counsellor wrote:well i heard that cat food is better because they are a little more picky about what they eat, so it is made to a better standard. also I understand that all pet in the UK is ok for humans to eat
although i've never tried and hope not to
Our old vet used to make me laugh as he said he had tasted every bit of dog food on the market. His point was that if he needed to recommend a product he could vouch for its taste
I checked with one of the other vets as I thought he was joking but they assured me it was true and that they had seen him do it. Having smelled some of the stuff our dogs eat he is a braver man than me
The OP is a good post and working out recipies and then storing the ingredients is an excellent idea. I suppose foraging and growing veg is also a good way to add some variety. The problem is that Rice and other grains are easy to store long term in buckets and dont take up too much space. Tins are handy and can last decades they take up a hell of a lot of space and are heavy.
I tend to follow the deals in Lidl/Aldi with my stores, so I pick up a large variety of tinned foods. I don't even like Tomato's! But I have 24 can of them in my stores. Because one day....I'll be sick of everything else and they'll look oh so inviting...
Hi everyone - just joined today but been looking at forums for a while now.
Yes I agree it really important to store a wide variety of foods - I currently store in this format:
Tins foods - Lidl has some great prices on tin veg that have expire in 3 years
Long Life foods - They last about 25 years but are expensive and beware VERY SALTLY as salt is
- natural preservative
Dehydrated fruit and veg - buy fresh fruit and veg in summer when it is cheaper and dehydrate. If you can grow your own you get amazing value for money. I grew 2 tomato trees last summer and got 100 tomatoes off EACH tree (i didnt use the whole pack of seeds!)
Meal Replacement Shake: Like slim fast / cambridge diet or any meal replacement shake - they have vitamins included and fulling (though not very high calorie) but give you a great chocolate fix
Fruit bars (but they usually only last 2 years so keep an eye on them)
Invest in a good dehydrator - I know the excalibur deydrators are expensive but they do the job properly of dehydrating foods which can be stored in mylar bags - used with oxygen absorbers will easily last 8 - 10 years and is very light weight. 10lbs of sweetcorn dehydrated comes to less than a lb in weight
Berries can be difficult to dehydrate so buy pre-done dehydrated berries from health food store and pop in the dehydrator for a couple hours it will be properly dried out and can be stored in the mylar bags. Dehydrated fruit and veg are easy to use when baking cooking
ALWAYS have a couple of buckets with lids with a variety of dry foods stored so if TSHTF you can grab one and you will have coffee, sugar, tea, milk, pasta, rice, veg, fruit all in one bucket. If you keep a bug out bag (BOB) in your car always have a keep a couple mylar bags of food in it - this is good for winter travel and in case of emergencies
Hi I am wondering about a dehydrator but it might be possible to do some in the oven, no ? I won't be able to grow enough of anything to justify buying one. I buy veg when I see it on offer or reduced but not in huge amounts, so would like to try it in the oven. I always wanted to store dehydrated mixed veg for soup but it costs a fortune.
diamond lil wrote:Hi I am wondering about a dehydrator but it might be possible to do some in the oven, no ? I won't be able to grow enough of anything to justify buying one. I buy veg when I see it on offer or reduced but not in huge amounts, so would like to try it in the oven. I always wanted to store dehydrated mixed veg for soup but it costs a fortune.
Suppose you'd have to weigh up how much it will cost you each time you have to have your oven on for hours when you want to dehydrate something against one outlay for the dehydrator.
You can actually make solar dehydrators - but I guess you'd need sun for that to work!
diamond lil wrote:Hi I am wondering about a dehydrator but it might be possible to do some in the oven, no ? I won't be able to grow enough of anything to justify buying one. I buy veg when I see it on offer or reduced but not in huge amounts, so would like to try it in the oven. I always wanted to store dehydrated mixed veg for soup but it costs a fortune.
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You can do things like corn /eggs and stuff in the oven (I will look for the youtube link and post it here - there was a woman dehydrating eggs in the oven she had to leave it overnight though)- but the oven needs to be between 60 - 70 degrees I believe, Ideally a fan assisted electric oven which circulates the air like the Excalibur dehydrator. The trick is not to cook the corn or veg or fruit but dehydrate it and that takes a few hours.
As itsbitsy says : its about weighing up the cost of running the oven against the outlay of the dehydrator. The dehydrator has 4- 9 shelves depending on the model so you can dehydrate potential 4-9 different types of fruit and veg in one go as against the oven, most people don't have that many trays.
In summer you can dehydrate fruit in the sun placed on metal/aluminum tray (cover against flies/bugs with a net) - my grandmother used to do that - I presume its the same way for veg but not sure, never saw her do any veg
I am wondering about a dehydrator but it might be possible to do some in the oven, no ? I won't be able to grow enough of anything to justify buying one. I buy veg when I see it on offer or reduced but not in huge amounts, so would like to try it in the oven. I always wanted to store dehydrated mixed veg for soup but it costs a fortune.
