Prepping for Brexit thread

unrecordings

Jazee wrote: »

You can get packs of 30 of this online cheaply from chemist 4 you. Long dates too.

two quid from boots, so an easy little insurance policy

Living_proof

Smooth peanut butter is available in tubs for £4.99 and this is quite palatable straight onto bread, etc. It would last me for months as a single person, but probably just a couple of weeks for a family.

unrecordings

If you can get milk, then you can make butter. If you can't get milk then I suspect martial law will follow shortly after - but it's not going to come to that (unless you live near a port)

[Deleted User]

We're all imagining different things that could happen and the joining together of our apprehensions is possibly making the problems we may have 'bigger' than they will be in reality. I prep to make sure we'll have a safe place to stay where we can (if we can stay at home) have enough to eat, be warm and dry and keep ourselves occupied until whatever the problem is becomes milder or goes away. The hype over Brexit is being magnified by those with vested interests on both sides of the debate and the fearfulness in the populace is growing day by day. If there are temporary shortages I hope I've been able to anticipate what they are of the bits we use/need and have them in beforehand and if we have power cuts I've already got lighting and keeping us warm and cooking sorted out now. I've already got waterproof shoes and coats and warm winter clothes, I've got books and board games and hobbies to keep us occupied if there's no media/tv/radio being broadcast. HWK has tools and the necessary bits for repair of most of what we have, I have sewing and repair items for our clothing and interior of the house. I think most of us who have made plans and been pro active in looking at possible futures need not be as out of countenance as we seem to be. I hope things will eventually be sorted out, the timescale may be far longer than I can imagine for that to happen but one day we'll walk out of this long tunnel of misery and apprehension and there will be a new and contented settled life to make, we'll make it so!

It's choice to be organised and prepared and we who post on this thread have made that choice and hopefully will be in a better position than those who haven't BUT it's choice as to whether you act in your own interests or just run round shouting 'it's not fair' too isn't it and if people haven't thought to be prepared it's their choice not to as well.

euronorris

A bit of Mayo spread on bread, if you like Mayo. Or salad cream, if you prefer. Alternatively, if it's a bacon sandwich, ketchup spread like butter works well in sandwiches.


If it's for toast, I'd just use honey or jam as a topping instead, and forgo the butter/marg.

Primrose

If there's one lesson to be learned from this exercise it is perhaps the reality of what proportion of food self sufficiency we now have in this country.

A nation that has the capacity to feed itself has a valuable resource. Perhaps a lesson to be borne in mind for the future when hundreds of dairy farmers have sadly gone out of business in the past couple of years because supermarkets have been squeezing the price of milk and sometimes selling it for almost less than it costs to produce. Ensuring manufacturers can make a profit on their products may mean slightly higher prices for consumers but at least ensures a product is available.

I sometimes think we poorly understand the economics of supply and demand but that,s another issue.

Meanwhile, has any anybody ever succeeded with a recipe for savoury porridge? Our experiment a while back for a curried version was an absolute disaster! I suspect oats need to be used as a "bulking" product with another ingredient rather than on their own.

maryb

Marge lasts for ages and if it gets near its useby date I would just use it in cakes.

But butter freezes very well and I like to stock up on butter at this time of year anyway to put in the freezer because the cows will have been in the fields eating grass rather than Lord knows what. That's if you buy Red Tractor butter which mandates a certain amount of grazing - Lidl's butter is Red Tractor, for example. After that I buy Kerrygold because the cows are out in the fields for longer in Ireland

ben501

Primrose wrote: »

I know dried milk powder is available as a fresh milk substitute but wonder what can usefully substitute for butter in /sandwich making/toast making activities. Dry toast/bread is not very appealing !

I rarely use butter these days. Far too expensive (I prefer Kerrygold). For baking bread, cakes, anything that asks for butter, I use Clover. Always bought when it's 'on offer:rotfl:'.
Okay for spreading on bread/toast too. It freezes well so you can have a few spares.

[Deleted User]

Primrose look up Scandinavian rice porridge or Tanzanian Ugali porridge which is made from fine cornmeal which can be found fairly easily here in the UK. The rice porridge is lovely with a knob of butter and you can have it as a sweet dish too with either butter and fruit compote (traditionally cherry) it's Christmas breakfast now but was a staple dish for our forebears or it's also nice with a nut of butter and cinnamon sugar. Ugali is usually served with African beans as the carb part of a meal but can be made looser to a porridge consistency and served with veg and savoury spices. It's also good with milk and sugar as our oat porridge would be.

Primrose

An interesting thought, Maryb, on the makeup of butter. I'd had never given much thought to the different diets milk producing cows might eat between summer and winter feeding. I suppose being a more rural environment over there in Ireland many of you are closer to your food sources than we are in our towns and cities in the UK.

I,m wondering what the time factor is between the milk being produced, turned into butter and then sold in supermarkets and whether a long period in cold storage in between might be the case so that perhaps your winter consumed butter was still produced from milk produced from summer eaten grass. And could a butter eating expert with fine taste buds taste the difference? Another example perhaps of how divorced we're becoming from our food sources!