The Prepping Thread - A Newer Beginning ;)

villagelife

I have a community fridge in my village which is where once a week you can go and fill a bag for life sized bag for £5. It is to stop food going to landfill. There can be a random selection but always have tins (often soup and pulses and tinned veg), rice or pasta, bread ( some on sell by date) a large se!ection of fruit and veg ( some from people's gardens) and a random selection of yoghurt/salad dressing/eggs/cheese and then meat or fish or pizza. Most areas you are limited to one of two items, apart from fruit and veg, to ensure there is enough for all. It is a cheap way of buying food and gives more variety to always picking up the same food. The local councillor organised it all with a few helpers. 

elaine241

VJsmum said:

Also thanks for the dried veg idea.  I have a bit of a horror of mixed veg (from being forced to eat that horrid tinned stuff at primary school - i'm now 56 ) but i'm sure i can cope with adding some dried to make soups.

I am glad I am not the only one!! Aged 55 and I can not eat that stuff to this day!! I can not even face the frozen variety!
I for one have space to run three freezers and therefore I stock up on bargains when I see them. Picked up 5 packs of good quality sausages from Lidl marked down to 70p. During the summer they had a special offer of a side of fresh salmon, I spotted the last one with a 30% sticker on so in the freezer it went! 
My potatoes are mainly in the ground although if we get a really hard frost  it maybe trouble. I have nowhere safe to store them as we have furry friends running round the farm despite regular poison. I am thinking of covering one patch with old hay off the barn floor then putting a sheet over that, it may keep the frost off. Hopefully I will sort something out for the very cold months. I have an old chest of drawers may put some in them as it has to be wooden not plastic. 

MingVase

That community fridge sounds a great idea. I use tinned carrots and potatoes to make soup. Nuke them in a blender.

littlemoney

Following the announcement of the tiers after lockdown I will not be having any visitors in my house till in sometime in March/April at the earliest. Everyone I know has family so they will be having their permitted 3 households bubbles over christmas but I was hoping to visit or receive a visit  prior to christmas but being in Tier 2 means no indoors visitors. The restrictions after christmas will be even tougher as the infection rate rises. Either total lockdown or all in Tier 3. I can't see meeting another person indoors  till late spring when we may be in Tier 1

On the plus side this does mean no christmas prepping,  I have no need to buy any special food for a visitor or to take to other people.  On the negative side, months of seeing no one as it's .too cold to sit outside especially as you get older. I seem to have lost the antifreeze I had in my veins when I was younger. All so people can go mad at christmas. A very high price but the government had to do it as people would have socialised anyway.

Living_proof

VJsmum said:

I'm not confident about storing potatoes long term.  I am however, quite concerned about shortage of fresh food, from January - particularly if there is no deal. 

Not sure what to buy to get maximum bang for my storage space - thinking about tins of fruit, soups, beans, corn.  I am not fussed on tinned veg other than corn and maybe mushy peas.  I think i will clear a little more space to gradually buy some of these tins over the next few weeks.  Not panic buy, exactly, just add a few extra here and there.. 

what are others storing? 

I bought a 10kg bag of best Basmati rice over a year ago. I store it in the garage in a metal bin marked 'bread' and a year later there is still almost half left and it is as good as ever. Basmati is given to very young people in India as a dowry and it could be many years before they wed, so I think if stored properly would be a very good long-term store. Next time I will just buy 5kg and for health reasons it may well be brown.

Living_proof

DryTheRain said:

 as are wholefood stores if you have one nearby. For years I thought the local one was a bakery, as its name suggested that, but it’s an absolute treasure trove, selling a huge variety of dried fruits & veg, herbs, spices, pulses (including fast cooking soup mixes), cheaply and in lots of different sizes. 

It sounds like Daily Bread, DTR which started off in an old bakery in Northampton more years than I wish to admit ago! Fantastic range and when I revisited the area a couple of years ago I stocked up again with a lot of wholefoods. Maybe you have something like that where you are based?

euronorris

Littlemore, we are straight into tier 3 here and we *might* see my MIL on Xmas eve, but it depends. She is definitely going to her step daughters on Xmas day, but I don't know who else they might have bubbled up with. It's not straightforward at all, and relies on people in your bubble being honest (which many are not inclined to do). My parents have decided to stay home this Xmas, rather than risk it. Plus they don't want to put the guilt on anyone if they did catch it. So if the numbers don't come down here, we might not see anyone even for an outdoors walk. DD still goes to school, but that's it. 

I understand why, but am struggling with it today 😢

DryTheRain

Well spotted Living_proof, my carer drove me over there one day and it’s a regular pilgrimage now. Gather they’ve been consistently very busy ever since the first brexit deadlines (2018?) which suggests quite a lot of quiet prepping going on. Always worth double checking what’s in your area 

thriftwizard

I'm sad for you, littlemoney, that's very hard. Is there anyone you can meet up with for walks, at least, if you can't form a bubble with anyone? Or maybe a socially-distanced cuppa outdoors, well wrapped-up? When not actually locked-down or raining, my two friends & I meet on the little parking space outside my neighbour's house on a Friday morning for a cuppa & a catch-up; she brings her garden chairs & table out, complete with flowers, and we sit there on the street, a good 6' apart, for an hour & put the world to rights. All 3 of us have less-than-normal lives, for a variety of reasons, and it does us the world of good. Various neighbours walk or jog past, with or without dogs, & always say hello too. I'm sure they all think we're daft, but it does get us out of doors & communicating with people outside our own immediate families. (Which I know we're all very lucky to have...) Anyway, now we're talking to neighbours we didn't even know before. But forming a bubble with someone would be your best bet.

DryTheRain

Very thoughtful suggestions TW - and littlemoney, it sounds like you’d be able to have a visitor under ‘exemptions from gatherings limits in all tiers’.  You’ve described yourself as older, and facing significant isolation due to the regulations, with mental and general health likely to suffer as a result. This 100% falls into the ‘providing care or assistance to someone vulnerable’ category.

Here’s the link for you, it’s second from last in the final section, really hope this helps xx
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/local-restriction-tiers-what-you-need-to-know#exemptions