tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 7, 2016 18:34:16 GMT 10
Tomatoes - have you ever read the Perseid Collapse by Steven Konkoly? You've pretty much just nailed the story (except it doesn't fall on election night). Sounds like that might have to be my next read. Just finished a trilogy based on economic collapse, so ready for something else.
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 7, 2016 18:31:23 GMT 10
Some vacuum bags are quite thin, but it is possible to get thick ones, minimising the chance of holes. I was looking at these www.thepackagingcentre.com.au/collections/vacuum-sealer-bags/products/channel-bags-250mm-x-350mm or similar. If you check your food stores often this won't be a problem anyway as it is very easy to see if the vacuum is gone - the package is no longer tight. You can't vacuum seal the Mylar with the standard vacuum sealer - that's what the oxygen absorbers are for. I would like some Mylar bags in order to compare, but I think for my purposes mostly I'll use the vacuum sealer bags - as that has worked well for me so far and I can rotate through most food in less than two years. If I decide Mylar will keep longer I'll put a few of each food item in Mylar for longer term, so not in my regular rotation, and possibly also use them for food that goes off quicker.
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 7, 2016 17:35:28 GMT 10
If they do end up being close to a dollar each, I might be interested in about 50. Depends on price though.
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 7, 2016 14:41:10 GMT 10
Anyone watch space weather? Solar storm incoming 8 or 9 Nov. Not bad enough to be worrying about, but it did have me thinking of the outcome of a blackout in the US on or just after election night. Perhaps people would have other explanations for the blackout.
As I said though, it is of interest for aurora watchers I think and not preppers so I'm not really expecting blackouts.
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 7, 2016 14:12:12 GMT 10
I usually order from ozfarmer.
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 7, 2016 6:58:30 GMT 10
Yes - ball jars. I have an attachment for my vacuum sealer that goes on the lid of them. When the jar is vacuum sealed you don't need the screw ring to keep the lid on - the flat bit just stays firmly on. The jars are expensive but I just try to buy a tray of them every now and then. They also don't come in a very big size - largest is about 750 ml.
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 6, 2016 15:04:25 GMT 10
Thanks for your ramble.
Another option - expensive and takes up space but easily reusable - would be to vacuum seal large preserving jars (perhaps even with an oxygen absorber added?). Because of the cost of jars this would only be possible with a few things, but perhaps a food item of high value and high risk? At the moment this is the method I use for bulk purchase of dried fruit, although I only expect it to last a fairly short time just because it gets eaten!
My main storage items are long lasting anyway - like wheat - so I'm thinking that I'll get some mylar bags just for a few items.
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 6, 2016 11:46:16 GMT 10
I might be interested in some bags depending on the price
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 6, 2016 10:28:56 GMT 10
I'm trying to weigh up the cost-benefit of Mylar bags.
I have a good Sunbeam Food Saver. The box that it came in said that, for example, flour and sugar would go from lasting 6 months without vacuum sealing to 1-2 years with it. I can buy bulk bags or rolls of the stuff to make your own bags fairly cheaply.
So if I am only planning on saving enough food for 2 years, and it is stuff that we use all the time anyway, I could buy every 3-6 months, and package up in food saver bags, put them into lidded bucket with the date, and rotate the new stores to the back and the old stores to the front for our regular use.
I would pretty quickly see if the food was deteriorating faster than I was able to use it and adjust my methods. If that was happening, I could even include a chest freezer in the system (which would not be run if power went down, but I would also not be continuously replenishing dry stores then). I would prefer not to do that because of the expense of running the freezer and the nuisance of adding that to the rotation, but it could just be used for, say, nuts and coconut.
Another option if the issue with food saver bags is that they eventually get holes would be to use two food saver bags for things that need longer storage. An option if the issue is that the food comes with weevils already is to put the packaged up products into the freezer for a day or two to kill the bugs before putting them into buckets in a cool place in their rotation.
My experience with organic raw cashews is that when I open a food saver bag of cashews after they've been stored for 6 months or so they taste fresher than if I keep them in the freezer. I have some now that I've stored for about a year so I should open a packet and check them.
So are Mylar bags worth it?
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 5, 2016 15:04:02 GMT 10
Any progress on mylar bags in Aus?
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 5, 2016 14:56:24 GMT 10
I have been vegetarian for just over 30 years and 80-90% vegan for about 10 years. Vegetarians, and especially vegans, seem to use nutritional yeast to get a cheesy flavour in food a lot. I often see blogs/recipes where vegans rave about how much they love nutritional yeast, so I know lots of people do love it. I'm afraid that I do not. I would like to love it, and have bought it quite a few times to try it in different recipes, but I just cannot seem to love it - or even like it. For a while I used it in a mix with ground walnuts as a parmesan cheese substitute, and actually that was sort of nice, but it was really that I just put up with it - it wasn't great enough that I've kept doing it.
I just admit to this because I rarely see other veggos saying they don't like it - generally people seem very positive about it, but if you are going to try and stockpile it you might want to try a small amount first. You will probably love it and it will add wonderful flavour and nutrients to your food. Just make sure you like it before you buy a lot.
As a side note, I often make a vegan "cheesy sauce" (like for cauli with cheese sauce and that sort of thing) and it is just a traditional white sauce (using a vegan margarine, flour and soy or other non-dairy milk) with blond miso added. I find that gives a really good cheesy flavour. I think the miso I use is "shiro miso". For anyone who hasn't used miso before, it is a fermented product, so has some useful nutritional qualities. Add it to food at the end, avoiding boiling it.
It should be pretty easy to get nutritional yeast (and miso if you want to try that) from a health food shop. I don't remember seeing them in the big supermarkets lately.
Having read the nutritional info about nutritional yeast posted at the start of this thread, I am feeling that I should buy it again and have another attempt. I probably have an out-of-date packet at the back of the cupboard somewhere. But unless I get some really different results to previous attempts with the nutritional yeast, I'll be stashing a few extra packets of miso in with my stores.
Paranoia - Perhaps you have some good experiences with nutritional yeast that you can share??
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Nov 4, 2016 14:15:15 GMT 10
Have you tasted nutritional yeast? Are you thinking of getting it for flavour/nutrients?
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