Food in the time of a pandemic

[haresfur]

The virus causing COVID-19 is affecting the supply chain and food buying habits as people prepare to hunker down. Are you laying in a supply of chicken soup? Have you seen shortages due to the pandemic?

 

Apparently Rancho Gordo has become popular with viral preppers. Unfortunately not an option for me so I will have to make do with standard dried and canned beans.

Edited March 9, 2020 by haresfur (log)

[JoNorvelleWalker]

No food shortages here, except possibly King Arthur Flour.  Ranch Gordo Moro beans were last night's dinner but that made no dent in the supply.  I could stuff a bean bag to barricade my door from zombies.

 

[liuzhou]

Everything normal here, too.

[teonzo]

I live in one of the "red zones" here in Italy. We are forced to remain in the red zone and not go outside. Restaurants can be open from 6 am to 6 pm, no dinners out. Cinemas, theatres, libraries, gyms, discos, all public gathering places are closed. But everything is fine about food, no troubles in finding what I want to eat / drink.
I still wonder why they did not make all this fuss with the local flu epidemic 2 years ago, there were MANY MORE deaths and contagions. Maybe because it was not from China.

 

 

 

Teo

 

[Porthos]

Living in southern California we have to be prepared for life-disrupting earthquakes. We have a store of food laid in for that, along with water. There's TP in those supplies as well. We buy Scott bathroom tissue by the 36-roll pack so running out of TP is not really a concern; I just bought more because we were running low, nothing to do with the pandemic.

 

Running out of ice cream, however, would make me whiny.

 

Even though I have quit both renaissance faires I had been part of, my wife and daughter are still active in the guild kitchen and I have started acquiring a few foodstuffs that can go in the freezer. It will be interesting to see if the covid-19 issue causes cancellation of the faire by the  health authorities. Hoping not.

 

 

[Kim Shook]

Mr. Kim is on the Governor's task force for this and we decided to err on the side of caution.  We loaded up on food supplies and water a couple of weeks ago.  Just the regular stuff - canned meats, veg, fruit, milk.  If we don't end up needing them, what we don't regularly use will go to the food pantry.  

 

As I said to a relative that was borderline dismissing the dangers, the downside of being wrong for her is really bad.  If I'm wrong for imitating a "prepper", we've got some extra food. 

 

Store supplies seem to be ok, but Purell is nowhere to be found.

[JeanneCake]

I have been wondering how you are faring, Teo, so I am glad to hear you are ok.

 

I am having to get bleach wipes and hand sanitizer from my distributor since the grocery stores are out and we are using quite a bit of both at the shop.  Staff asked today if they could order these for themselves.  Of course I said  yes; I am lucky I have this option.  I find myself wondering where we will be at Easter; at Mother's Day.... will we be through the worst of it or still managing. 

 

Kim, you've made me remember I should have a plan for milk; the kid can go through gallon in a day if he's not careful!  Dry milk powder; I haven't thought of that in years.  My mother used it (as well as the synthetic "hamburger") about 40 years ago when we were young.  My brother definitely did not like it and we all refused to eat the "hamburger" (she  made sloppy joes with it and it was not a success)!  I think she tried stretching the milk with the powder and water instead of a direct replacement but either way,  my brother was not having it!

[Tri2Cook]

6 minutes ago, JeanneCake said:

Kim, you've made me remember I should have a plan for milk

Fortunately, if it got to that point here, I'm ok with evaporated milk. We always had regular milk in the house growing up but we also always had cans of evap in the house because it was cheap. Me and my 4 brothers and sisters grew up on hot cereals for breakfast and apparently it was cheaper to have us use evap on our hot cereal than the regular milk. So it's what I was used to and I still like it so I could get by on it if I had to. I don't love it as a beverage but I don't drink a lot of milk anyway and, diluted with water, I'd rather drink it than the powdered stuff I've had.

[Kim Shook]

24 minutes ago, Tri2Cook said:

Fortunately, if it got to that point here, I'm ok with evaporated milk. We always had regular milk in the house growing up but we also always had cans of evap in the house because it was cheap. Me and my 4 brothers and sisters grew up on hot cereals for breakfast and apparently it was cheaper to have us use evap on our hot cereal than the regular milk. So it's what I was used to and I still like it so I could get by on it if I had to. I don't love it as a beverage but I don't drink a lot of milk anyway and, diluted with water, I'd rather drink it than the powdered stuff I've had.

That's what we chose.  Mr. Kim has sense memories re: powdered milk from when he was a child.🙂

[heidih]

I have not personally seen milk as a staple since I was a child and my own (now 28 year old) does not either.  Cheese, yogurt and the like are nice to have but no panic about milk - I can cross that off the list. Maybe too much of the "blue stuff" as a kid. (non-fat)

[TicTac]

What is more concerning is that people do not have more than a couple weeks worth of TP at home!? 😄

 

But seriously, this whole stock up on hand sanitizer is ridiculous....

 

If there is an outbreak and say things get as bad as they are in Italy/China, people are going to be staying home - why on earth would they then need hand sanitizer!?  If anything, get yourself some extra soap - certainly more effective and then you wont need to fight over moisturizer!

 

On the food topic, I would like to say that I purposefully did not participate in the 'clean out your freezer' challenge for a situation like this, but that would not be entirely true.  But it certainly does help to have a chest freezer loaded to the brim with frozen vac pack'd meats, soups and other odds 'n sods....just in case.

 

 

 

 

 

[dcarch]

I grow my own salad indoors.

 

What do you guys do? I don't know how you can sanitize salad greens from the store.

 

dcarch

[kayb]

I have a boatload of toilet paper, but am low on paper towels. Can do without milk, but running out of half and half would be a Code Red alert.  Have enough meat, canned/frozen veg and pantry staples to last a while. If I don't go from this, I'll go from something else. In the immortal words of Hank Williams Sr., "You'll never get out of this world alive." 

 

I can deal with that, as I head for a meeting tomorrow while sneezing incessantly from spring allergies. Y'all send help if they quarantine me.

[heidih]

2 minutes ago, kayb said:

I can deal with that, as I head for a meeting tomorrow while sneezing incessantly from spring allergies. Y'all send help if they quarantine me.

 

I have food, I have wild greens outside - so all good. The allergy thing though. My opening line "I have allergies - I am not sick"

[JoNorvelleWalker]

46 minutes ago, dcarch said:

I grow my own salad indoors.

 

What do you guys do? I don't know how you can sanitize salad greens from the store.

 

dcarch

 

 

[Porthos]

3 hours ago, heidih said:

I have not personally seen milk as a staple since I was a child and my own (now 28 year old) does not either.  Cheese, yogurt and the like are nice to have but no panic about milk - I can cross that off the list. Maybe too much of the "blue stuff" as a kid. (non-fat)

A movie came out when I was a young adult about sharks titled, "Blue Water, White Death." That's what I call skim milk.

[Martin Fisher]

Panic buying is easy to understand, most folks see no need for long-term preparedness.

Heck, when there's the threat of a snowstorm here there's rush over-buying of milk, bread, eggs, toilet paper, bottled/jugged water, beer, junk food, etc.

 

I remember the gasoline lines and the serious blizzards of the 70s (we were sometimes snowed-in for a couple weeks.)

My Grandparents and the like harped about the shortages and struggles of The Great Depression.

 

No panic buying here (meaning my house), I try to stay prepared.

 

 

 

Edited March 10, 2020 by DiggingDogFarm (log)

[Martin Fisher]

I try to keep 6 months worth of food on-hand.

If we don't happen to use it I can give it to folks who are TRULY in need.

I give away food frequently to rotate stock and keep things fresh.

I have about 60 lbs. of venison and 50 lbs. of chicken/turkey in the freezer that I plan to can later this week — with the help of the housemate.

Edited March 10, 2020 by DiggingDogFarm (log)

[Margaret Pilgrim]

Husband and I have low red-meat requirements/desire, so many of our meals fall into the category of cupboard sourced.    Green veggies would be missed, but shortages of those occur locally periodically with ecoli scares.     As Anna suggests, one learns to substitute and improvise.     Think outside one box and inside another.

[Anna N]

In terms of food I think we have been indoctrinated into the idea that unless we have a balanced, nutritional diet every day of our lives we will come to harm. We don’t know how long this will last but I can be almost certain that few of us will succumb to starvation, scurvy, rickets or hyponatremia. Many of us are old enough to know what it’s like to live through food shortages that lasted longer that this is likely to. We may succumb to food boredom and/or withdrawal from food porn. 

[heidih]

@Anna N reminded me of a character in a Marlena de Blasi novel recounting food .shortages in Italy during WW2. He was so so hungry. His mother had him close his eyes and as she fed him the last slice of bread she vividly described the cheese on the bread (which was imaginary). The only starch left was ground dried chesnuts. When spring sprung there were wild greens but winter was bleak.  They made it

[TdeV]

27 minutes ago, Anna N said:

withdrawal from food porn

 

Oh, @Anna N, say it ain't so!

[JoNorvelleWalker]

I am afraid.  Not just of the virus but of running out of limes and dying a horrible death of scurvy.  I am not afraid of running out of Rancho Gordo beans.

 

More Moro beans tonight for dinner.

 

[rotuts]

I offer some thoughts here

 

 

Im at very high risk due to Age and etc. for a very poor outcome.

 

I accept this.

 

Ive found  Target   , on-line 

 

has ample supplies  of non-perishables.

 

ive taken advantage of this personally 

 

and I can stay at home and wait for delivery

 

Who Knew there are 62 oz jugs of Marinara sauce ?

 

I do know now , and in a few days will have a few jugs

Edited March 11, 2020 by rotuts (log)

[Margaret Pilgrim]

While we use tons of both dry and house made pasta (which reminds me that we have little excess flour on hand) , we don't get around to grains often.    I have had my eye on clearing out my "collection" of spelt, bulgur, green and yellow peas, black and red rice, and friends.    I now see this trove as several weeks of nutrition, push come to shove.   The bean stash is a separate entity.