Re: Digest Number 2607

[Guest guest]

>> I'm curious to know, what do you do for " emergency " situations. I was

looking at my old " hurricane " box and there's not a thing in there we can

have; so as I try to prepare a new one, I find there's not much I can fill

it with. We live in a hurricane prone area, so I need to pack

an emergency box. What do you suggest for that? Thanks so much, <<

Wyndie,

I've sort of been " missing in action " from this list since Hurricane

Katrina, as I live in New Orleans. I have to say that an SCD life in a city

which was three-quarters destroyed has been... interesting. Rather like the

Chinese curse, " May you live in interesting times. "

I'm actually working on something about how I managed during and after

Katrina, and what I'm hoping to do for the future.

Short form, though, is that you've already gotten some really good advice.

<wry grin> I need to learn how to can stuff myself, but haven't had the time

since the storm. (They have FINALLY cut my hours at the bookstore -- I will

miss the larger paycheck; I will not will miss continual exhaustion and

really plain foods! My husband asked me if I could make SCD lasagna for our

30th wedding anniversary this upcoming Sunday.)

Having a dehydrator is a good idea. You can dry an amazing number of fruits

and vegetables which can be reconstituted into tasty meals. I do NOT

recommend pre-prepared dried foods because they frequently have hidden

illegals. REALLY hidden illegals.

I just don't trust manufacturers. I had tracked down some dried tomato

powder, which I thought would be a lot easier than constant peeling and

cooking down tomatoes. (You want to cry? I lost tomato sauce from somewhere

around 150-200 pounds of tomatoes which I peeled, de-seeded, and cooked

down, courtesy of the August Witch, Hurricane Katrina.)

Emails and phone calls, and the company ASSURED me there was nothing but

tomatoes in their powder. I kept digging, finally found their supplier, and

found, at the bottom of a layer of web-pages, the information that this was

" dried tomatoes in a food-grade matrix " . More research proved that most

" food grade matrices " were starch based. I went back to the company and

said, " So tell me about this food grade matrix. " To which the answer was,

" Oh, that. That's just a little bit of malto-dextrin to make sure it flows

smoothly and doesn't cake up. It won't hurt anything. "

Malto-dextrin just happens to be one of the things Elaine warned us most

stringently about when it came to commercially prepared foods.

Hence, I won't trust most commercially dried foods.

If you're going to evacuate for a storm, you'll need to follow the

parameters for traveling with SCD.

If you're going to be staying, you have to plan how to do without electric

power for any where from 24 hours to a month. I'm sure you already know

this, since you mention your " hurricane box " .

A generator is useful for short-term preservation of your refrigerated and

frozen foods. But it is noisy, smelly, can be dangerous, and can also be

very difficult to keep in fuel if there's a severe power shortage for a long

period of time. (The friend with whom I stayed for the first four days after

Katrina had one.)

I have to run -- I get to the Tuesday Farmer's Market for the first time

since it reopened after Katrina. If you'd like to discuss this further, feel

free to email me off-list. (Things like the particular needs of your

particular family, rather than general emergency parameters.)

(If you're interested in reading about how we got out, check here.

http://community.compuserve.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?msg=105542.1 & nav=messages & webta\

g=ws-sflit

)

-- Marilyn (New Orleans, Louisiana, USA)

SCD for my fur kids since 1998

SCD for me since 2001