. At one point, the squaddies are being taught various aspects of survival in the wild, and there's a wonderful sequence of the instructor demonstrating how to dispatch a cuddly white bunny with a swift karate chop, followed by how to make a chicken dead. Having pulled its head off, he does the finger-puppet routine complete with spiel about how if you kill two chickens, you can then entertain the troops with a Punch and Judy show.

Took me right back to a very cold night on a survival exercise up a mountain in the Brecons fifty years ago - although we were taught to be sure we never pulled the head off on account of the mess :cool:

[Deleted User]

Peoples pickiness and fadiness are only a product of affluent times when there is plenty and an excess of plenty at that. I should be very surprised if in times of hunger anyone had qualms about rabbits or anything else being raised to be eaten, more likely they would move heaven and earth to obtain a piece of the product to feed their family. I wonder if folks were fussy in wartime on rationing?

NewShadow

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

I wonder if folks were fussy in wartime on rationing?

There were known vegetarians during rationing and the vegan society traces their origins to 1944 - so it's fair to guess their would be vegans living on rations during the wars.

https://www.vegsoc.org/page.aspx?pid=875#

It probably was't easy but I find myself reluctant to criticise those who do no harm to others while abiding by their own principles.

monnagran

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

Peoples pickiness and fadiness are only a product of affluent times when there is plenty and an excess of plenty at that. I should be very surprised if in times of hunger anyone had qualms about rabbits or anything else being raised to be eaten, more likely they would move heaven and earth to obtain a piece of the product to feed their family. I wonder if folks were fussy in wartime on rationing?

No, they were not. Goodness knows what some of the meat was that butchers had to foist on to the public. However, my father was brought up on pigs trotters, brains, and all sorts of unmentionable bits of animals so no criticism was allowed in our house.
This could explain why I eat so little meat now. Any veg, but meat and fish are still regarded suspiciously.
Chicken is fine as we kept our own and chicken was the biggest treat in the world, only enjoyed at Christmas.
Father was considering keeping rabbits that were destined for the table but was sent off to fight for king and country before he could get that little project up and running. My poor young Mum was relieved. She coped magnificently with the chickens and grew every sort of veg and fruit that nature had devised.
The autumn was a whirl of pickling, bottling and isinglassing eggs. I never knew what it was to buy a vegetable or piece of fruit.

I wouldn't say that I was an enthusiastic prepper. Having lived through the most austere and frightening of times I have reached a stage in my life where if TEOTW threatened I would probably pull a bag over my head, lie down and wait for blissful oblivion.


On the other hand ........there are my precious grandchildren to be considered.

x

[Deleted User]

I don't have any problems with folks opting to be vegetarian or vegan, it's a free world when it comes to that kind of choice and it's anyones right in life to opt not to eat meat or whatever it is they feel is ethically wrong. What I wonder is why people feel they have the right to alter the free choices of other people who think differently. The freedom of choice cuts in both directions but I don't often hear of meat eaters criticising and feeling they have the right to tell vegetarians what they can or can't grow on their allotment. We've had allotments for the last 40 years and had many different interpretations of their uses on neighbouring plots including 3 hives of bees but in all that time no one has ever told us we were wrong to do with our plot what we opted to do!

DigForVictory

So a fiver is a fiver regardless of its minimal tallow content or that said minimal tallow content distresses vegans & certain religions?
When it comes to what you choose to eat & drink, I'm All For freedom of choice, but I'd rather our *currency* was ethically acceptable to all people, or at least 99%. I gather the £20 note is being reconsidered but the tenner will be rolled out (sorry) anyway.

[Deleted User]

D for V do you have a money tree??? can I have a cutting please??? xxx.

I don't know WHY they have to use tallow in the new £5 notes, it seems a very odd ingredient that would be more use for candles and rush lights and it's sad that the fact there is tallow in them is distasteful to some parts of society. Knowing this why on earth would they mint £10 notes with an unchanged content???

In a horrified quick internet search I also find that animal products are used in the making of plastic bags, fabric softener, shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, sugar, beer, wine, gummy sweets, perfume, crayons and condoms and that is only with a very quick look, things I'd never have guessed, would anyone else?

NewShadow

Innovia, the Cumbria-based company that makes the new £5 note, says it buys material containing animal fat from a supplier, which it did not name. It also did not specify what animals the tallow is derived from.

The firm said tallow is used as an additive to give the £5 notes their “unique” anti-static and anti-slip properties and it points out that the amount of tallow in each note is “minute”, substantially less than 1 per cent.

A spokesperson for the company told CNN, Innovia are looking to eliminate the use of tallow, "but obviously that will take time. It's a very difficult process".

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/new-5-notes-why-do-they-have-animal-fat-in-them-a7448106.html

The Maths!

Tallow is rendered cow or mutton fat, but for the sake of argument let's go with cows here.

How much do cows weigh? Between 1,100kg for a male (bull) and 720kg for a female. So, on average, a cow weighs 910kg.

The body fat content of an average cow is 25 percent. Therefore, the amount of fat in an average cow's body is 227.5kg.

How many kilograms of this fat is contained in offcuts you could use to make tallow? About 40kg, according to a man at the James Elliott butcher in Islington.

How much tallow is used in one note, according to the Bank of England? "A trace", which chemically means less than 100 parts per million, or 0.01 percent. A polymer consultant I called confirmed that the tallow present in a given polymer would be a fraction of a single percentage.

New £5 notes weigh 0.7g, therefore there is roughly 0.00007 g of tallow present in one £5 note.

How many fivers are in circulation now, and therefore will be around by May of 2017, when all the old paper ones have been phased out? 329 million notes.

To work out how much tallow will be used in total in all of these fivers, we need to multiply 0.00007g by 329 million, which gives us 23,030g, or 23kg.

And if you get about 40kg of tallow-worthy fat from the average cow, how many cows would you need to make every single £5 note in circulation?

JUST OVER HALF OF ONE COW

https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/a-very-precise-calculation-of-exactly-how-many-cows-are-being-murdered-for-the-new-fivers

moneyistooshorttomention

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

Peoples pickiness and fadiness are only a product of affluent times when there is plenty and an excess of plenty at that. I should be very surprised if in times of hunger anyone had qualms about rabbits or anything else being raised to be eaten, more likely they would move heaven and earth to obtain a piece of the product to feed their family. I wonder if folks were fussy in wartime on rationing?

Actually a much lower proportion of the population were vegetarian (for instance) back in the time of WW2 and I don't think people expected to be as "individualistic" as we do these days - but rations were adjusted accordingly (ie to give extra vegetarian food instead of the meat/fish).

https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/13/a4362013.shtml

[Deleted User]

There's a difference between making a lifestyle choice and opting to be vegetarian, which is perfectly fine and no one can quibble over that for any reason I can think of, and deciding that someone elses choice to breed livestock of any kind for meat is wrong and pressuring them into stopping not because 'they' are troubled by it but because you don't think they should is against everything I hold dear by way of freedom of thought within the law of the land. When I say you, I don't mean you! but the third party in this case.

I wondered if folks in wartime accepted that they got what they got and just got on with it as best they could or if there was resentment over choice and control being taken away from individuals. I think from everything I've read that the whole population were behind the war effort and eager to do their bit towards winning the war but I just wondered if there was dissention of any kind in the ranks because of imposed rationing. I can't see the population now being very accepting of imposed rationing should that ever be necessary, we're used to multi choices in all aspects of our lives aren't we?

I know vegetarians could swap the meat in their ration for extra cheese but it must have been very hard to get enough variety in those days.