Democrats Dumpter Fire Debate
Nice summary of the antics and it means I didn’t waste my time watching the food fight debate.
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Prepping For Covid
Tim gets a small cut of any food buckets sold. If you’ve done nothing, ordering a month worth is a first step.
It is a bit heavy on carbs, but a reasonable mix of flavor in a keep alive kit taking no thought or physical action.
OTOH, you can do better for less money but with shorter shelf life (year or two instead of 25) by hitting the grocery store for a big bag each of beans, rice, flour and a big jug of olive oil; then add some canned meats, a big bag of pancake mix, some canned or dry milk, jug of syrup or jars of jam. Jumping it up with Knorr Sides gives more flavors (though so does a bunch of boullion, or some ketchup / BBQ Sauce and dried onion granules) and of course canned goods of all sorts. I’ve lived off of canned ravioli and canned pea / bean soups for days on the road. A flat of a dozen ramen cups is about $4 and is almost 2 weeks of “good enough” lunches.
Musings from the Chiefio 
FWIW, I snagged a couple packages of individually wrapped toast cheese peanut butter crackers at Sams. 250 calories each pack, box of 40 packs was $6. Couldn’t pass up a 40 oz bag of smokehouse almonds either for $12 :-)
And how much is a truckload of Busch Light, you know… to make sure you have a safe drinking water* supply?
*Busch Light = Drinking Water.
It’s not that it tastes awful or anything, but when you get a stronger buzz from Dasani bottled water, I suppose it’s all the same to stock up on Busch Light.
;o)
@HR
Ha!, the golf cart will be backed outside in order make room to position the 2 pallets of Busch Light in the garage properly out of the impactful UV rays. The problem is that may end up being less than a month supply,,,,,,,,,,! Has anyone else here had Ramen noodles, chicken edition, cooked in Busch Light? C’mon man, you ain’t a prepared if you haven’t.
Not bush light or ramen, but breakfast cereal and beer… not bad. (Not good either :-)
Hey, I was out of milk and it could help with the hangover…
Seriously:
What is the deal with canned lima beans? Walmart, Costco, Bargain Market, Smart & Final: NONE.
I did get 2 x 2 lb. Bags of dry… but….
I thought about making this a separate posting, but really, a comment is enough. Hardtack.
1 tsp salt / cup of water. 2 cups flour. Mix to a non-sticky dough. (Add flour as needed).
Roll out (thinner is easier on the teeth). 1/4 inch is good. Cut to cracker size snd poke holes in it.
Bake. Suggested temperature and times vary a lot. From 175 F and one hour per side (wheat jerky? ) to 375 F for 1/2 hour.
Now it will store in a glass jar for the remainder of your natural life, plus that of your children.
:-)
DO NOT EAT DRY! You will break teeth. Classically these are soaked, or broken and soaked, in water, coffee, tea, or beer.
https://www.skilledsurvival.com/hardtack-recipe-survival-bread/
Remember Maternal Grandad and at least 3 generations prior were in HM Merchant Marine… so a gallon a day is what I’m evolved for ;-)
A video how to:
I don’t think it will get bad in the US….BUT….$100 buys a LOT of can and dry foods to go into a large plastic bin as insurance and, other than the bagged flower and rice, will keep a couple of years easy. Actual “insurance” cost is very little as I will just rotate through the bin for most of it. Supplemented with my normal panty, gives 30+ days easy.
Speaking of traditional ship’s rations–I understand that sauerkraut in barrels was an excellent source of vitamin C. Even after a voyage lasting years, story is, you could open a sealed barrel and still find the sauerkraut to be edible.
Yes, sauerkraut is a lactose fermentation method of preserving cabbage and has more Vit-C than the starting material. The lactic acid is preservative (but you must keep bugs out).
When you look into it, many of our favored “ethnic” foods really started life as a preservation method. Sauerkraut, salami, sausages, smoked ham & bacon, corned beef, salt pork, kippers, baked bread, kimchee, cheeses, jerky, various chips, cookies, crackers, dried fruits and raisins, (and certainly fruit cake…), pickles in all their kinds, sugared fruits, jams, fruit preserves, on & on….
Got all my canned food including sauerkraut, glass canisters filled with barley, pasta, flour, can’t eat rice.)… Think I’ll bake a fruit cake. :)
Can’t eat rice? That’s a new one on me. Didn’t know anyone had a rice allergy… though for blood sugar it can be a problem… but then pasts and flour ought to be out too…
FWIW, I’ve yet to find a grain that can’t be cooked in a rice cooker… and lots of rice recipes can swap in a different grain. Couscous too. Millet in moderation (too much screws with the thyroid)
But about that fruit cake….
While they keep forever, I’m not certain the ability to be eaten is proved. .. ;-)
I used to be able to eat rice but last coupla’ years nope. Reduced flour intake too, still eat potatoes.
Not intending the fruit cake to last too long. Currants, mmm…
I just cooked a good solid fruit cake (as in Christmas cake type) yesterday. My Other Half loves it. I soak the dried mixed fruit in brandy for weeks, after having given it several washes to get rid of that ghastly oil that’s used to coat it. Can’t eat much cake myself although I love it too.
It’s always sensible for us as rural dwellers to keep a good back up of tinned (canned) foods.
Well of course if you soak it in enough brandy :-)
FWIW I actually liked the Christmas fruitcakes. Rarely seen in silicon valley…
The Carolinas were famous for another ships store. POTATOES! But these potatoes were dumped into ‘boiling hot pine tar’ then fished out. They were completely cooked, sterile and sealed by the pine tar. Just crack them open and eat. I wonder if the same method was used on carrots? Onions?
I have had them at some of the weirder festivals I have been a vendor at. They are actually quite tasty. The potato can be white or sweet.
https://ezinearticles.com/?South-Carolina-Cook-Gives-New-Life-to-Vintage-Southern-Recipe&id=697279
I just finished reading an old book, “The Swiss Family Robinson”. It was fascinating to read what they did with food when they found it. Some meats they put up in containers in fat.
I need to read some Foxfire books.
This is hysterical.
Obama version II
https://twitter.com/Charitable_Fury/status/1232938236491767808
When my Ex and I were stationed in Germany I made several fruit cakes. Not only did I wrap them in brandy soaked cheese cloth, I got a syringe from some friends in medical and injected the cakes with brandy. Used up the whole bottle… Those cakes sat for a month.
We had a lunch party for all the Unwed officers we knew at Christmas, after eating that cake they could barely find the door. Of course there wasn’t a crumb left.
Speaking of Ship Stores…
They sure have improved!
@Gail – I have never heard of ‘pitched’ potatoes before. That is interesting stuff.
I’m betting it would work with carrots, turnips, parsnips, and other root veggies, BUT, I don’t think it would come out as well as potatoes. The root vegies have lower water content and higher fiber
@Gail. I also inject brandy into the cooked cake. I use a clean metal skewer dug well in and then use a teaspoon to spoon the brandy out of a glass. Sometimes there is a little brandy left over and you can guess where that ends up! ;)
As for potatoes in tar, when I was a child we used to put potatoes into the hot coals of the bonfire on Guy Fawkes night, ( 5th of November). Ashy and a bit burnt on the outside, delicious within! No nonsense about wrapping oiled spuds in aluminium foil.
So the Dimocrats have a problem but so too do those big MSM companies reporting the news, especially reporting political news.
Take for instance this video from Project Veritas, where they find that ABC News correspondent David Wright not only self identifies as a socialist but also says that reporting politics is against the commercial imperative of the company (and most mainstream commercial TV broadcast companies).
E.M.Smith [said] 27 February 2020 at 4:13 am [GMT]:
What is the deal with canned lima beans? Walmart, Costco, Bargain Market, Smart & Final: NONE.
Nearly the same here at what is reputedly the highest-revenue Publix supermarket in metro Orlando, thus presumably having the highest rate of stock replacement. The Fordhook lima beans were only in-stock only in 1 of the upscale “Southern-seasoned” brands (i.e., Margaret something-or-other, not Bush). Frustrating because the store was offering buy-1-get-1(-free) on either Del Monte or Dole branded cans (but not both). I also didn’t see any in the Publix house-label. I was surprised by the stock situation, but being a devote(e) of the Fordhook cultivar [#], I didn’t compensate by checking the situation for the less satisfactory “baby limas” or the conspecific “butter beans”.
But hey! We rely on you as our expert on agricultural-market conditions!
They are virtuous as “a virtually fat-free source of high-quality protein“, &c. Beware that they are toxic if eaten raw, altho’ it’s safe to eat the commercially canned product if uncooked by consumers).[*]
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Note *: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lima_bean#Health,_cooking_and_nutrition].
Note #: Many solo undergrad dorm dinners featured lima beans, notably a combo of limas over simmered white rice drowned in a gravy of undiluted Cream of Mushroom soup. Is that worthy of the “prep cuisine” topics?
One of my favorite expedient / prepper meals is a can of green limas (or butter beans if I must), heated and drained, with just salt, pepper and butter on them. With a slicd of buttered bread, it’s a meal. That’s why I was looking for them.
Never did the mushroom gravy thing, but I might try it… That’s more an expedient dish than Prepper Cuisine meal, but I could see it as part of a themed set of meals based on limas or on mushroom gravy… like succotash with cornbread. So limas / rice / gravy & biscuits would round it out enough.
Sidebar on legume toxicity:
I only buy canned kidney beans if possible as they are also toxic if undercooked. Every year, somebody tries to make chili beans in the slow cooker with dry kidney beans and gets sick. They MUST be boiled. So I like to get canned limas and canned kidney beans, but dry pintos and lentils. IIRC, it is lectins that are the problem.
FWIW, I did some searching, since nobody had an answer here. Didn’t find an answer anywhere else, either. Did find a couple of folks complaining about no wax beans. Thinking about it, I’ve not seen wax beans in cans lately either.
There were some general stories of bean crop losses in bad weather, but generalized. At this point, I have to assume it is something weather related. Either that, or all the grocers have decided to conspire against the limas and wax beans…
If I am remembering correctly, our gracious host, it *is* the lectins in beans that may be a problem. Dose and route make the medicine or the poison. People seem to forget that. People also seem to forget that some folk have metabolic processes that turn ‘nontoxic’ stuff into toxins.
Anyway, I seem to recall wax beans always being somewhat scarce around here, though I thought it was because the demand isn’t high; especially compared to most other beans. Back in the day, our garden was a mix of corn, squash, peas, beans (mostly butterbeans but sometimes snap beans and/or lima), okra, corn, cantaloupes and/or watermelons, collards and turnips. In another section, we’d have tomatoes and peppers. These were set among fruit tress: plum, pear, peach and apple.
We went to Costco to start prepping last night. Crowded (checkout lady commented it was like a weekend crowd). Noticed some folk were obviously doing the same. Picked up a 5-pack of Clorox wipes, some Kirkland meats and soups, a 9-pack of canned green beans, and my weekly package of organic blueberries.
I plan on more trips there, but first to a gun store. My wife finally allowed for guns, so I’m starting with a 12ga for in-home SHTF defense.
E.M.Smith [said] 28 February 2020 at 7:30 am [GMT]:
Sidebar on legume toxicity:
I only buy canned kidney beans if possible as they are also toxic if undercooked. Every year, somebody tries to make chili beans in the slow cooker with dry kidney beans and gets sick. They must be boiled. So I like to get canned limas and canned kidney beans, but dry pintos and lentils. IIRC, it is lectins that are the problem.
While you’re at it, what about black turtle beans, the frijoles negros of my family’s culinary “appropriations” (how dare we!) from Ybor City [@].
And for that matter, what about frozen beans? It now seems -to me that they’d need to be treated as just very cold fresh beans, therefore all the precautions for fresh beans would need to be applied.
Hey-yell! Now I’m goimg to need to review my recent purchases of seasonal-annual-style special culinary issues, notably my currently misplaced “Slow Cooker” special issue of Southern Living. I assume that the biochemistry-oriented Cook’s Illustrated has your warnings well nailed down.
——-
Note @: Ybor City is a more-than-century-old district of Tampa, Fla., that was founded by immigrants mostly from Cuba, but also from Spain itself. A place maybe better known nowadays for its highly regarded Ybor City Brewing than for its original cigar-focused economy.
Odd you would mention black beans… I’ve got a 3 cup dry pot of them on the stove that’s been through the “boil 5 min. Set an hour” quick soak and the “drain, refill, boil 10 minutes and set an hour” first cook. Just waiting for me to be ambitious enough to do the 2nd water change, final cook with seasonings and ham / SPAM…. I know, traditional is white beans & ham, but I like the black ones better…
E.M.Smith [said] 28 February 2020 at 11:16 pm [GMT]:
Odd you would mention black beans [….] Just waiting for me to be ambitious enough to do the 2nd water change, final cook with seasonings and ham / SPAM …. I know, traditional is white beans & ham, but I like the black ones better
“white beans“!? As the title of a respected Web-site says: “What’s up with that!?” “[T]raditional” to whom? Are you thinking of the concoction (cue “Anchors Aweigh”) known as “navy beans“? Or perhaps a transplanted Fabada Asturiana?
My family’s black beans combines the Cuban influences of Ybor City, thus the Cuban trinity onion, bell pepper, and garlic, plus the, um, quite thorough cooking of legumes from at least some German cuisines. Oh! And featuring ham hocks, cooked at least until they fall apart, which I suppose is down-home Southern (in contrast to plausible Cuban or Spanish sausage or upscale jamon). I like the consistency a bit sludgy. I now shamelessly ignore family criticism of inauthenticity, and add small hot peppers [#] while sautéing the trinity, and add fresh sliced mushrooms to the simmering stockpot [†].
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Note #: Home-grown tabasco or the comparably-sized fresh “Thai”. Failing that, dried arbol. Beware the visually identical but nonpungent peppers that are
attributed toexcused as demand from Japanese markets; it’s an exasperating discovery when you didn’t open the package until you started cooking.Note †: You might be amused to learn that once when I brought such a pot to an office-lunch pot-luck, I was told by someone who’d tried it, as a matter of praise, that “this is very Puertorican“.
I was, as a white guy, raised on white beans and ham. It could be Navy Beans or Great Northern, depending on what was cheaper. Dad would buy a ham, and we’d have a lot of “Ham and ‘something'” then the bone and residual ham would go into a big pot of beans. I’ve continued this behaviour to today. Dad leaned toward navy beans, IIRC.
I like black, red, and cranberry beans more (mostly because I like colors and antioxidants) so prefer to use them. Price is about the same and flavor doesn’t change much so what’s left? Color and aesthetics.
So it goes…
At Señor Enriques home, Mama Celerina preferred pintos. They made more refritos (and I learned how to make them from her). In some ways I’m half Mexican, culturally. To this day I love refritos con queso on tortilla or aroz con Frijoles con tortilla. It is the basis of Mexican cuisine.
Lately, I’ve come to use Peruanos. A kind of pastel green / yellow bean. It tastes and cooks like a Great Northern, but has some color.
Per growing, I’m doing Christmas Limas, a kind of brown seeded green bean, purple pod, and runner beans.
Beans.. It’s a thing…
We didn’t grow up on beans, even though we had one breadwinner for 6 family members. I think when money was tight, that was when we had tuna casserole (no noodles, but potato chips on top)…or WAFFLES for supper!! (Who has waffles for supper?!?!?)
In my salad days at college, that was when I discovered how great slow-cooked beans and ham hocks could be. Then I learned how great it was to have fresh-baked cornbread with it.Just add butter and honey.
Then there was the Buckaroo Beans (soak the pinto beans overnight beforehand, etc.) along with brown rice. You could cook some kind of meat with the beans, but I enjoyed it well enough without meat. Those beans and brown rice gave me a nice, steady, long-lasting level of energy. I especially noticed it when getting around town on a bicycle.
I also learned how beneficial long-handled underwear could be, too! Back then, bomber jackets were fashionable, but eventually I got a long wool coat with a fake fur lined hood, and wore that with tall boots. I figured if dressing like that kept the Russians warm, then it would be better for those cold walks across campus in the winter.
This winter, I’ve been knitting. I made my first hat using needles that were one size too large (according to the directions), but I loved the way it fit, so I made a second one. And I made scarves to match the hats. I have fingerless gloves started on my tiny needles using tiny sock yarn, and have started a pair of socks using non-sock yarn. I am getting to where I tend to get sleepy while sitting in meetings, so having a knitting project to keep my hands busy helps keep me awake.