Straw Poll. How much food do you have in reserve? How well do you stock rotate?

[grenfell]

To be honest I can’t really say for sure , probably around three months although it does depend on the time of year and what is in the garden .
How well do we rotate ? Reasonably well but of course there’s always the odd hiccup . We pulled a tin of rice pudding out of the back of the cupboard recently, just pass it’s bb date well slightly over 12 years but we opened it , tried it and it’s all gone now. Our daughter asked us if we had our wills in order..

[jennyjj01]

To be honest I can’t really say for sure , probably around three months although it does depend on the time of year and what is in the garden .
How well do we rotate ? Reasonably well but of course there’s always the odd hiccup . We pulled a tin of rice pudding out of the back of the cupboard recently, just pass it’s bb date well slightly over 12 years but we opened it , tried it and it’s all gone now. Our daughter asked us if we had our wills in order..

12 Years is impressive. My oldest is about 7 years past. I've had rice pudding and carnation milk go brown in the tin.

[mcprepper]

Really hard to say how long we could last … would depend on whether our (young) adult children were home or not. I used to rely on the freezer much more but lost everything 2 years ago in Storm Arwen when we had no electricity for a week. We tried to get through the contents of the fridge then freezer but didn’t get anywhere near and had to chuck loads out Since then I’ve turned more to storing tins / jars and dried goods but find this tricky as we eat more fresh produce and don’t use tins as much. I don’t feel I have the balance right yet. I also got in a right pickle a couple of months ago when I bought lots of Mylar bags and food grade buckets for rice/pasta/oats etc but then decided it would be a waste to store them like that as I couldn’t then rotate them (we eat a lot of rice and pasta)? What do others do in terms of long term storage/rotation of dried goods?

[GillyBee]

I used to rely on the freezer much more but lost everything 2 years ago in Storm Arwen when we had no electricity for a week. We tried to get through the contents of the fridge then freezer but didn’t get anywhere near and had to chuck loads out

"
Have you considered learning to cure meat using salt to make "bacon" "Lamcon" etc? It might help save the meat supply in the event of another power outage.

[grenfell]

12 Years is impressive. My oldest is about 7 years past. I've had rice pudding and carnation milk go brown in the tin.

We tried it cautiously , it smelt and looked fine and then a taste of a little . When we decided it was fine we ate it . I tend to avoid damaged tins of course . Funny you should mention milk going brown , we have several tins of caramelised condensed milk and it’s naturally a pale brown and I’ve wondered how I would know …

[Frnc]

Am trying to use up my dried egg. I forgot and bought eggs a couple of times.

It does seem to make good pancakes. We used ours up pretty fast once I turned it into an "instant pancake mix" by blending it with flour and dried milk and leaving it in a tub in the kitchen for the sons to raid.

Hmm. I have a big tub of Nido to use by next May, I could start that early. I fancy some pancakes! The last egg I made was a bit leathery, think I overcooked it. Will report back on the pancakes.

[mcprepper]

Have you considered learning to cure meat using salt to make "bacon" "Lamcon" etc? It might help save the meat supply in the event of another power outage.

No I haven’t to be honest and it’s not something I’ve ever considered or read much about but it’s a great suggestion and I’ll do some research - thank you.

[GillyBee]

The "old fashioned" way of doing this was to submerge meat in a "salt box" and keep draining the liquid and adding more salt. Other versions involve making a brine and submerging the meat. All work best in cooler conditions - but were household standard tools in the days before fridges.
The most modern version is to add a very controlled amount of salt and add some nitrite (curing salt). The River Cottage smoking and curing book I use says the curing salt is not essential but commercial H&S types like it.
I can make a basic bacon from belly pork as follows.
For each 1kg of pork I add 50g salt and 50g brown sugar. Dump the whole lot in a zip seal bag and massage the salt and sugar into the meat. Leave it to sit somewhere cool. (I do use my fridge for this but would also consider using semi defrosted meat in a cool place) Turn every 12 hours to ensure the salty juices contact all of the meat. After 5 days remove from the bag and dump the brine. Pat dry with paper towel. Store cool and keep turning it so that it can dry out slowly - or hang it up Can be used as soon as the 5 days are up. RIver Cottage say this can also be smoked using cold smoking techniques.

[GillyBee]

The "old fashioned" way of doing this was to submerge meat in a "salt box" and keep draining the liquid and adding more salt. Other versions involve making a brine and submerging the meat. All work best in cooler conditions - but were household standard tools in the days before fridges.
The most modern version is to add a very controlled amount of salt and add some nitrite (curing salt). The River Cottage smoking and curing book I use says the curing salt is not essential but commercial H&S types like it.
The book is this one "Curing & Smoking: River Cottage Handbook No.13"
I make a basic bacon as follows.
For each 1kg of belly pork I add 50g salt and 50g brown sugar. Dump the whole lot in a zip seal bag and massage the salt and sugar into the meat. Leave it to sit somewhere cool. (I do use my fridge for this but would also consider using a cool place in a pinch, especially if the meat is still semi-frozen.) Turn every 12 hours to ensure the salty juices contact all of the meat. After 5 days remove from the bag and dump the brine. Pat dry with paper towel. Store cool and keep turning it so that it can dry out slowly - or hang it up Can be used as soon as the 5 days are up. RIver Cottage say this can also be smoked using cold smoking techniques.
I have also seen & tasted some incredible jerky done by rubbing salt & garlic in a little vinegar onto strips of venison that were draped over a line hung over an open fire (washing line style) for 24 hours. The fire was in an open sided roofed pavilion with the line as high as it could go to protect from rain.

[GillyBee]

And after that huge post last night I have just found this website which covers everything in detail. I am now off to download the contents to local storage.
https://eatcuredmeat.com/