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Chapter 4 - #3 Need – Food
Instant Storage Stockpile
Our next need is food. The average American consumes anywhere from 2,500 calories to 3,790
calories per day, depending upon whose statistics you choose to believe. Compared to that, the US
government recommends that the average man eat 2,700 calories and the average woman eats
2,200 calories per day. Activity levels, body mass and diet affect this, so keep in mind that these are
merely averages.
If we eat less calories than we need, our body has to look elsewhere for the energy we need. So, it
will turn inwards, using the stored energy we have in fat cells. If there is no energy stored in the
body, it will start consuming itself, breaking down proteins into the simple sugars we need to burn
for energy. At that point, starvation has set in.
The average American has a long way to go before reaching the point of starvation. Once again,
depending upon whose statistics you believe, the average American can live anywhere from 30 to
100 days without food, without harm, due to the energy we have stored in our bodies.
Regardless of how much fat any of us are carrying, eventually we'll all reach a point where we run
out of energy for our bodies to consume. We'll run out of essential nutrients long before that,
developing health problems and possibly even attacking muscle in order to get the protein that we
need. Before that happens, we'll find ourselves without energy, struggling to do normal activities
and losing our ability to think clearly.
So, after an absolute maximum of 30 days, we need to have food to survive. In a typical survival
situation, it may actually be much less than that, as we'll be working harder and burning much more
energy than normal. So, any survival plan must include a goodly stockpile of food for ourselves and
our families to eat.
Building Your Food Stockpile
If you talk to the average person on the street, asking them about prepping, most people who aren't
preppers will talk about stockpiling food. When people start prepping, that's usually the first thing
they think about doing. There's nothing wrong with that idea, as you're going to need a lot of food to
survive for any length of time. For most preppers, the act of stockpiling food is something that never
really ends; they just keep adding more and more.
The big question here is "How much food do you need?" Unfortunately, that's a question without an
answer. Since none of us know what sort of emergency we're going to face, we don't know how long
we're going to have to survive off of that stockpile.
When hurricanes Katrina and Sandy struck it was days before the government was able to offer
people any help. It took well over a month to get electrical service back to everyone and it took a
couple of months to get the supply lines fully functional once again. Those were just regional
disasters, what would happen if we were struck by a major disaster that hit the whole country? How
long would it take for supply lines to be back in place again?
One of the worst possible scenarios we can face is an EMP. Experts say that if an EMP attack were
made on the United States, it would take two or more years to restore electrical service to the
country. Considering that 90 percent of the people would die in the first year, that sounds like it
might never get restored. In such a case, how much food is enough?
This is why preppers never really finish their food stockpile. No matter how much you have, a little
more might be a good idea. But many stop after a year, working under the assumption that they will
have some other means of harvesting food within that year.
I would suggest starting out by creating a one month supply and then adding a month at a time until
you reach a year's worth of food stocks. Once you get there, you can review the situation, as well as
the other things you are doing to ensure your family can continue eating, and decide whether you
need to keep adding to your stockpile or not.
So, how do you do that?
To start with, you need to figure out how much food your family needs to eat in a crisis situation.
There are several ways of doing this, but the easiest is to create a two or three week detailed menu
for everything your family would eat in a survival situation.
Here we run into our first problem. We have to assume that in a survival situation, we won't have
electrical power. So, the survival menu that we create must be based upon foods that we can store
for a long period of time, without electricity. In other words, no fresh fruit, no fresh vegetables and
no frozen meat. For that matter, we'd better not count on any of the frozen prepared foods we are
used to eating.
For that matter, there's a lot of food that your family may be accustomed to eating, which you won't
be able to store for a survival situation. Much of the prepared food, junk food, snack food and
breakfast food we are used to eating all the time won't store for a prolonged period of time, no
matter what you do. You're going to have to go back to the basics and work from there.
I'll give you a list of foods that you can buy to store for a survival situation in a moment, but let's get
back to the menu. You're not only going to have to come up with the menu itself, but the recipes
you need for the foods you are going to store. Since you won't be able to buy or store much of what
you're family is used to eating, you're going to have to find other things to eat, which will not only
provide the necessary nutrition, but be something your family will be willing to eat with minimal
complaints.
Based upon your menu and those recipes, the next step is to create a list of everything you'll need to
have, in order to make that two or three weeks worth of food. You'll have to bake your own bread,
so you'll need to include the ingredients for that. In fact, you'll basically have to make everything
yourself, so you have to break everything down to the most basic ingredients. Don't miss any of
them.
Simply multiplying that list by the number of weeks you're trying to build a stockpile for will give you
a pretty good idea of how much of everything you need, in order to have enough food to feed your
family through a crisis.
So, since we have to avoid fresh and frozen foods, as well as our favorite prepared foods and junk
food, what types of foods should we plan on buying?
Proteins:
Canned meat - There are a number of types of canned meat available, including canned
tuna, SPAM, canned chicken, canned beef and salmon. While not as good as fresh, you can
make great soups, casseroles and stir-fry out of canned meat.
Textured vegetable protein (TVP) - Granted, it's not as good as meat, but it's better than
nothing. I wouldn't recommend eating it as it is, but once again, it works out great in soups,
casseroles and stir-fry.
Dried meat (jerky) - Meat dries well as jerky, which will keep for a long time, if properly
made and packaged. It can be rehydrated for cooking with.
Summer sausage - Cured meats, which is what lunchmeat was originally called, are
preserved for long-term storage. You have to be careful about this, as not all will store for a
prolonged period of time.
Nuts - A great source of protein and useful for baking or just eating.
Peanut butter - Not only a great source of protein, but a great comfort food as well,
especially for kids.
Beans - For much of the world, beans are a prime source of protein. While we Americans
aren't used to using it for protein, it can make a great addition to a survival diet.
Cheese - Another great source of protein, although a bit hard to store. To store cheese,
triple dip it in paraffin, allowing it to cool each time. One nice thing about cheese is that
when it turns moldy, it's only on the surface, you can cut the surface off and the cheese
inside is perfectly good to eat.
Carbohydrates:
Grains - You'll need flour for baking. Ground white flour doesn't store well, but if you buy
unground whole grains, it stores much better. You'll need to have a mill as well, so that you
can grind the grains to flour in order to use it.
Pasta - Pastas can be used in a large variety of ways and store well for a prolonged period of
time. I'd recommend storing a variety of different forms, for use in soups, casseroles and
Italian dishes.
Rice - A common source of carbohydrates around the world. Brown rice stores better than
white rice, but both are usable.
Granola - Granola stores well and is an excellent breakfast food. It can also be used for
making your own trail mix by adding dried fruit and nuts.
Breakfast cereal - Breakfast cereal really doesn't store all that good and is bulky. However,
the simpler cereals will store. Remember though, the only milk you're going to have to eat it
with is powdered milk.
Fruit and Vegetables:
Canned vegetables - For the long term, you're going to want to get a vegetable garden
growing; but in the short term, canned vegetables are your best possible selection. The nice
thing about canned foods is that you can basically ignore the expiration date.
Canned fruit - A great source of carbohydrates, as well as vitamins.
Dried fruit - Good for baking and snacking, dried fruit keeps well if it is properly packaged.
Spaghetti sauce - I'd recommend stocking up on a lot of spaghetti sauce, especially if your
family likes Italian food. It covers most other flavors, so can be used to get your family to eat
squash and other things they may not be used to eating.
Cooking Essentials:
Bullion - I'd recommend stocking quite a bit of beef and chicken bouillon, as it can be used to
make soup stock. This will allow you to use a wide variety of foods to make soups. You can
buy bouillon in bulk or restaurant packaging, saving considerably on the cost.
Mushroom soup - If your family likes casseroles with mushroom soup on them, then I'd stock
up on this as well. Like the spaghetti sauce, it's great for hiding unusual flavors.
Dry milk - Nobody likes dried milk, but you'll need to use it for baking.
Powdered eggs -Like the dry milk, not a favorite, but necessary for baking.
Salt - Salt is the most basic spice, as well as a necessary ingredient for preserving foods. If
you buy it in bulk, it's much cheaper.
Spices - The right spices allow you to make one thing taste like another, at least to some
extent. This might just be the saving grace to get your family to eat things they are not used
to eating. Even basics like rice and beans can be made to taste better if spiced well.
Sugar and Honey - Both sugar and honey keep virtually forever. Sugar often becomes the
first food staple that people start looking for. Like salt, sugar is used in preserving foods,
although just for fruit.
Cooking oil & vegetable shortening - Necessary for baking and cooking. Fats can be hard to
come up with in a survival situation, so stock plenty.
Baking essentials - Baking powder, baking soda and yeast will be needed for baking breads
and other goods. Remember, you'll be baking much more than you're used to, so you'll use
much more than what you normally would.
Final Ingredients:
Coffee - This might be your most important survival food, especially if you have family
members that are not human until they've had their second cup. It could help prevent many
an argument.
Hard candies - Useful for extra energy, a pick me up and a reward for kids. Most candies
won't keep well over a long period of time, but hard candies will, if moisture is kept away
from them.
That list may seem rather extensive, but it leaves a lot of things out that we're used to eating. If
there's something your family wants, that I've left off the list, see if you can manage to package it in
some way that allows you to store it for a prolonged period of time. The problem is, those things
probably won't keep for an extended period of time, no matter what we do to try and preserve
them.
One way around this problem is to rotate food stocks. If there's something your family may want to
eat, which won't stay good for 20 years, no matter how you package it, but will last a year, then buy
a year's worth. Then, every time you go grocery shopping, buy some of that item, put it in the back
of your stock and grab an equal amount off the front. That way, you get to use it as part of your
survival stock, because your stock of it never goes bad.
Packaging Food for Long-Term Storage
Pretty much all the food you buy in the supermarket is only packaged for short-term storage. The
manufacturers assume that you are going to use their products within a few months, and package
them accordingly. Unfortunately, that means that those same food products won't last long enough
when stockpiled for a long-term survival situation.
Even foods which are vacuum sealed in plastic won't last for a long period of time, as air can actually
migrate through most plastics, albeit slowly. We had bought a bunch of summer sausage on sale one
year after Christmas, expecting to put it in our survival stockpile for meat. It lasted for about two
years and then it went bad, even though the summer sausage was preserved meat.
The one exception to this is canned goods. Regardless of what the expiration date says on canned
goods, they will last 20 years or more. So, if you buy canned goods or can your own food, you have
food that you can store more or less indefinitely. The one exception is if it canned in a plastic jar. We
find that apple sauce canned in plastic jars, is only good for about a year. So, like some other foods,
we are forced to rotate our stock of apple sauce.
Okay, so canning will take care of all wet foods, but that's it; you really can't can dry foods. Although
there is a "dry canning" method that is done in the oven, rather than in a canning pot, there isn't
much history with it, so nobody is sure yet whether it will store foods for a long period of time,
without the risk of them going bad.
Nevertheless, there is a method of packaging dry foods which has been developed, which will store
them for a prolonged period of time. For most dry foods, you can count on them lasting 20 years, if
you follow this method. You will need:
Food grade five gallon buckets
Six gallon aluminized Mylar storage bags
Hair straightener or clothes iron
Canister vacuum cleaner or an upright with a removable hose
Oxygen absorbers
Rubber mallet
Permanent magic marker
As you can tell from the short list of supplies, this isn't a complicated method to use. The basic idea
is to vacuum pack the food in the aluminized Mylar bags and seal them in the buckets. Oxygen
absorbers are added inside the bag, with the food, to draw out the oxygen, so that nothing can live
in the bag. The five gallon bucket is strong enough that insects and rodents can't chew through it.
Aluminized Mylar is about the most air-proof plastic bag that you can get. This is the same material
that the fancy Mylar balloons with printing on them are made out of. Whereas helium will pass
through the walls of a normal balloon within a day, it stays in the Mylar balloons for several weeks.
Oxygen molecules are much larger than helium ones are, so if they hold helium in that well, you can
imagine how well they hold oxygen out.
Oxygen absorbers, as well as the aluminized Mylar bags can be purchased from a number of online
suppliers. You can buy food grade plastic buckets from your local building materials center. They are
white, to distinguish them from those that aren't safe for storing food.
You have to be careful working with oxygen absorbers, as they are very fast acting. They are
packaged with an indicator in the package. This indicator, which is a colored tablet, changes color
when enough oxygen has seeped into the package to render the oxygen absorbers useless.
Because they are fast acting, you can't just leave a package of oxygen absorbers open on the table,
while you are working with them. You literally have to work as fast as you can, so that they don't just
absorb the oxygen out of the air and become saturated. Ideally, you should have one person on your
packaging team whose whole job is to work with the oxygen absorbers, so that they can put them in
the buckets and reseal the package while waiting until the next one is needed.
Since we're talking about storing food in five gallon buckets, we're obviously talking about storing it
in bulk. You'll want to have plenty of food to work with, before we start this project. I typically try to
do ten or more five gallon buckets at a time, and only order the oxygen absorbers I need for those
buckets.
1. Start by opening the aluminized Mylar bags and putting them inside the buckets. Fill them
with food, to about one inch below the top edge of the bucket. Fill all the buckets before
going on to sealing them.
2. You might want to mark the sides of the buckets at this time, showing their contents. Don't
wait, or you'll probably have trouble remembering what's in each of the buckets.
3. With the hair straightener or clothes iron, heat seal the top of the bags, leaving a hole open
that's just big enough for the vacuum cleaner hose to fit into. Although there will be about
ten inches of material sticking up over the top of the bucket, you only need to seal a strip of
about two inches. Leave the rest so that you can reseal the bag, once you remove some of
the content.
4. Put an oxygen absorber in each bag. The person who handles the oxygen absorber should
reseal the bag of oxygen absorbers immediately. Please note that from this point until you
have the bag sealed, you need to work as fast as possible.
5. Put the end of the vacuum cleaner hose into the opening left in the top of the bag and suck
out as much air as possible. You don't want to push the hose down in far enough that it
sucks out some of the food, just enough to get past the seal.
6. Once as much air as possible is sucked out of the bag, pull the hose out of the bag. Using the
hair straightener or clothes iron, heat seal the opening, so that the whole bag is sealed.
7. Breathe a sigh of relief that you did that fast enough.
8. Fold the top of the bag down into the bucket and put the lid on. Use the rubber mallet to
drive the lid down onto the rim of the bucket. You will be able to hear the difference when
the rim of the bucket encounters the rubber seal on the lid.
There is an actual lid removal tool available for removing the lids off of five gallon buckets. While not
absolutely necessary, using it is much easier on your hands, than removing the sealed lids without it.
You may want to consider buying one of these tools.
Your finished buckets of food need to be identified, if you haven't already done so. It is a good idea
to mark them on several sides, as well as the top, so that you can see what's in it no matter what
angle you're looking at it.
Store your sealed food in a cool, dry place. Basements are ideal, as they are usually cool and unless
you have a flood, they should remain dry. Of course, food stored in this manner will float if your
basement floods, so you won't lose it. Keep an inventory of what food you have stored, as well as
where you have it stored, so that you can find it easily in the midst of a disaster.
A Bit More on Food Preservation Techniques
The method we just talked about works fine for dry foods, such as grains, dried beans and pasta, but
you can't use it for all your foods. You will actually need to use a combination of different storage
methods, to be able to stockpile all the foods you need.
Salt and Sugar, the Magical Preservatives
Before we get into talking about specific food storage techniques, I want to take a moment to talk
about salt and to a lesser extent sugar. These are nature's preservatives and when used properly,
will protect just about any food from the danger of bacterial eating it and making it unfit for human
consumption.
The secret that makes salt work for preserving food is something called osmosis. When salt is
concentrated in an area, it causes water to pass across membranes in order to equalize the salt level.
Since all living matter is made out of cells, which are surrounded by cell membranes, that means that
the salt draws the moisture out of the food.
This is a key component of many methods of food preservation. Salt fish, for example, is packed in
salt to dry it. Once the salt has drawn most of the moisture out of the fish, it is sun dried to finish the
process. By then, the fish has absorbed enough salt that bacteria can't survive on or in it.
When bacteria come into contact with salt or with food which has been preserved with salt, the salt
does the same thing to the water in the bacteria cells that it does to the meat cells, drawing the
water out. Once enough water is drawn out of the bacteria, the bacteria dies. So, any type of food
preserved with salt will kill bacteria, preventing the bacterial from making the food spoil.
The exact same thing that happens with salt also happens with sugar. That's why some types of
dried fruit seem to be encrusted in sugar. The sugar is protecting the fruit from bacteria, killing any
that come into contact with it. Although the natural sugar in the fruit isn't enough to kill the
bacteria, the added sugar is.
Please note that the salt and sugar will only protect the food from bacteria, not from insects and
rodents, although salt will prevent some insects, such as ants, from eating foods. In addition to the
preservation techniques used, proper packaging to protect from insects and rodents is required.
Dehydrating Food
Many types of foods can be preserved by dehydrating them. Meats, fish, fruit, vegetables and even
herbs can be dehydrated to preserve them. In the case of meats, fish and fruit, salt or sugar is used
in the dehydration process, in order to protect the dried food from bacteria.
Dehydration is an old food storage technique, old enough that we really aren't sure when it started.
The oldest known drying of meat (actually fish) goes back over 500 years in northern Europe.
Nobody knows when the American Indians started making Jerky, but it was long before the white
man ever stepped foot upon the New World. Dried grains and other foods have been found in tombs
over 2,000 years old.
Foods can be air or sun dried, but you'll do better in buying a dehydrator or making a solar
dehydrator. Either one will work about the same. The main difference is where the energy for the
heat is coming from.
If you buy an electric dehydrator, spend the extra money for a quality one. The main things you need
to look for are adjustable temperature and a blower fan. These will help ensure that the food you
are dehydrating is warmed evenly, so that it dries evenly.
My wife and I used a cheap dehydrator for years that didn't have a temperature control or a blower
fan. It merely had a heating coil in the bottom, with several round trays that stacked above it. While
that dehydrator worked, we had to rotate the trays through the stack during the day, in order to get
the drying action even. When we finally broke down and bought an Excalibur dehydrator, we found
that not only could we dehydrate foods faster, but that it came out better.
Before dehydrating anything, check a recipe book for dehydrating. Some foods will need special
treatment, before drying. Fruits, vegetables and herbs can usually be dried by simply cutting them
and arranging them on the trays in the dehydrator. Turn it on and allow the heat to wash over the
food for the recommended time, until the food is finished drying.
Meats and fish are more complicated to dehydrate than fruits and vegetables, but not real bad. The
first stage in the process is to trim off all fat, as the fat can turn rancid. Once that is done, you want
to marinate the meat or use a rub on it. In either case, you are applying a combination of salt and
flavorings to the meat, as part of the preparation process. Obviously, the salt is the more important
part of this step. Make sure that if you use a rub or marinate that you do so consistently throughout
the whole batch of meat. You'll need to turn the meat several times as it marinates, in order to
ensure that all surfaces come into contact with the liquid.
Meat that does not receive enough salt during the marinating or rub stage will not last, even if it is
dried properly. The meat needs the presence of the salt, to kill any bacteria that come into contact
with it.
Dehydrated meats can be kept for a fairly long time, if they are stored properly. The method
mentioned for storing dried foods can also be used for storing meats, once they have been
dehydrated. They won't last as long as other foods, but they can last a couple of years.
The easiest way to store dehydrated meats for a long period of time is to freeze them. Frozen dried
meats will store indefinitely. Then, once a disaster happens and power is lost, the will still last for a
couple of years, based purely upon the drying process of turning them into jerky. Just make sure
they are stored in airtight containers when removed from the freezer.
Canning Food
Canning is the proven method of storing all wet foods, especially fruits and vegetables. You can use
canning to preserve meats as well, but they must be canned at a higher temperature than fruits and
vegetables. So to can meats, a pressure canner is required.
The idea of canning is to create an environment in which anything that can damage the food is killed
and seal the food into that environment. Bacteria and protozoa die at 158 degrees Fahrenheit, so
raising the temperature of the food above 158 degrees will eliminate any bacteria and protozoa in it.
At the same time, that will kill insects, insect larva and insect eggs, ensuring that they can't grow in
the food. The food is canned in a glass jar with a metal lid, so it is protected from any rodents or
insects eating their way through the container and the food is underwater, preventing it from
oxidizing. Finally, the jar is vacuum sealed to maintain that safe environment.
Canning is so well established that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has done extensive
experimentation on it and developed extensive data for use in developing recipes. Essentially all
canning recipes are based upon that experimentation, ensuring that all canning recipes are safe.
The most important part of canning, besides ensuring that everything is clean, is heating the jars of
food being canned. It isn't enough that the water bath reach 160 degrees, the contents of the cans
must reach that temperature. To ensure that, the jars are left in the hot bath for a minimum of 20
minutes. This allows the heat from the water bath to heat the contents. When the jars cool, the lids
are naturally vacuum sealed on.
To can meats, a higher temperature is used to ensure killing any bacteria or other pathogens in the
meat. Since water boils at 212oF and won't rise above this temperature, a pressure canner is used.
By putting the contents under pressure, the water actually boils at a higher temperature. As long as
you follow the directions in the recipe, the canned meat will be safe.
Pickling is used in conjunction with canning at times. In pickling, the food is allowed to sit in an acidic
bath, along with herbs. For acid, vinegar is most commonly used. The acid and herbs affect the flavor
of the food, changing it. "Dill pickles" as we know them, are actually pickled cucumbers. Some
melons can be pickled as well as meat. Corned Beef is actually pickled beef.
Smoking Meats
Smoking can be used to preserve meats, cheeses, poultry and fish. Today, most smoking is cold
smoking, used only to flavor the meat; however, in times past, they would hot smoke, preserving the
meat as well as flavoring it.
Let me be clear here, cold smoking will not preserve meat, only hot smoking will. It is important to
understand this difference. Not only does the meat have to be hot smoked, but it also has to be
marinated in brine first, so that it is saturated with salt, before it is smoked. Otherwise, it will not
keep. This process of soaking the meat in brine is called "curing" it.
The first step in smoking meat is always to marinate it in brine for at least 24 hours. Some recipes
actually require injecting brine into the meat as well, because soaking it in brine only gets the outer
layer of the meat saturated with salt. For smoked and cured meats (cold cuts) salt is mixed
throughout the cut up meat, before it is stuffed into the casing, to ensure that bacteria can't survive,
even without the smoking.
Like with dehydrating meats, it is necessary to remove all the fat from meats that are going to be
smoked in most cases. There are exceptions, such as bacon, ham and some cured meats; but in most
cases if the fat is left on the meat, it can become rancid. Smoked fat will not become rancid, so
leaving it in place is no problem, if the fat is properly smoked.
The first stage of the smoking process is always cold smoking. This is accomplished at a temperature
of 68 to 86oF (20 to 30oC). In this stage, the smoke flavor is imparted into the meat. Proteins on the
surface of the meat react with the smoke, forming a skin of pure protein, which is impervious to
bacteria. This cold smoking stage takes about an hour to an hour and a half per pound of meat in
each chunk (not total meat weight); it will vary slightly, depending upon the type of meat being
smoked.
Once the meat is cold smoked the temperature is raised for the hot smoking portion of the process.
Hot smoking occurs at 200 to 225oF. This is hot enough to actually cook the meat, as well as kill any
bacteria or other pathogens inside the meat.
The actual time for the hot smoking potion will depend upon the type of meat and the weight of the
chunks. It is necessary to raise the internal temperature of the meat to one high enough to cook the
meat to the center, killing the pathogens. You can't use a meat thermometer to check it either, as
puncturing the protein skin of the smoked meat will allow bacteria access to the meat inside.
Smoking is a slow-cooking process, like cooking in a crockpot. That explains why smoked meats are
so tender. The higher the internal temperature of the meat, the more tender it will be.
As with canning, there are a wide range of time-tested recipes for smoking meats. If you decide to
smoke your own meats, be sure to find a good recipe which has been used successfully before and is
in agreement with the U.S. Department of Agriculture's guidelines. You can check for minimum
times and temperatures at the Dept. of Agriculture's website: www.foodsafety.gov.
Refrigeration, without Electrical Power
It's a good idea to assume that electrical power will be lost in any disaster situation. Of the
infrastructure we depend upon, the electrical grid is the most delicate and the most easily damaged.
So there's a very real chance that electrical power will not be available. One of the things that will
cause us to lose is our refrigeration. However, refrigeration existed long before electrical power in
homes did and we can go back to some of the methods that our forefathers used.
Granted, those methods weren't as good as modern electrical refrigeration. Nevertheless, they did
work. They allowed our ancestors to store fresh foods for longer than they would have been able to
if they just left the foods out, just as our refrigeration allows us to do.
Before electrical refrigeration became popular, most people in developed countries used ice boxes.
These insulated cabinets were powered by ice, making them essentially the furniture version of the
ice chests that we might take to the beach or on a picnic. Ice was harvested from lakes and rivers in
the wintertime and kept in ice houses. During the warmer parts of the year, that ice was delivered to
people for use in their ice boxes.
Unless you happen to have an ice house full of ice handy, that's not going to work for you and I. So,
we need to go back even farther in history, to the time when people didn't use ice boxes. During that
time, they would try to keep their fresh produce and dairy products underground, where it was
cooler. If they had a cave on their property, they would use that for cold storage, if not, they might
use a well.
The Root Cellar
People who didn't have a conveniently located cave on their property could still have natural
refrigeration by digging a root cellar. This is nothing more than a man-made cave, intended for use in
storing produce, so that it lasts longer.
The root cellar works under a very simple principle of thermodynamics. That is, that heat rises and
cold goes down. That means that anything underground is going to be cooler than things that are
above ground, unless it is so far underground that it reaches a geothermal layer; not a problem with
a root cellar.
The root cellar would be cooled by the cooler night air, the coolest of which would go down into the
cellar, following the laws of physics. Once there it was trapped and would stay. When the sun arose
and heated the ground around the root cellar, the ground itself acted as an insulator, helping to
keep the cellar cool. Even if the door of the cellar was opened, the cooler air would stay in the root
cellar, keeping the food stored there cool.
Root cellars still work for those who want to invest the effort in making one. A simple root cellar can
be made by digging a hole in the ground and putting a plastic storage bin in it. Produce can be put in
the bin and the bin covered with straw to act as an insulator. A piece of plywood or an old door can
be placed above it, to protect the root cellar from scavenging animals.
A variation of this is to use an old refrigerator, burying it, laying on its back, with the door facing up.
That gives you an insulated root cellar, which is protected from bugs and rodents getting into it and
with an insulated door at ground level.
While this sort of simple root cellar will work, it doesn't provide a lot of room for storing food.
Digging an actual root cellar into the ground would be better, providing more space for more
produce. If you are going to grow a vegetable garden to supplement the food that you are
stockpiling, a good root cellar would be a wise investment.
A typical root cellar is somewhere between six foot and ten foot square. It can either be dug into the
ground, or if you live in a hilly area, you could find a spot where you could build it into the side of the
hill. Remember, the lower down it is, the cooler it will stay.
You will need to shore up the walls of the root cellar with something to give it strength. Cement
blocks are the least expensive way of doing this. Of course, a lot depends upon how much you want
to spend on your root cellar. To build a good one, dig a hole large enough for the cellar and pour a
cement floor. Build the walls out of cement blocks and then pour a cement roof. Cover it all over
with dirt, leaving an access for the stairway.
If you build a root cellar by digging a hole in the ground, you'll need some way of pumping water out
of it. Water tends to fill holes in the ground and will destroy your produce if not pumped out. It
would actually be better to have a layer of gravel under the floor slab and pump the water out of it,
rather than allowing the water into the root cellar itself. However, a root cellar built into the side of
a hill won't have a problem with this, as the water will flow down the hill.
Designs of root cellars can vary greatly, depending upon the room available. Another easy way to
make a root cellar is to close off a corner of your basement, turning it into one. You'll need to
provide access for the cool night air to make it inside the root cellar from outside, as well as
insulation from any indoor heating that might reach your basement.
The Zeer Pot
A simple refrigerator can be made that uses evaporation for cooling. These have been in use in
Africa for centuries and are extremely easy to make. On an average, they will keep produce fresh for
three to four times longer than if the same produce is left out on a table, where it is exposed to the
ambient temperature.
To make a zeer pot, all that's needed is two unglazed ceramic pots, with one being sufficiently larger
than the other that the smaller can nest inside the larger. The space between the two pots is filled
with sand, leaving the top of the inner pot level with the top of the outer pot. The sand should stop
about a half inch to an inch below the level of the two pots rims. If either of the pots have holes in
the bottom, as is common for flower pots, the holes need to be plugged.
The pots can be of any size, just as long as they will nest together. Typically, pots are used which
allow for a layer of sand between them of one to two inches. Any more is unnecessary. A zeer pot
will keep the produce inside 20 to 30 degrees cooler than the ambient temperature.
To use the zeer pot to keep food cool, water is poured into the
sand, filling it entirely. This water will seep out through the outer
pot, making the clay wet. The water will then evaporate off the
outer surface of the pot, absorbing heat from the pot to do so. This will drop the temperature of the
pot and its contents, cooling whatever food is placed within it. This is especially effective if there is a
breeze blowing.
It is necessary to add water to the sand regularly, so as to keep the sand saturated in water. If it
dries, the pot stops cooling. Covering the top of the pot with a thick wet cloth, such as a washcloth,
helps it to stay cool, blocking the hot air from getting to the produce inside the pot.
There is actually a company in India which has taken this idea a step further, making small
refrigerators that work by evaporation. The space between the inner and outer wall of the
refrigerator does not have sand in it, but is left open, to be filled with clean drinking water. That way,
the refrigerator provides not only a means of keeping produce cool, but is also a water cooler,
providing the family with chilled water to drink.
Alternate Cooking Methods when the Grid is Down
Not only will we lose refrigeration when the electrical grid goes down, but also our normal means of
cooking. People who have a gas range in their kitchen may be able to cook for a while, until the
pressure in the gas lines drops, but people with electric ranges won't be able to cook at all... at least,
not in the same way they are used to.
Cooking is essential, as many of the foods we eat are not in an edible form unless they are cooked. In
addition, cooking kills microscopic pathogens that might be in the food. Food poisoning comes about
when people eat food that has not been properly cooked, leaving alive dangerous pathogens.
Although our stove may be down due to a loss of electricity, that doesn't mean that we are without
any way of cooking. Most American households have a barbecue grille, which makes an excellent
emergency stove when the power is out. You can use pots and pans on a grille, just like you can on a
stove, although the open fire may damage the finish on the outside of the pots, if they have an
enameled finish.
The problem with using a barbecue grille is that of fuel. Most people don't stockpile a large amount
of charcoal in their homes, as it takes up a lot of room and must be protected from getting wet.
Likewise, few people have more than one canister of propane for a propane grille. However, both
propane and charcoal grilles can also be used for cooking with wood. Cooking with wood may
damage the gas injector element in a propane grille, but these can be removed and replaced.
Wood - the Easiest Option
The easiest long-term cooking option is to cook on wood. As a fuel, wood is plentiful in most parts of
the country, is relatively easy to harvest and is sustainable. If you are going to be heating your home
with wood, cooking with wood is a logical step to take. There are several ways of going about
cooking with wood:
Fireplace - If you are heating your home with a fireplace, then it makes sense to also use the
fireplace for cooking your food, as this eliminates the need for a separate cooking fire. In
olden times, they usually had larger fireplaces, so that they had room for cooking.
Nevertheless, you can still cook in most modern fireplaces. Adding a crane to the side of the
fireplace, provides a hook for you to hang a pot on for cooking.
Wood-burning stove - In olden times, when people had a wood-burning stove, they cooked
on it as well. The stove had a flat top, with actual burners set into it. That allowed access to
the inside from the top, as well as from the door in the side. Modern wood burning stove are
more intended for use as a heater and may not work as well for cooking. If the top of the
stove is insulated, the top may not get hot enough for cooking.
Of course, there are wood-burning cooking stoves that are still available on the market, but
these are rather expensive. Unless you are building a home out in the country, where fuel is
a problem and you are likely to cook over wood, this might be too much of an expense to
consider.
Fire pit - The modern fire pit is a rebirth of the old fire pit that was used before fireplaces. It
is essentially a fireproof basin that you can place a fire in. Today they are usually used
outside on a patio or deck, but in ancient times they were placed in the middle of a room,
with a hole in the roof to act as a chimney.
You can buy commercially made fire pits that are made of metal or make your own out of
landscaping stones. If you make your own, you'll need a bed of gravel or cement first, to
keep the fire off the ground. Then, build a ring of stones to contain the fire. In this, it is much
like building a fire pit for camping in the woods. The pit should be at least 12" deep, to keep
the fire in. Buy a metal grille to put over the top so that you can cook on it.
Of course, with any means of cooking over wood, you'll need a goodly supply of firewood or charcoal
that you can use. In parts of the world where they still cook over wood, it is common to keep the fire
going all day, so that it doesn't need to be lit for the preparation of each meal.
Making Charcoal
It's fairly easy to make your own charcoal, if you prefer cooking over that. Actually, even when
cooking over wood, what is typically done is to allow the wood to burn down to coals and cook over
the hot coals. By making charcoal, you actually save time in the cooking process.
To make charcoal, you'll need a closed metal container. The decorated containers that are used for
selling flavored popcorn at Christmastime work well. Make a small hole in the center of the lid,
about 1/16" in diameter.
Fill the container with loosely packed chunks of wood and put the lid on it. Set it in a fire that you
have already burning and leave it there. The hydrocarbons from the wood will start passing through
the hole in the lid and will likely catch fire. This is good, as it gives you a gauge that you can use.
When the gases stop passing through the hole (the fire goes out) the charcoal should be ready.
Remove the container and open it to dump out the completed charcoal.
Another Cooking Option
Another very effective option for cooking during a time of crisis is to use a camp stove. Most of the
camp stoves today run off of propane, which brings us back to the same old problem of storing
enough fuel. Unless you're going to have a stockpile of little propane bottles, those stoves will only
last so long.
However, Coleman still makes what they call their "dual fuel" camp stove. This two-burner stove
model hasn't changed in 40 years or more. It's called dual fuel because it will burn either Coleman
fuel or unleaded gasoline. While gasoline may be hard to come by, it will probably be the easiest fuel
to find. You may even be able to siphon it out of abandoned vehicles.
This is the type of stove where you have to pump up the fuel tank, like on the old Coleman lanterns,
pressurizing the tank. While the pressure valve lasts for a long time, make sure that you have a spare
one or two, in case yours goes bad.
Baking without Electricity
Baking is usually harder to accomplish than frying or boiling. The major difference with baking is that
the oven heats the food on all sides, not just on the bottom. You can't readily do that on a camp
stove or barbecue grille. However, you can still bake quite well, with a couple of more primitive
types of ovens.
Clay oven - The clay oven looks like a clay dome with two openings in it, separated by a
shelf. The bottom opening is the firebox and the top one is the oven itself. There is usually
some sort of door for the oven, made out of wood, to help keep the heat in.
To make a clay oven, you start by making a mold of the firebox. Build up clay or clay and
brick to surround the mold, with the exception of the door. Make sure you use good quality
clay and that you get the air bubbles out of it. If air bubbles are left in it, they may cause the
oven to break. You also want to make sure that you use firebrick, rather than regular bricks.
Do the same for the shelf, trying to keep it thin (2" to 4" maximum). Once that is fairly hard,
make another mold for the oven itself, on the shelf. Then, you can add the clay layer,
packing three to four inches of it all around the mold, but leaving the doorway open. When
done the whole clay oven needs to be left to dry thoroughly.
The dirt mold can be scooped out of the finished and dry oven. Check to make sure that the
inside is dry as well. If it is not totally dried, allow it to dry thoroughly before lighting a fire in
it. You'll need to fire the clay, at least somewhat, by lighting a fire in it and allowing it to
bake the oven. This won't be perfect, as you don't have a kiln, but it will have to do.
To use the clay oven, start a fire in both the bottom and the oven, allowing the fire in the top
oven to heat up the oven. Once the oven is heated well and the bottom fire is burning well,
the fire can be removed from the top oven and added to the firebox. By preheating the oven
in this manner, the fire will only have to keep the oven warm, not have to heat it.
Dutch Oven - The Dutch oven is what was used for baking in the home during the Colonial
and Pioneering eras of our country, leaving the clay oven for use by commercial bakeries.
This type of Dutch oven was a bit different than what most look like today. The modern
iteration of the Dutch oven is nothing more than a five to seven quart pot. But the old
version was made of cast iron, had a lip around the lid and feet cast to the bottom so that it
could stand in the coals.
You can still buy this type of Dutch oven today, although they are not common. They are
available in various sizes, up to about seven or eight quarts. Not only are they great as an
oven, but they can also be used as a soup or stew pot. It's a good idea to have one on hand,
for use whenever cooking over a fire.
To use this type of Dutch oven, one puts the dough inside the oven and sets it in the coals of
the fire, being sure to keep it level. The top is put on it and more coals are shoveled onto the
top, making it so that there is heat both above and below the food being cooked.
Cooking with the Power of the Sun
Another totally different way of cooking in a grid-down situation is by using the power of the sun. If
you were anything like I was as a kid, you enjoyed using a magnifying glass to start fires and hassle
ants. Well, that same power that we used back then for not such great purposes, can easily be
harnessed for cooking real food, when needed.
The key to cooking with solar power is to have a lot of sunlight available. If you live in an area where
you have a lot of rainy and overcast days, you're probably not going to be able to cook with solar
power. In addition to a lot of sunshine, all that's needed is some way of focusing the sun's beams on
your cooking pot, so that it will heat up enough to cook the food inside.
There are three basic types of solar cookers which you can use. Two of them are reflective, reflecting
the sun's light onto the cooking pot, thereby increasing its intensity. The third uses a large
magnifying glass to focus the sun's beams. This third one can actually get hot enough to melt some
soft metals.
The two reflective cookers are also able to be purchased commercially if you desire. However, they
are simple enough to build, that you may want to make your own and save that money for
something else.
As the sun moves throughout the day, you will need to adjust the position of your cooker every once
in a while. Otherwise, the focal point for the sunlight will move off of your pot and it will not heat.
Check it every 30 minutes throughout the cooking cycle and adjust as necessary. Using a black
colored pot, such as cast iron, will increase the absorption of the light and its subsequent conversion
to heat.
Solar Box Oven
The solar box oven is the simplest solar cooker you can build. It consists of a cardboard box and
some aluminum foil. The foil, when glued to the inside of the box and to the box flaps, acts as a
reflector, focusing the sun's rays into the box. Adding larger flaps or additional flaps to the box can
increase the amount of sunlight, thereby increasing the efficiency of the cooker.
To make the solar box oven, start out with a box which is big enough to put your cooking pot in, with
ample space left over. This extra space will help ensure that the light can reflect inside the box. Glue
aluminum foil, shiny side up, onto the inside of the box and the box flaps. It is important to have as
smooth a finish as possible, without wrinkling the foil. This is easier to do if you deconstruct the box,
separating the seam where it is glued together.
Once the box is coated with aluminum foil, it can be reconstructed simply enough by using a hot
melt glue gun to reattach the seam that you had taken apart.
To use the solar box oven, the box is placed, facing into the sun. That means having to prop up the
edge of the box, so that it is pointed directly towards the sun. Setting the front edge on a brick or
rock can accomplish this easily. Place the pot inside, centered in the box and propped up so that it is
level and so that the reflected sunlight can hit it. The box flaps will need to be held in place as well,
so that they can point the sunlight into the box. This can easily be done with sticks or dowel rods.
This type of solar oven is a slow cooker, much like cooking with a Crockpot. It will take several hours
to cook whatever you put in it, so be sure to check it regularly. Putting the pot in an oven roasting
bag can help keep the heat in and make the food cook faster.
Parabolic Solar Oven
The parabolic solar oven improves the operation of the simple box oven that we just looked at, by
increasing the amount of sunlight that is directed to the pot where the food is located. It is also
easier to adjust as the sun moves across the sky, as the reflective surface is one continuous piece,
rather than several pieces. For this reason, I prefer it.
To make your own parabolic solar oven, you need a parabolic television antenna. Not one of the
modern ones that we use, which are less than two feet across; you need one of the old ones that
were about six feet across. The larger size provides a lot of reflective area for the sun.
The way that a parabolic antenna works, is that the parabolic dish (the curved dish) is a reflector for
radio waves. The actual antenna is a small device that sits in front of the antenna, usually on a post
that places it in the exact focal point of the antenna. Any and all radio waves that hit the reflector
are sent to the antenna for capture.
The position of the antenna portion is important, as that is the place where you want to put your
cooking pot. It has to be positioned there, as that is the focal point of the antenna. Just as the radio
waves are reflected to that point, so will the sun's rays be focused to that point, where they will be
able to cook your food.
Like with the simple box oven, we're going to make the parabolic cooker reflect the sun's rays by
using aluminum foil. Since the surface is curved, the foil needs to be applied in small pieces, two to
three inches square, or it will wrinkle as it is being applied. Cover the entire inside surface of the
parabolic reflector with the aluminum foil, gluing it shiny side out. The holder for the antenna can be
converted to a holder for the pot, putting it at the focal point.
Fresnel Solar Cooker
A Fresnel lens is a plastic sheet magnifier. You've probably seen them. You can buy them in office
supply stores and dollar stores. They look like a sheet of clear plastic, with circular ridges molded
onto the backside. People who have trouble reading the phone book use them to magnify the small
lettering.
Those smaller Fresnel lenses aren't big enough to make a cooker out of, but the ones used in the
old-style big screen televisions are. Before they came out with our modern, flat television sets, a big
screen television took up the entire corner of a living room and was housed in a large cabinet. Like
any other CRT (cathode-ray tube) they projected the image onto the back of the screen. In order to
do this, they had a large Fresnel lens mounted behind the screen.
You can scavenge these Fresnel lenses out of these old big screen televisions. Generally speaking,
when people want to dispose of them, they'll put them on the curb with a "Free" sign on them. Take
it home, take the screen apart and find the Fresnel lens hidden behind it.
You can also buy these scavenged lenses on eBay at times. Obviously, the larger they are, the better.
The one I have built up in the picture is about two feet by three feet, although you can get them
larger. I recently harvested one that was 30 inches by 40 inches.
The Fresnel lens needs to be mounted into a frame and then the frame mounted into a stand. It is
important that the angle of the frame be adjustable in the stand, so that the sun's rays can be
properly focused on the food to be cooked. You also need some sort of a stand for the pot or pan of
food, so that it can be held in the ideal position.
The focal point will be about two feet from the lens. To check the focal point, direct the lens at the
sun and put a piece of cardboard behind it, moving it until the sun's light is making as small a spot as
possible. Measure the distance between the cardboard and the lens and you'll know the focal
length. If you don't work quickly, you'll need to be ready to put out a fire, as the cardboard will catch
on fire.
To use the Fresnel solar cooker, set the lens in its frame up, pointing directly at the sun. Then place
the pot of food to be cooked on the stand, directly in the focal point of the lens. Please note that this
cooker will work much faster than the others, so you'll need to check the food regularly. I've seen a
cooker of this type fry an egg in less than a minute. I've also seen it melt pennies in about two
minutes. So, it will generate quite a bit of heat.