JWR’s Recommendations of the Week:

39 Comments

1. James, did you actually buy the 3 ply masks that you recommended in this post? What was your specific experience with them?

   1. Those were recommended by a reader, who described them as “good quality, for that price.” The breathing resistance, she said, was typical. She was shocked that they ACTUALLY had them in stock, and shipped them promptly. With so many states now asking people to wear masks routinely, I expect the shortage of disposable masks to continue for many months.

2. The only problem with trying to stock up with meat is you currently cannot find a deep freezer anywhere, there has been a run on that item as well, as folks start to see the perils in front of them.
   My neighbor across the road raises grass fed beef, this year he did not even hang a sign up, all sold out in Feb. thankfully we have a standing order.
   Same goes with pork, if at all possible please seek out your local rancher and buy direct from him and he should be able to point you to a mom and pop butcher too.
   Eliminate the middle man keep the money local

   1. One way around the freezer issue, if you have a pressure canner, is canning the meat. It takes a little while, but you get shelf stable meat that is ready to eat.

3. A good reminder from JWR re: the need to stock (and re-stock) food supplies including canned roast beef or corned beef. Prices are going up, and meat shortages continue at least for now. We are seeing these conditions in our area also.

   In addition to grocery store style meat stocks, we would encourage everyone to consider having their own chickens (and maybe turkeys or ducks depending on your interest, experience, environment, capacity, relevant rules or laws, etc). Farm fresh eggs are a terrific source of renewable protein.

4. Yes, there appears to be shortages on buying new freezers but I would suggest canning hamburger,stew meat, chicken and turkey chunks and pork . Stored properly in a cool & dark area it will keep a long time and is not affected by a power outage. We look at our freezer as a shorter term storage area until we use the food or can/preserve it.
   Meat is being rationed now and is in limited supply. The time to get serious about saving stuff was yesterday. The next best time is right now!

   1. Every year after Christmas we take advantage of the sales on turkeys and we can turkey. This year the price was literally a steal, about $.18 a pound. So we canned three of them. We cook each turkey then cut off all the meat into chunk size pieces and put the bones and skin, etc. into a pot with 8-12 quarts of water to simmer for four hours. We get about 7 quarts of meat with broth and about 3 quarts of just broth out of each turkey. We were still in the dark about any pandemic when we did this in late December. Had we known we would have done six turkeys, maybe more.

      1. One Guy,
         We also buy turkeys when on sale and can up meat and broth. We bought a turkey a month ago at $ 1.43 a pound , still cheap meat compared to other meats. We do chicken and turkey in quarts and do beef burger ,stew meat and pork in pints like Tunnel Rabbit mentioned. We are doing a canner full of burger as I am writing this.
         I have reconditioned an old 14 quart capacity Presto camp canner and am looking forward to putting it to use this canning season. The first test run will be outside.

5. Use pint size jars for meat as the portion size is just about right for one or two persons. They have gone up about 80 percent in the last few months.

   https://www.amazon.com/Kerr-Canning-Regular-Mouth-70610-00503/dp/B007SXEPT4/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3BDD66DECTF0P&dchild=1&keywords=kerr+canning+jars+pint&qid=1589380948&sprefix=kerr+canning+jars%2Caps%2C191&sr=8-1

   1. I ordered some canning supplies plus pint and 1/2 pint jars from Walmart and it took almost a month to get the last part of the order. I paid $10/case for pints and $8/case for 1/2 pints. I figured the prices would double of the next few months.

   2. I like to can corned beef in pint jars. I buy it in bulk before Saint Patricks Day. Have done it for several years now.

      A pint is great for nice batch of corned beef hash.

      75 minutes processing time.

   3. That’s exactly the way my wife and I do it, we can meat in pints, and occasionally I’ll do a few half pints. After we can the chickens and rabbits we cook the remainder of the animal down and make stock, and we can some of that in pints, but we have found that for most of our cooking needs we usually use a quart of stock anyway, so we have started canning the stock in quarts. It’s amazing how much more useful product you get from an animal by cooking the bones and meat into stock. It tastes better than the packaged stuff at the store too.

   4. Fast places to pick up mason jars every where USA.

      Walmart and Target.

      Canning for food preserving was getting abandoned but those two stores are universal in every state

      Actually if you order off of Amazon you will get a Walmart box

      1. Also at Farm & Fleet

         I got lots of them a few weeks back and they delivered them very promptly.

         Rock on

      2. Around here in central NC the Walmarts still mostly have plenty of canning supplies. Sometimes they are out of jars, or at least certain sizes/brands, but generally they are available at Walmart for around $8/ dozen for pints and $9/dozen for quarts for Anchor Hocking or Golden Harvest, and around $1 per dozen more for Ball or Kerr.
         Dollar General has jars, lids, and rings around here too, for around the same price as Walmart.

      3. If you live near Rural King, they still have decent prices and availability of canning supplies. I think they ship too, but I can’t comment on the shipping rates. Rural King is a competitor to Tractor Supply in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, West Virginia, Virginia, Florida, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Alabama, Missouri and a couple in Michigan and North Carolina.

         1. I’ve heard good things about Rural King, I plan to check one out, the nearest one to me is in VA near where an Uncle of mine lives.

         2. Love Rural King!!
            The people that work there are some of the nicest people I’ve ever met!!

            Rock on

   5. Ace Hardware Kalispell: Ball Qt.Jars Wide Mouth 12 Pack $16.19 with veterans discount.
      Ball Pt. Jars Reg. Mouth 12 Pack $11.69 with veterans discount.

      Called in the order this morning and picked it up one hour later. Store Mgr. brought it out and loaded into the back of the truck.(He was wearing a mask and gloves)
      I don’t think that price is an 80% mark up

      1. Hi Vickie,
         Sounds like you bought old stock at the old price. If the prices at Amazon are any indication, when the store in Kalispell restocks, they’ll have to mark it up. It is always good to be ahead of the curve, and to ”beat the rush”. This nut did not fall far from the tree on the farm. Just as some of our ancestors did, they jarred up at least one year’s worth of food piled up just in case. Some used nearly 500 quart jars per person to accomplish this. This is why when grandma passed, there were thousands of jars to get rid of. Now there are getting scarce at yard sales, and the local Eureka thrift store charges .75 cents for a used jar, no lid and seal.

         1. The thrift stores do seem to be slim pickings on jars. It seems like now I can buy new jars with lids and rings for about the same as what the Thrift store wants for just the jar.

         2. To me it’s about availability – – what can I get today- -locally.We want our money to support
            home town businesses and it’s workers.Our days of roaming around Salvation Army and
            Good Will looking for canning supplies are over.

            1. I also haven’t tried to look at the thrift stores much in a while because of not finding much. I wish we still had more local hardware stores that kept canning supplies, none of them do anymore.

6. Some Seiko self winding watches, known as Kinetic, have a capacitor that stores power for the quartz crystal. I have no idea how that capacitor would react to EMP. So I keep an old fashioned Timex wind up in my kit.

   Otherwise the Kinetic is a great watch.

7. Do a google search on WWII rationing. I have used it as a guide for my larder for many years. It can help prioritize. Also Costco has Kirkland 12 oz canned beef, also sold on amazon. It has gotten pretty pricy lately. I have used some and it tastes real good.

   1. Canned corned beef tight times recipie (with out extra spices but you can add I like Chiles or red flakes and tobasco)

      I can corned beef cooked like hamburger all smashed and crispy.
      4 to 6 eggs scrambled into the corned beef.
      Throw in mayo or miracle whip or ranch dressing
      Serve in sandwich (slices of tomato are good here as are onion slices pickles etc)

      That one pot of food will take me through a whole day even at work if taken for lunch overtime work as well.

      It’s very heavy in the stomach though so you should plan on having a full lunch time to digest
      Drink lots of water and there ya go all day off of 1 can 4 eggs mayo(in my case) and bread

   2. I searched out WWII rationing as well and then kept an eye on what went out of stock quickly in the last few months. It didn’t appear to be the same type of things as WWII. So much has changed since then. So, I started thinking about what is grown/manufactured here in the US, and then what is grown regionally, then locally, and tried to work from there. We have plenty of beef where I live, wheat, potatoes, but don’t grow rice and not a lot of beans that I can tell. Coffee is one of those things I try to stock up quite a bit that was also a WWII rationed item, which is not widely grown in the states. I think a lot depends upon where one lives. According to the Idaho’s state agriculture website, “Idaho’s 25,000 farms and ranches produce more than 185 different commodities, and we’re ranked in the top 10 in the U.S. for production of more than 25 crops and livestock.” If I lived elsewhere, I’d be researching what my state produces, how available that product is locally, and what I would need to supplement in the form of storage. My two cents.

      1. On the potential rationing area my plans and logic:

         I know myself that I can get by on salads consisting of tomatoes lettuce (leafy ones not iceburg) spinach cabbage with or with out meat cheese or dressing (I don’t like to do with out but can)

         These are things that I can grow in small pots (even milk jugs) if need be.

         I also know from experience that I can pickle many fruits.

         As a result I will be focusing on limping by until I get those going. The goal is to use those to lower cost items to reduce the grocery bill giving me room to afford then now newer higher priced items.

         Also cooking food with much higher vegetables and fruits to meat ratios ie 2 chicken breast cubed and cooked into a thick potato soup with broccoli, cauliflower, onions and other veg will make a meal or two for me and my wife that will run all day (that’s dinner one night lunch next day) even when I am working.

         Most of our “grandma recipient” when doubled with veg will make meal and lunch dishes. At least in my families cook books. But then again my grannies cook books came from depression and dust bowl Oklahoma and the others were from surviving post WW1 Germany she left the land right before VJ day.

         1. I think you are wise to see that what your grandparents lived through, could be a reality for us too. I feel the same way and have some experiences that taught me how to be frugal.

8. Does anyone else find it amusing that canning jars have suddenly become such a valuable resource? Up until 2 months ago, I was buying canning jars at the thrift stores for pennies on the dollar, because they couldn’t get rid of them. And yes, I bought everyone I could find, as long as they weren’t more expensive than new ones.

9. Wife went to the store today, Safeway in North Pole, meat was down low, no chicken at all … the rest was rationed to a few items each for a purchase. This is the first time I’ve seen this sort of activity here except for the toilet paper fiasco …

   1. Yikes,
      I’m praying that the situation changes for you and that the next time she goes that there will be more in stock for you

      Rock on

10. When it all started to happen in late Feb/early Mar here….I immediately went to the farm store, to see if (maybe? by the grace of God?) they had some little chicks. They did! They arrived 20 minutes after I got to the store…straight from USPS/pick-up. I was first in a line of several people. Picked up 30 chicks, even though we weren’t really ready for more chickens. I AM SO GLAD that God blessed and we got them. No chicks available now anywhere. Our old layers are providing protein now….hopefully, if God blesses, those newbies will be our fall protein/back-up source.

11. Cans of Keystone Beef are still trickling in at the local Walmart on a truck about once every other week. They don’t stick around too long though, lol. Usually it’s the larger 28oz can for $7-something, but there’s also the smaller 14.5oz can for $4-something. My mother gets them anyway ‘just because’ — she likes to cook with them, reminds her of the pot roast and the way the meat tears away. I like it cause the “Buy or Use” date is almost 5 years away (and the gelatinous fat that may be useful later). Keystone also has cans of chicken that last a long time too.

    And we still have plenty of chicks at the local ‘farm, home, and outdoor’ store.
    They’re still coming in. Our area has been blessed overall, I guess.

12. I see my library has The Lincoln Conspiracy as an audio book so I’ll definitely be checking that out. I’d also recommend The Hour of Peril about the same event which focuses on the work of Allan Pinkerton, America’s first private detective.

13. For MealSaver/Seal a Meal fans,take a look at service@simplehousewares.com
    2pk. vacuum sealer bag rolls.
    (1) 8 in. by 50 ft. roll (1) 11 in. by 50 ft. Roll. Item #KF-003-3
    Work great on rice,beans,pasta,sugar,salt,biscuit and pancake mix.Bacon and chicken also.

14. Why is this press release coming out of the DOD, and announces it’s involvement with the Dept of Health in the acquisition of 100 million doses of a vaccine by the end of 2020? Can’t the Dept of Health handle that, or do they need help with the inoculation process? Does the Dept of Health need the military to deliver and enforce a mandatory vaccination program? Read the press release here:

    https://ce-publiclw.naturalnews.com/ct.asp?id=6CC2DE92A2334117CEF704926FB7E554B0E4285AF78EFC112EF8FBCF1C59DAB49BFDB95F636871B44E07BDC3BE82AA9C3C256E48CD04D9B2B8E6FE2DA9BDD968&ct=4aeUs3cAAABCWmgzMUFZJlNZp95aKgAAHRmAAAP6EC%2f336AgAGhFPEmRkep5RghoKm0xTZNTRoNDEHBJ3WT%2b2HMCxxZF03JANykccenVgm6lHsIawvao9jaIOVbXqLTKlzgFGpYGeRvdM2hIEQzw75UIcbUVISqzyAdDGKv94%2fF3JFOFCQp95aKg

    “The contract also enables ApiJect Systems America to accelerate the launch of RAPID USA manufactured in new and permanent U.S.-based BFS facilities with the ultimate production goal of over 500 million prefilled syringes (doses) in 2021. This effort will be executed initially in Connecticut, South Carolina and Illinois, with potential expansion to other U.S.-based locations. RAPID will provide increased lifesaving capability against future national health emergencies that require population-scale vaccine administration on an urgent basis.”

    1. Tunnel Rabbit,

       No way, Never, not gonna happen for me. Thank you for posting this. I guess my state (IL) being part of the beginning of this shouldn’t surprise me.

       Rock on

15. Its interesting to see that you posted something about Bix Beiderbecke because I’m from the Quad City area and enjoyed go to the Bix fest every year…

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