Category Archives: Prepping

Plans, Not Panic

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This is not an overtly political post, however, there is no doubt that the geopolitical events currently unfolding in the Middle East are going to have an impact on us all in one way or another.

I am interested to hear about what preparation and strategies you have in place. Have you considered how you will manage if fuel becomes limited, rationed or simply unavailable? What about food? Frozen goods, shelf stable supplies and home-grown produce?

Here are a couple of views of my pantry.

Luckily, it is autumn and the freezer is almost groaning with produce we have gathered and stored in various ways. I also did a big shop of bulk dry goods just a few weeks ago so the pantry is generally well-stocked.

The other thing to consider at all times but it is particularly relevant now is to make sure that food is not wasted. Leftovers can be turned into a whole new meal and some creative thinking might be required if ingredients run low. There are many websites that offer ideas of substitutions that can be made for specific ingredients.

This afternoon I saw a message to a local group asking if anyone was travelling to the next town (about 15km away) this evening and who might be interested in carpooling. This gladdens my heart immensely as it means people are thinking ahead about what they can do to make a difference as well as looking out for others in their community.

We have a small blessing as we are driving a hire car after my crash last month and it is a hybrid so less fuel required. We are also trying to minimise our travel and combine errands where possible. There is plenty to keep us occupied close to home and we are very fortunate to be able to catch the train to Melbourne if we wish with only a relatively short drive to the railway station in the next town.

I do have flights booked to travel interstate in about 6 weeks so I am hoping I am still able to do that. Yesterday, I received an email from Jetstar advising that my flight had been changed by about 10 hours – early morning instead of late afternoon. I expect that is as a result of the later flight possibly being cancelled. It is not a problem for me but the impacts are already starting to show.

I am mindful that the lack of fuel will have massive potential impacts in the farm and transport sectors so it is important that we all take whatever steps we can to minimise our personal usage. We should also try to be responsible for ourselves and look out for those less capable in our communities.

Rearranged and Ready

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While we were away on holidays in northern Europe there was a catastrophic bushfire which began less than 20km from our home. That was far too close for comfort. When we arrived home a couple of weeks later we decided to upgrade our vague evacuation plan. You can read about our initial response in this post from late January.

We have had some rain and are experiencing much more moderate temperatures so the bushfire threat is significantly reduced.

Anyway, yesterday I decided that I really needed to tidy up the 3rd bedroom. When we gathered up everything in case of another catastrophic fire risk we had it all stashed in that room.

I carefully resorted everything and decided on an arrangement that would allow us to keep things we use in their regular locations for the 9-10 months of the year when the risk of an emergency evacuation is minimal.

I have 2 emergency boxes stocked with detailed lists attached and a third box in which to collect a few other things in order to leave immediately if required. There is also a bag with 2 woolen blankets. These do get used on beds during the winters months but this is where I will store them during the summer and they form part of the emergency kit. I have lists of everything. These are all stored in the top of the linen cupboard which is located centrally in the house. It is funny that I still refer to it as a linen cupboard as there is more of other stuff than linen in it.

A close-up view.

I hope I never have to put this plan into action but I feel that I am as prepared as possible should the worst case scenario ever eventuate.

Harvest Happenings

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Even with a relatively small garden the late summer and early autumn harvests are enough to keep idle hands occupied.

We have 2 varieties of Nashi pear trees espaliered and we have had them netted for the past 3 months to allow the fruit to grow and ripen unhindered by our feathered friends.

Today we picked all of the fruit from one tree. 70 Nashi pears.

GMan has been busy for several hours peeling, cutting and slicing. We cooked them in batches in the microwave and they are now cooling before we freeze them. We use the lightly stewed fruit on our breakfast cereal.

The fruit from the other tree will need to be picked before too long. Meanwhile the tomato harvest continues. This all from a single plant. We have enjoyed generous serves of tomato in lots of meals over the past few weeks. I think I will need to dice and freeze some of them for use in casseroles and other cooking during the winter.

Additionally, the cherry tomato plants are now ripening so I am simply destalking and rinsing them and freezing in 1kg bags. I can see some sauce making in the not too distant future.

I’m Back

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After 5 weeks on holidays we have returned home. The change in weather has been quite a shock to the system. After 5 weeks in Europe where the temperatures were mostly below freezing we have come back to a heatwave in the middle of an Australian summer.

The risk of bushfire is ever-present in these conditions and unfortunately disaster befell a small community quite close to where we live while we were away. This weekend and next week are extreme fire danger conditions with a total fire ban across the entire state where we live.

While I had a pretty fair idea of my evacuation strategy, we decided to be a bit more proactive with our plans.

This is what we did:

Identify what we would take if we needed to leave
Prioritise immediate ‘grab and go’ stuff
Add things if time permitted
Locate as much as possible together in an easily accessible spot
Create checklists so that you are not relying on memory in a time of high stress

Ready to go.

Checklists

There are a few things that we would need to add but most of what we would take is set aside in the spare bedroom. It will remain like this for the next couple of months. Even after that most of it will not all be dismantled but stored in the top of the linen cupboard and reviewed well before next summer.

The other question is when do you leave and where do you go. The general guidance from the authorities here in Australia that it is best to leave early. As for where, it really depends on where the risk is coming from. It is important to be prepared to amend your plans as required.

In line with the theme of this blog, my task today was made considerably easier because my home is mostly decluttered and organised. I know what we have and where it is located.

Are you in a fire-prone area? What about other natural disasters? Do you have an evacuation plan?

Tinned Tomatoes

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You may remember this post from about a month ago. I bought 3 rather large tins of crushed tomatoes. I made sure that I had a plan for how to use/store nearly 3kg of crushed tomatoes once the can was opened. This is important to make sure that nothing goes to waste.

I opened one a couple of days ago and used 2 cups of it in a dish I was making. The remainder are now frozen in quantities which are a similar size to a regular 400g can of tomatoes.

Buying Basil

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Basil grows easily here during the summer and sometimes I am organised enough to make and freeze some pesto for use throughout the year.

However, I bought a large (800g) can of basil pesto a few weeks ago when I spotted it at Cheaper Buy Miles when were in Melbourne. There are several of these stores, predominantly in inner suburbs of Melbourne, where you can buy an amazing array of short-dated items.

Here is an image from their website.

You never know quite what you will find so it is quite an adventure. They often have a good selection of gluten-free and vegan foods, too.

Anyway, back to the basil pesto. I bought a 800g tin for $6 and based on the average price per 100g of basil pesto at Woolworths it is worth about $20!!

Of course, it can be quite daunting as to what to do with this kind of bulk quantity. I used some to make a creamy basil pesto and mushroom pasta dish for dinner the other night then I portioned the rest up in ice-cube trays and froze it.

I now have a bag of frozen cubes of basil pesto which will thaw quickly and easily for a multitude of uses.

Labour Intensive

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The last week of May ran away while I wasn’t looking so welcome to a new month and the first official day of winter here in the southern hemisphere.

Towards the end of last year I picked a good crop of garlic that I grew. In fact, I harvested 1.7kg of garlic. I have replanted some, given some away and used it as required for the past 6 months. There was still a substantial quantity left so I decided to make my own garlic salt.

I spent a good few hours carefully peeling and thinly slicing the cloves.

Here they are laid out on the racks and ready to go in the dehydrator.

15 hours later the pieces were dry and crunchy. Here is some of the results.

I then ground the dried garlic pieces to a powder and mixed them with an equal weight of salt.

This is the 300g of garlic salt which I now have ready to use in cooking as needed.

Although it was a fairly time-consuming project, I feel that this was definitely worthwhile.

Ready to Roast

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It almost 2 years since I wrote this post with a recipe for pumpkin soup. After a long, hot summer we are finally experiencing some slightly cooler days.

Like all of my cooking escapades there is plenty of room for variation. A couple of days ago GMan was baking a couple of loaves of sourdough bread so I decided to make use of the oven being on to roast the pumpkin while the oven was heating up to the temperature required for the bread.

Pumpkin wedges brushed with a mix of balsamic syrup and olive oil.

After roasting the skin peels off easily.

A pot of deliciousness.

We had soup for dinner and there were another 10 serves to go in the freezer for future meals.

It was a productive kitchen day as I had also made a new batch of spreadable butter, deyhdrated the pumpkin seeds and some root ginger which had been in the freezer for a couple of years and GMan made the bread.

A Successful Experiment

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I have been occupied with some non-blogworthy business so not a lot to share at the moment.

However, the dehydrator has been working overtime as I dried a couple of lots of sliced nashi pears. This has been a raging success and I will definitely be some more over the next few days. The pile of fruit spread on the dining table is gradually reducing.

This is what they look like.

More importantly they taste absolutely delicious.

We went out to lunch with friends today and had our main meal so didn’t need too much for dinner. I did not take a photo but we had a small platter of crackers, dip, camembert cheese and the dried pears which was very tasty indeed.

Processing Plums

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It is that time of the year when everything seems to be ripening at once. I have a nectarine tree but no other stone fruit, however, there are plums aplenty around town and I have received some from 3 different sources in the last week so today I made jam using 3.4kg of plums.

This is the result.

These were the first batch of plums I was given. They don’t look much but have a lovely flavour and beautiful deep red flesh.

Since having an airfryer I have discovered that it is a relatively quick and easy way to sterilise the jars and lids rather than having to turn the oven on. That is definitely a consideration on a day like today when the forecast temperature was 37C (98.6F).

However, it was not all plain sailing as I had a calamity with the second batch of jars. Thankfully there were only 4 of them but they came to grief when I managed to catch the handle of airfryer with my oven mitt and send the contents flying across the kitchen floor. One jar broke but that was all. GMan kindly swept up the broken glass while I retrieved the remainder and the lids, re-washed them and started the process again.

The other job was somewhat simpler than jam-making as I had some gifted oranges to juice. It is the first time I have had fresh orange juice since we moved here which has been a bit of a shock after having what seemed like an endless supply from the 3 trees we had in our previous garden.

Finally, we were delighted to record 42mm of rain in a series of thunderstorms overnight. It has given the garden a welcome soaking during what has been several weeks of fairly hot, dry weather.