Category: Food Storage & Cooking

Local Food and Energy from Top Lit Up Draft Micro-Gasification Stoves, by Doug B.

"Food and energy are the two keystones of any community economy anywhere on earth.   If we produce and distribute food and energy locally, we have the food, the energy and the money.   We establish the capacity to create and retain wealth in our community.   We put in place the two foundations of any human economy."  -David Yarrow. More and easier food and energy production immediately raise standards of living. Less time worrying about essentials, leaves more time to do everything else.  Do not overlook this simple truth in preparedness and future planning.  Top Lit Up Draft (TLUD) stove technology has …


Letter Re: Food Storage in the Southern United States

Mr. Rawles, Regarding the letter, Food Storage in the Southern United States by Gary S.,,  in Florida, from May until October, the heat is merciless, making food storage difficult. Some items, like powdered milk, barely last the summer without electrical cooling. Most folks turn their A/C up or off during the day when they are away from home or pay a very high electric bill. .With the droughts of the past few years, even heavily canopied forest home sites can be too hot. Power outages from wildfires, hurricanes, storms, tornadoes,  or heat waves can cause loss of air conditioning for …


Letter Re: Storage Food At COSTCO Stores

Jim, I just noticed while in COSTCO today that they have 6 gallon buckets of freeze dried food on offer. For $99, you get a one-month supply of 2100 calories a day, enough for one adult. I wonder how many people caught in the megastorm that hammered the East Coast recently had any food stored in, and how difficult it was for most folks to get provisions before the stores were stripped bare?  Just another reason to keep something one hand. For more variety, though, folks should really consider storing other stuff, as taught in your Rawles Gets You Ready …


Staying Sane (and Happy) at Your Winter BOL, by Mrs. Icebear

I laughed my way through the entertaining and informative (even for me – I had no theoretical knowledge of waxing skis whatsoever, just did “what the other kids did”) recent article on the “exotic Norwegian” cross country skis. So I thought that maybe a couple of other Norwegian experiences might be of interest to survivalblog-readers: Having lived the first 30 years of my life in Norway and had ample experience with both skiing and offgrid living as a part of everyday life, I have some personal tips on not just surviving offgrid, but actually having a good time even though: …


Do-It-Yourself Prepping, by L.J.D.

In the past year, prepping has gone from an interesting concept to a way of life for us. There are countless resources for information, products and equipment available to the person who has an open calendar and a bottomless bank account. Unfortunately for the rest of us, even if we can carve out enough time to fully devote ourselves to prepping, we tend to find a large portion of supplies to be out of the realm of our current budget. And, with the economy in crisis, it doesn’t seem probable that the budget will be increasing anytime soon. In our …


Addictions That Could Be Your Undoing, by Z.T.

I have tried to think about things that you may not have thought of, in regards to The End of the World as We Know It (TEOTWAWKI.) And maybe not just fresh ideas for readers, but even for those that write about these things. And, it’s possible that you may even think that I am going waaaay out there to bring you fresh ideas. But I’m not. I bet you haven’t thought of how silly and secret addictions can really hurt you. Have you? While the effects of hard drugs, even seemingly minor alcoholism, have their own withdrawal symptoms that …


Letter Re: U.S. Army Recipes Available Free Online

Jim, I have been building a library of preparedness-related documents to store on a DVD data disc. In my search for cooking recipes, I found this web site: U.S. Army Quartermaster Corps School: Food Service Publications & Links The page contains a link to a ZIP archive of recipes use by the Army — about 100 MB of indexed recipes of all types. A direct link to the ZIP file is here. Watch ‘Yer Top Knot and Keep Your Powder Dry, – The Wyoming Geezer


Lessons Learned on My Prepping Journey, by Tim K.

As Seen on TV – My Humble Beginnings I admit I’ve watched just about every episode out there from all of the popular survival shows – Survivorman, Beyond Survival, Man vs. Wild, Dual Survival, Man Woman Wild, and yes, even Worst Case Scenario with Bear Gryllis . I ate it all up. Those shows got me hooked on wilderness survival. My Christmas and birthday lists went from a focus on video games and computer upgrades to things like paracord, solar blankets, magnesium fire starters, etc. I also got a few great books that gave me vast amounts of knowledge. Everything …


Letter Re: Cooking the Farmyard Fowl

James, I really learned a lot from the Cooking the Farmyard Fowl article by Irishfarmer.  My chicken flock is reaching an average of two years of age and they are laying fewer eggs.  It is time to learn how to put them into the stew pot. I had two questions raised from that article.  How do you make a killing cone, and how do you kill and process a chicken?  I found good information at the following links: How to Make a Killing Cone  It includes sizing information ranging from bantams to turkeys.  That page referred me to How to Kill …


Some Advice for Newbie Preppers, by Jillie

Around two years ago, I was sitting at my friend’s house visiting and he tells me about the supposed end of the world on December 21st, 2012.  At first I thought he was feeding me a line of horse manure.  He went on to tell me that he was going to buy the car of his dreams that he wouldn’t be able to afford, rack up his credit cards, get a big loan and live it up.  He wasn’t going to have to pay it back anyway, the world was going to end and we were all going to die.  …


Cooking the Farmyard Fowl for Modern Eaters, by Irishfarmer

In an austere situation, or even an economically challenged one, what do you do with those old hens, the ones eating more than laying, and especially, extra males, like all those roosters that hatched or came with the hatchery order?  We’re not talking here about raising broilers from the hatchery, feeding and sweating over them for the required number of weeks, doing the killing all in one or two days and then packing them into the freezer.  This article is for the person who is facing eating real barnyard birds.  It is also for the person whose family is used …


Letter Re: Sugar and Spice Will Always Be Nice

In the interest of honest and complete coverage of the topic, I’d like to clarify and expand upon the comments made by a contributor about the "brown sugar" typically marketed in the United States and Canada.   Brown Sugar is indeed just white sugar with molasses added to it. But what is not clear to most people is that molasses is what is left over when you refine sugar cane or sugar beets into white sugar.   Some sugars labeled “turbinado” or “demerara” sugars are made from partially refined sugar-juice that have had some of the water driven off by …


What Made Me Begin Preparing for TEOTWAWKI, by Elizabeth in the Northeast

I woke up a few months ago. Literally, I woke up one day and realized if TSHTF, I was toast. In a big way. It all started with Hurricane Sandy. I live in a coastal town in the Northeast. The beach is a comfortable twenty minute walk from my home. Three streets behind me is Water Street, so named because not only is home to various Marina’s and marine supply stores, it has a tendency to flood every high tide. I woke up the morning Sandy hit to an eerily lit sky. Even though a hurricane was heading our way …


Letter Re: Food Storage in the Southern United States

Sir: As a Central Texas Prepper, I have solved my food storage problem affordably, as follows: On my property there was an existing 20 foot by 24 foot sheetrock walled tool shed. I gutted this building and installed slabs of 8 inch styrofoam panels against interior walls. These blocks of foam were salvaged from floating docks on a local lake as most people were installing plastic floats under their docks. The styrofoam blocks were free for the taking..As the floats were used and had been in the water in some cases for years, they looked gross and smelled bad also. …


Letter Re: Sugar and Spice Will Always Be Nice

Dear Editor: My father worked for many years at a sugar factory, and I can tell you there is no such thing as a natural “brown sugar”.  Brown sugar is simply post-production white sugar with molasses added.   As you make your recipe, use slightly more than the called for amount of brown sugar–maybe an extra teaspoon or two, and then add molasses.  If the recipe calls for light brown sugar, add a little molasses.  Dark brown sugar? Just add more molasses.    Also, because you’re storing the components separately, your “brown sugar” never gets hard as a rock, because you mix it at …