The Poor Man’s Prepping

[goofygurl]

Oh and the House of GG/BARR will be joining ZombiePreparation in the hand laundering for the sake of saving $$ for the portable washer. We have laundry on site, but neither of us can justify spending $100+ each month to do laundry. That $100+ will come in handy in other areas that we are trying to prep for, like firearms and food (food atm, firearms later).

[goofygurl]

Curad Peroxide .18 each and Curad Bandaids for .50 each with the coupon in the post.

http://wp.me/p1G4Xl-7wT (is my blog, just a short link)

[zombiepreparation]

Curad Peroxide .18 each and Curad Bandaids for .50 each with the coupon in the post.

http://wp.me/p1G4Xl-7wT (is my blog, just a short link)

Okay! Got the link! Trying to figure out the coupon print & a way to get there. Am PMing with questions.

[zombiepreparation]

A thermos will stay hot longer if it is full.
Taking water/coffee out will let the air get in and cool it down.
(My folks always used them for coffee when I was a kid.)

Regarding this:
In post by CG on pg 12 of this thread is a link that eventually leads to a review of a thermos in which reviewer indicates I don't have to actually take the lid off to pour my clear liquids out which will add to keeping heat in thermos. (although not ever fond of heat+food+plastic... but in a pinch or Event I can live with the combonation)

[zombiepreparation]

I was thinking...
If you are already boiling water to purify it, that could go right into the thermos to heat it, then you pour it into something else to cool.
That would mean you are not wasting water or the energy to heat it, and it will cool faster.

Oh. I just got what you mean. Purify for drinking/cooking/teeth/etc. Yeah. Good idea!!! (I am re-reading this thread again... learning more. )

Well, drat, my post following ZG's post back on page 9 indicates I understood at that time. So it seems I forgot what I knew and have re-learned in my re-reading. Wonder how long I'll hold onto this 'learning' this time.

[goofygurl]

Regarding Tanky's post about stomping the clothes in the tub to wash them. Yes, he's dancing...and having a grand old time doing it..lol



Regarding ZombiePreparation's post about dirty water. This was first pass with clothes that were dirty, but normal wear, nothing excessive done in them to cause them to be this dirty. They were mine and his, no kids clothes. Also, this is with NO soup added. The second pass (with soap added that time) was clear enough that we felt okay going ahead and rinsing them.

[ZombieGranny]

GG, I would make a bet that the first batch looked like that due to soap residue on them.
Most washers don't get it all out.
(Too many people follow the detergent makers' recommendations regarding soap amounts as well, rather than cloth makers.)

[duodecima]

GG, I would make a bet that the first batch looked like that due to soap residue on them.
Most washers don't get it all out.
(Too many people follow the detergent makers' recommendations regarding soap amounts as well, rather than cloth makers.)

We are using a regular (he type, front loading) washer, and we found that the first time we left the soap out, we noticed NO difference. I use 1-2 Tbsp of detergent per load now, unless it's truly grimy, which stretches my laundry detergent (and brings cheap storebought detergent per load-price close to home made detergent per-load price.)

[goofygurl]

GG, I would make a bet that the first batch looked like that due to soap residue on them.
Most washers don't get it all out.
(Too many people follow the detergent makers' recommendations regarding soap amounts as well, rather than cloth makers.)

I know. Was just nasty...lol.

[graingurl]

Not sure if this is the right place for this but wondering what folks think about the idea of peanut butter powder as a prep/storage item. I'm going to check it the next time I'm at the grocery store but I think the storage life would be a little longer because 85% of the fat has been removed. But you need water to rehydrate it (thereby adding higher need to water storage).

[goofygurl]

Not sure if this is the right place for this but wondering what folks think about the idea of peanut butter powder as a prep/storage item. I'm going to check it the next time I'm at the grocery store but I think the storage life would be a little longer because 85% of the fat has been removed. But you need water to rehydrate it (thereby adding higher need to water storage).

Peanut butter by itself has like a 5 year shelf life. It will separate, but can always be stirred and mixed back up. I would just do that, but then again we prep in a small apt right now and can't afford the space for extra water.

[Lynn LeFey]

Part of what I like about peanutbutter is that it's packed with calories, lasts long, and is immediately consumable. Removing the oil and turning it to powder removes two of those qualities. I've never used the powdered peanut butter, but HAVE considered it. I wish Emergency Essentials had little single-serving test-packs for their products. The 'MyChoice' cans help, but only so much. I still have loads of tomato powder and whole egg powder from getting those to try (both good, by the way).

Peanut butter is also cheap. So, minus the extra weight, I don't see a lot of benefit to not just storing it as-is. Just my opinion, of course.

GoofyGurl... wow... I'm seriously sorry to hear about the forced move/loss of preps. They need a hug smiley.

Zombiepreparations... yep. Nothing like seeing the very real possibility of trouble to get your brain back into gear on preps, huh?

My only low-budget preps lately has been another trip to ALDI. I got a couple cans of tuna in oil. I remember hating that overly rich flavor when its in oil, when I was a kid, but man... that's a lot of 'free' calories there. I also got a canned ham for a little over $3. I got a 5 gallon bucket with sealing lid to put all my non-canned food preps in so in the event we get a small visitor of the rodent variety, I won't get my stuff mangled. My preps are probably somewhere over 2 weeks but ... emm... probably not too much over that.

If 'slow and steady wins the race' is true... I am SO winning!

[goofygurl]

Part of what I like about peanutbutter is that it's packed with calories, lasts long, and is immediately consumable. Removing the oil and turning it to powder removes two of those qualities. I've never used the powdered peanut butter, but HAVE considered it. I wish Emergency Essentials had little single-serving test-packs for their products. The 'MyChoice' cans help, but only so much. I still have loads of tomato powder and whole egg powder from getting those to try (both good, by the way).

Peanut butter is also cheap. So, minus the extra weight, I don't see a lot of benefit to not just storing it as-is. Just my opinion, of course.

GoofyGurl... wow... I'm seriously sorry to hear about the forced move/loss of preps. They need a hug smiley.

I moved on my own. My lease was up and I moved in with my boyfriend (Barr here on the forums). The theiving they did though was while I was down here getting things ready. Thanks for the hug though. I appreciated.

Zombiepreparations... yep. Nothing like seeing the very real possibility of trouble to get your brain back into gear on preps, huh?

My only low-budget preps lately has been another trip to ALDI. I got a couple cans of tuna in oil. I remember hating that overly rich flavor when its in oil, when I was a kid, but man... that's a lot of 'free' calories there. I also got a canned ham for a little over $3. I got a 5 gallon bucket with sealing lid to put all my non-canned food preps in so in the event we get a small visitor of the rodent variety, I won't get my stuff mangled. My preps are probably somewhere over 2 weeks but ... emm... probably not too much over that.

If 'slow and steady wins the race' is true... I am SO winning!

[Deenie7]

I ended up making my own "tomato powder" last year. I got about 30 lbs of tomatoes from a pick-your-own day at the CSA farm I subscribe to each year, and canned them, which involved lots of tomato peeling. (Pain in the ass, btw, even if you use the method of cutting a shallow X in the end opposite the stem and dropping each into boiling water for 30 seconds to a minute.) I dried the tomato skins in my food dehydrator, then ground them up in a food processor until I got a semi-granulated texture. This is more for adding tomato flavor to something, rather than dissolving into a smooth liquid.

[zombiepreparation]

Not sure if this is the right place for this but wondering what folks think about the idea of peanut butter powder as a prep/storage item. I'm going to check it the next time I'm at the grocery store but I think the storage life would be a little longer because 85% of the fat has been removed. But you need water to rehydrate it (thereby adding higher need to water storage).

I am always thinking abt portability during a relatively short-term bug "out" Event. The flood is coming! Get out!... The apt building is on fire! Get out!... The nuclear plant is going to melt down! Get out! My BOB is for those conditions, I can't come up with BO 'anything' for PAW or EOTWAWKI. I have no workable BOL for those scenarios.

My point being, whether it will always stay this way or not, my BOB food supply is almost entirely powdered or ground way down; humus, spinach, split peas, lentils, parsley, potatoes, re-fried beans, oats, mixed vegetables, farina, polenta, milk, ramen (yep, folks, I put the ramen in the blender and made it an even more instant instant food for my BOB), red & green bell pepper, chives, etc. So in a scenario of get out fast and for a short time, for me, a powdered peanut is an interesting investigation.

For me these powered things are easy to rehydrate w/o fire, I eat them already so they are 'comfortable', I consider them a 'Gray Food' like people speak of being a 'Gray Man' in that they don't look like food, especially identifiable food, even more important to me: Appealing identifiable food. Thinking this could reduce opportunity theft. It is also much much easier to share in dire situations: giving a big pinch of this/that in multiple people's water if water is still available in attempt to stave off EVerybody's starvation while trying to reorganize.

Therefore I am interested in looking at a BOB peanut butter powder. Not for storage though. I don't think so at this time. Peanut butter is too simple to store/to eat just as it comes.

Powdered peanut butter for BOB. (hey, unless there is peanutbutter in sealed single serving pouches like the Spam, mayo, sardines, etc.)
Regular peanut butter for storage.
For me at this time.

Bring more ideas like this to the Poor Man's Prepping thread!

[graingurl]

My BOB food supply is almost entirely powdered or ground way down; humus, spinach, split peas, lentils, parsley, potatoes, re-fried beans, oats, mixed vegetables, farina, polenta, milk, ramen (yep, folks, I put the ramen in the blender and made it an even more instant instant food for my BOB), red & green bell pepper, chives, etc. So in a scenario of get out fast and for a short time, for me, a powdered peanut is an interesting investigation.

Where does one get powdered hummus or did you make it yourself?

I'm also wondering about the whole water issue. We currently have almost a 1 week drinking supply (1 gal pppd and 1 for pets). We have a 55 gal rain barrel but can't count on it if it doesn't rain and plan to use that water primarily for sanitation, we are looking into a larger water storage container. However much of our prep at the moment is dried foods. I am working on getting canned veg and obviously that "water" would be useable (although it comes with a price - high sodium and more chemical contamination). I'm wondering how much "other" water folks store to support their dry/reconstituted food storage?

[Lynn LeFey]

I'm not sure about where to get powdered hummus, but since hummus is mostly garbonzo beans (chick peas), you can get Garam flour, which is just finely ground chickpea. Alternate spelling on Garam is 'Gram'. International markets will have it, but the spelling on the package may be different. It cooks up in about the time it takes to boil water. Awesome stuff. I highly recommend it.

Zombiepreparation... I can certainly see how powdered foods give you some advantage if you're carrying the stuff. I think you've got a different angle on carrying food than I've ever seen. However, I'd say that bouillon cubes and plain white flour would be better than grinding ramen. Probably a good deal cheaper, too. And, I should note that I've made meals of the Gram flour I mentioned above, a bouillon cube, and flour made into little dumplings/pasta.

[zombiepreparation]

Where does one get powdered hummus or did you make it yourself?

Dang, do I feel fortunate or what! We have a couple of local stores that offer a pwdered (just add water & luv) hummus mix. One store has pre-packaged by them in small unit amts. Another store has bulk so I can determine how much I wish to take home. I always have 'pounds' of it on hand because I eat it every single day, usually not even like actual hummus in that I make it 'drinkable', sometimes with other things (like greens I've blended) added, sometimes not. Sometimes it is a soup base for me. It would be hard to explain how much I like this sippable hummus drink because it is delicious to me. The last several days I went ahead and made it into real textured humus to dip the cucumbers in that I'm harvesting right now. But my fav and daily use is the drinkable version.

Which is how I started thinking about my current plan of powdered BOB foods. It was a natural step for me to move that direction. You see I have these little plastic containers with screw-on lids that don't leak (they may be Ziplock. I don't remember). They nest real well and I figured one time "Hey, I could rehydrate the hummus I like to drink and secret it in something while it is re-hydrating, then drink it when it's ready. Bet that wouldn't be too conspicuous, a little cup, looks like water but not enough to steal. hmmm." Then "Say, what about the dehydrated spinach? I could blend it into powder and add it to the humus for drinking. Who's gonna try to steal a small ziplock with green powder." Which led to "HEY, I can probably powder all of this stuff to facilitate re-hydration time w/out hot water." And so on with all the things I mentioned above. I also have oats, instant rice, etc. I forgot to mention. All blended to small unidentifiable size for easy re-hydration w/out heat if needed. btw- I will happily 'drink' hydrated oats and rice if necessary without a second thought.

I pack quinoa for sprouting on the move too. Good protein. Sprouting camouflaged in those plastic containers I mentioned, or just softened for consumption later.

Hey! I just thought of this, I could do couscous too! Blend it down to a powder.

And... all the food I powder takes up muuuuch less space in my BOB.

My though processes. Entertaining at times. Comes up with useful stuff now and then though.

[ZombieGranny]

zombiepreparation,
If it is not too much trouble, could you put a list in a single post of the items you have dehydrated and powdered?
I dehydrate and powder or mince many things, but put them in soups.
Do you drink them all cold, or some hot; and do you use them in any cooking?

I ask, because we are eating healthier (must be around for the grandkids, doncha know).
We already make health shakes, and are going to get a wheat grass juicer next month.

[zombiepreparation]

I'm also wondering about the whole water issue. We currently have almost a 1 week drinking supply (1 gal pppd and 1 for pets). We have a 55 gal rain barrel but can't count on it if it doesn't rain and plan to use that water primarily for sanitation, we are looking into a larger water storage container. However much of our prep at the moment is dried foods. I am working on getting canned veg and obviously that "water" would be usable (although it comes with a price - high sodium and more chemical contamination). I'm wondering how much "other" water folks store to support their dry/reconstituted food storage?

At this time *I* am basically doing The Poor Man's Prepping water storage: Bottles & jars that had food/drink in them before that have been cleaned, then rinsed with bleach solution, dried, rinsed, lastly filled with tap water for storage since tap water 'comes' with chlorine in it.

Not my creative idea, just reading what others in this thread and elsewhere suggest/do. But I am only one person and you have a family to prep for so what do I know.

The bulk of my potable water preps is in 64 oz juice containers. Lots of them. These items always have water in them. I started out with maybe three, four, of those containers in December last year. I began encouraging my friends to send their emptied containers this size my way. I now have 19 and a half gallons stored that way. Emptied and refilled periodically.

I have a few errant 16 oz soda bottles that are always clean and full of water. I'll guestimate maybe three gallons worth.

So that's around 22 gallons always ready for action. For me abt 21 days for food/drinking/tooth brushing. For a family of four - seven it's a three to six day supply, so even that much never hurts in an emergency.

Then I have buckets; three/four/five gallon, food grade, that supermarkets deliver their icing, potato salad, cold slaw, etc. to their stores in. Around 41 gallons worth of buckets, kept at the ready to be filled at a moment's notice if an Event is giving me time. Kept nested in one corner when not in use.

During this last heat wave, there was reason to be prepared if local water dropped below necessary levels and/or municipal equipment stopped pumping water to the city so I did what I call my Katrina move (as in hurricane Katrina). I filled every container in the apartment that could hold and maintain potable water, including the crock pot. From little jars to yogurt containers to all food storage containers to ball jars to peanut butter jars to all cooking pots. And I got a little under four more gallons. And last my Berkey water filter holds 1 1/2 gallons.

(That was a fun exercise; quickly filling everything with water for a possible short term Event. Leisure learning. In case anybody wonders, I am now slowly using up the stored water on gardening. Downstairs/two gallons a day, balcony/keeping the 5 gallon work bucket on the bacony filled for the plants there.)

I don't relate to water storage in the big prepper plans, with huge (or even big) containers and lots of them. I'm small time. Oh yeah, and Poor. And live in a tiny apartment. So I make do with what I can. But I'll tell you what, this exercise did surprised me with how much water I was capable of gathering quickly.

Until you figure out something big and permanent I don't think you could go too wrong with big glass & plastic drink (juice? soda?) containers filled with water, sitting in a row or nestled away, in case of a small Event comes your way.

[goofygurl]

Not sure if this is the right place for this but wondering what folks think about the idea of peanut butter powder as a prep/storage item. I'm going to check it the next time I'm at the grocery store but I think the storage life would be a little longer because 85% of the fat has been removed. But you need water to rehydrate it (thereby adding higher need to water storage).

I am always thinking abt portability during a relatively short-term bug "out" Event. The flood is coming! Get out!... The apt building is on fire! Get out!... The nuclear plant is going to melt down! Get out! My BOB is for those conditions, I can't come up with BO 'anything' for PAW or EOTWAWKI. I have no workable BOL for those scenarios.

My point being, whether it will always stay this way or not, my BOB food supply is almost entirely powdered or ground way down; humus, spinach, split peas, lentils, parsley, potatoes, re-fried beans, oats, mixed vegetables, farina, polenta, milk, ramen (yep, folks, I put the ramen in the blender and made it an even more instant instant food for my BOB), red & green bell pepper, chives, etc. So in a scenario of get out fast and for a short time, for me, a powdered peanut is an interesting investigation.

For me these powered things are easy to rehydrate w/o fire, I eat them already so they are 'comfortable', I consider them a 'Gray Food' like people speak of being a 'Gray Man' in that they don't look like food, especially identifiable food, even more important to me: Appealing identifiable food. Thinking this could reduce opportunity theft. It is also much much easier to share in dire situations: giving a big pinch of this/that in multiple people's water if water is still available in attempt to stave off EVerybody's starvation while trying to reorganize.

Therefore I am interested in looking at a BOB peanut butter powder. Not for storage though. I don't think so at this time. Peanut butter is too simple to store/to eat just as it comes.

Powdered peanut butter for BOB. (hey, unless there is peanutbutter in sealed single serving pouches like the Spam, mayo, sardines, etc.)
Regular peanut butter for storage.
For me at this time.

Bring more ideas like this to the Poor Man's Prepping thread!

There is. JIF to go is what it's called. Also, Walmart sells Peanut Butter & Co in single serve packets too.

[goofygurl]

On water storage you should figure 1-2 gallons, per day, per person...and don't forget your pets.

[zombiepreparation]

Zombiepreparation... I'd say that bouillon cubes and plain white flour would be better than grinding ramen. Probably a good deal cheaper, too. And, I should note that I've made meals of the Gram flour I mentioned above, a bouillon cube, and flour made into little dumplings/pasta.

I had the ramen anyway. I was just testing it out. Doing a "Let's see what this does!" thing. Thanks for the tips.

[zombiepreparation]

(hey, unless there is peanutbutter in sealed single serving pouches like the Spam, mayo, sardines, etc.)

There is. JIF to go is what it's called. Also, Walmart sells Peanut Butter & Co in single serve packets too.

Excellent tip.