Category: Food Storage & Cooking

Dear Mr. Rawles,   I would like to add one more consideration to the post-collapse coffee junkie.  My fellow caffeine addicts may be under the misperception that their fix has to come from Java, Columbia or China.  Not strictly true.  Although it is not “coffee” per se, there is a native plant which can provide a caffeine jolt, hold off that dreaded withdrawal headache for you or be used to treat asthma attacks.  Ilex vomitoria var pendula, a.k.a. “Weeping Holly“, is the only native caffeine producing plant, and grows very well anywhere other hollies grow.  The preparation is a little …

Jim, I’d like to put my two cents in the coffee discussion. I work with a major coffee roaster and I know we and probably no other roaster in the country packages stale coffee. When beans are roasted they can be exposed to oxygen for a long time with out going stale. However, when the beans are ground they do have to be packaged quickly or they will go stale. If our ground coffee is not packed within 28 hours it is sent to the compost center. The comment about the coffee being packed stale because other wise the bags …

Sir: In the recent article Coffee in a Post-Collapse Society, the author is talking about Arabica coffee being only cultivated near the equator. Robusto green coffee can be grown in the southern states like Florida, south Texas (same latitude as Cuba, a coffee producing country) basically any place that citrus can grow, Robusto coffee can grow. Robusto coffee can grow at low altitudes although it is not know for it’s high quality taste. Robusto coffee beans that are used mostly for instant coffee and a blend with Arabica beans in espresso for a creamier foam. Yields for Robusto coffee are …

I’m big on food storage and my hobby is finding and photographing beetles. These two interests converge when grain beetles start reproducing in my stored grain products.   I had bought some 50-lb. bags of corn and oats at the Tractor Supply Company store, intending to treat them for insects and put them up in 5-gallon buckets. I never got around to it and eventually noticed tiny grain weevils showing up around the house. The grain had not only become infested with Rice Weevils but their droppings had produced a lot of ammonia that turned the oak flooring dark beneath …

This article is to share what we have learned in our attempt to leverage our food preps by buying commercially and in bulk with Survival Blog readers. What works in our part of the world may not be reality in your location but I hope what we have learned will be of value to some readers. To begin with, one of our favorite places to buy in quantitative is “cash and carry” stores. Cash and carry stores were originally set up by large food distribution firms that allowed businesses such as restaurants, bars, smaller retail stores, schools, etc to come …