Hurricane Preparedness Cooking

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jjwdiver

Smoking Fanatic
Original poster
Feb 5, 2010
911
16
St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands
Since hurricanes are now approaching the US, does anyone have ideas, recipes, tricks etc... for cooking up various meats that can be used for however long AFTER the events.  No power means no fridge, and sometimes no cooking after a place gets toasted by a hurricane...so how do you:

Keep food that wont spoil,

Kinds of food to make for eating  (homemade MRE's)

you get the idea here - something like a semi-cured product that is edible, can be used like Jerky (open & eat) but isnt jerkey

Thoughts?
 
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but I will hang out would like to know also.

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found this

 
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Contents:
1 packet hot chocolate
2 packets flavored instant oatmeal
2 packets instant cup of soup
1 packet cappuccino
1 packet spiced cider
1 package cheese n crackers
1 granola bar
1 package raisins
1 packet of tea
2 packets of beef bouillon
1 Oberto meat stick
1 book matches
3 pcs jolly rancher hard candy
1 vitamin pack

 you can always chunk in canned tuna, chicken, sardines....whatever meat you prefer....
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I believe the safiest way to have and use meat products is either in cans or dehydrated foods. We are living in modern times where foods are packaged to last for very long periods of time and we should ALL have a stash on hand for those unexpected occurences...I started on mine last year and add to it monthly with both packaged and canned foods.Also have a good supply of ammo.
 
We have pre-smoked and vacuumed packed many recent smokes in the Freezer at this point. Once we know a storm is approaching, we will remove what we might want, then crank the freezer up as high as it goes. Keep the door shut, it will last for some time. We do have a generator though, so maintaining the freezer and fridge is the main focus. We have a propane setup for kitchen stove and a gas grill and smoker. Bar catastrophic events, we will survive.
 
One thing I learned is that good hearted people will send food convoys to the affected area,  In case I haven't mentioned it recently the first help we got was a semi full of food and water delivered by a bunch of Native Americans from a church in Oklahoma, Thanks to everyone that help us after Katrina.  One thing I would like to mention is that foods that take a long time to cook like dried beans and raw rice burn a lot of scarce fuel.  I would stock up on high energy carbohydrate laden foods like instant rice, pasta, instant mashed potatoes, canned beans, canned meats and tuna.   Crackers last a long time and are great healthy snacks with peanut butter.  Canned milk is essential, instant oatmeal and candy bars  Lots of tea or instant coffee.  You may have to drink heavily chlorinated water so drink mixes to cut the taste are helpful

Jerky is something that can be held without refrigeration for long periods and when diced into small pieces and re-hydrated make instant mashed potatoes edible.

We here without power for three weeks, fortunately  the streets got cleared enough to get to an unaffected area after 6 or 7 days but lines af gas stations and food stores where incredibly long and slow.  Fuel is very hard to find and even though a single lane of a hwy may be clear you could not count on finding gas.  We carried a 5 gallon can in the back of the truck for emergencies.    We buy chest type freezers down here because they hold food cold the longest.  When you open a chest type freezer the cold stays in the freezer.  A smaller generator run every 6 hours for 10 or 15 minutes will keep a chest freezer cold.
 
Here in western mass they are calling for 6 to 12 inches of rain......so here is the plan.

 Well I try to have 5 to 10 gal drinking water on hand, cans of meat and veggies. Box mac n cheese, cans of soup. have a freezer with about a week worth of meet and other provisions in, plan on using that first if the power is out.  I want to fill the freezer with ice also and the 5 day cooler full of ice. I have two 40 lb propane tanks and on 20 lb tank to hook to the grill or the double burner stove. Going to pick up stuff that wont spoil like summer squash and zucchini, apples. going to get a couple of rolls of tin foil and extra aluminum pans tonight so dish washing will not be a problem.

My generator is in the race hauler 35 miles from home and it is not easy to remove......IF the power is out it will just be like camping any way.

Now one big down side is right now I only have the MES for a smoker.....may have to use the gas grill and the foil pack method for some smoked burgers!
 
Looks like you have a handle on it Coma44

If you are to the west of the eye of the storm damage should be less.

A note to everyone that plans on connecting their generator to the house panel.   PLEASE be sure to pull the house main or circuit breaker.  YOU need to isolate the generator from the rest of the grid.  If you turn on the generator and the power back feeds through the pole transformer you CAN kill a worker or neighbor moving downed power lines.
 
"If you are to the west of the eye of the storm damage should be less."

We are on or just west of the predicted eye of the storm. They are calling for 5 to 10" of rain maybe as much as 12" in some places local. Far enough inland wind should be no big deal, but rain is going to be bad!
 
We have pre-smoked and vacuumed packed many recent smokes in the Freezer at this point. Once we know a storm is approaching, we will remove what we might want, then crank the freezer up as high as it goes. Keep the door shut, it will last for some time. We do have a generator though, so maintaining the freezer and fridge is the main focus. We have a propane setup for kitchen stove and a gas grill and smoker. Bar catastrophic events, we will survive.
X 2 like Flash said.

It appears as though we are near the center of a projected path.

This is unusual for us.

My Son already moved his Arc Welder/Generator from his tower shop to his house, with his fork lift.

His smaller (6,000W) generator is there if I need it for my fridge & freezer.

I also filled a mess of plastic 5 & 10 gallon buckets for flushing.

As long as my house holds together, We should be OK.

Bear
 
Guys - no one has mentioned this yet so everyone may have overlooked an important tool.

We have gone thru power outages with wildfires and have survived nicely by buying dry ice and putting it in the freezer. Once the freezer starts loosing the ability to freeze the dry ice takes over and will keep the freezer cold for several days to a week depending on how much you buy. It can also be used in an ice chest or in the bottom of a referigerator. Plan in advance - get it now before they sell out

Hope this helps you guys. Good luck with this storm. We will have you in our thoughts and prayers 
 
You need more water .The average American uses 4 gallon per day.But you can drain your water heater if you don't mind hose water and you still got the back of the toilet.Every few years we have ice storms here.Longest i went with power was 13 days.Camping in your house.
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Get battery's they are the 1st to go.I would go to burger king to charge cell phone.I had a gen but it was putting out 576 vac it fried my wii and TV
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.I did not check it before i hooked it up.I  have 5 LP tanks and a gosm and camp stove LP tree and lantern or two.Harbor freight makes a fitting to fill small one pound LP tanks from your bigger bottle.It came in handy. 
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Make sure and get cash from the bank or atm!!!   if the power is down no atm . Gas stations will be open pretty quick but most will not take CC or debit as they can't get them approved. Same for any grocery stores or mini marts that are open.

 Down here during katrina and gustav cell phone towers got distroyed and there was no service in large areas.

 Ham radio and sat. phones was a life saver.

 someone made the comment in a post to stock up on Ammo. DO IT!! 

 After katrina there was so many rumors going around about non existant riots and killings and robberies that most places here quit selling guns and ammo for a week or more. 

  better to have it and not need it ,than to need it and not have it.

 Katrina proved that humans, both good and bad  can turn into wild animals very quickly.
 
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Something tells me that most of the folks on here have plenty of ammo!

                                               
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I know I do!

                                             
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