The Golden Rule of Food Storage:

Store what you use, and use what you store.

All foods have a limited shelf-life, no matter how they are stored or preserved. It is imperative that you have a plan for rotating your food stash to keep it fresh. Even if your food doesn't spoil, through time it will lose much of its nutritional value and flavor.

Many survivalists spend a lot of money on specially prepared foods that they will never eat. An example is the highly-touted MRE's (Meals Ready to Eat.) MRE's were invented by the military for long-term storage of complete meals for survival situations when there is no means for preparing or cooking food. The problem with MRE's is that they are very expensive, especially if you are preparing for a prolonged emergency. I do not recommend that you rely on them for the bulk of your emergency food stash. A few MRE's in your bug out bag is okay. But forget about storing case upon case of MRE's in your home stash.

In Ground Storage

The simplest method for short-term food storage is your garden. Certain root vegetables, like carrots, turnips, parsnips and horseradish, may be left in the ground through the winter. After the ground begins to freeze, cover them with mulch, such as dry leaves or straw, to protect them from hard freezes. They can then be dug up as needed in the kitchen. Other cold-hardy crops, such as lettuce, cabbage, beets and cauliflower, may also be left in the garden, protected by a heavy mulch, for several weeks after the growing season.

Root Cellaring

In the old days before canning, people relied heavily on their root cellars, which allowed them to store fruits and vegetables through much of the winter. Most fresh foods need a very cool and slightly moist environment. Dirt floors are ideal, and the procedure works best in areas where the winter months are very cold. Most basements today are too warm and dry, especially if they are equipped with a central heating unit that is used to heat the house, so root cellars may not be practical for many of us. There are several ways around this problem, including insulating off a portion of your basement, or even better, digging outdoor pits for storing your vegetables and fruits. To learn more, check out the excellent books mentioned in the Additional Resources section at the end of this web site, including Root Cellaring: Natural Cold Storage of Fruits & Vegetables by Mike and Nancy Bubel.

Common Methods of Food Preservation

Before we take a look at the various methods of food preservation, it will be helpful to discuss the factors that cause food deterioration and spoilage. Chief among these are microorganisms, which consist of bacteria, yeasts and fungi (molds.) Microorganisms, or "microbes," require the presence of water to grow and multiply. Most microbes, including molds, also require the presence of oxygen. Some anaerobic microorganisms, including botulinum—the causative agent of botulism, an extremely dangerous form of food poisoning—can thrive in the complete absence of oxygen. Enzymes, which occur naturally in plants, will cause foods to deteriorate in time resulting in the loss of nutritional value, flavor and palatability. Enzymes also require the presence or water or moisture. Exposure to light will cause the destruction of some vitamins, and the rate of all chemical and biological reactions, including the actions of enzymes and the growth of microbes, will increase as the temperature increases. So all preserved foods will keep better and longer when protected from light and stored at cooler temperatures.

Dried Foods

Drying or dehydration is an excellent way to preserve food. Without moisture, the microbes that are responsible for food spoilage can not thrive and the enzymes that lead to deterioration are inactivated, so the food is preserved in a form that is suitable for long-term storage. Properly dehydrated foods do not require refrigeration. They can be stored in airtight containers or plastic bags and will keep for a year or longer—the dryer the food the longer it will store. When dehydrating food for long-term storage, care must be taken to insure that most of the water is removed, otherwise spoilage, particularly by molds, could become a problem. As with all preservation techniques, some nutritional value is lost during the drying process, but dehydrated foods retain most of their nutritional value and dehydration remains one of the best ways to prepare food for storage without the need for refrigeration or sterilization. Since water is responsible for much of the bulk and most of the weight of any food, dehydrated foods are lighter and more compact, making them ideal for backpacking or for your bug out bag. If you want you can restore dehydrated foods by soaking them in water for a few hours before eating them. Dehydrated vegetables are great to use in soups and stews. Many dehydrated foods, particularly fruits, are delicious right out of the bag without rehydration. We will discuss food dehydration in more detail later in this chapter.

As seen in the photograph above, dried foods are stored in airtight containers made out of plastic or glass. Survivalists prefer plastic because glass can can be easily broken during a disaster such as an earthquake.

Canned Foods

Canning requires the complete sterilization of the food and container, completely eliminating all traces of microbes. The enzymes that would in time lead to deterioration are also destroyed by the heat used in the canning process. Special glass jars (e.g., Mason jars) and two-piece lids are used for home canning. The lids are designed to completely seal the jars with a vacuum inside which prevents the entry of microorganisms. Properly canned foods will keep almost indefinitely, but their quality begins to deteriorate after about a year so it is recommended that they are consumed within a year or two. Canning sterilized foods in a 10 minute boiling water bath in sterilized jars is adequate for high-acid foods such as fruits, tomatoes and foods pickled in vinegar. Nonacid foods such as meat, fish, fowl and vegetables require a higher temperature (240^o F or 116^o C) which is obtainable only in a pressure canner. A pressure cooker will double as a pressure canner providing it is large enough to hold the glass jars that you are using. We will discuss canning in more detail later in this chapter. Complete instructions for home canning can be found in the instructions that will come with your canning equipment or in any good canning recipe book. The instructions should be followed closely.

Commercially canned foods—the familiar items that we find on our grocery store shelves—usually come in either glass jars or tin cans. In my opinion canned foods, whether commercially prepared or canned at home, should make up the bulk of your food storage program. They are by far the least expensive option when it comes to food storage. They do not have to be refrigerated and they require minimal preparation before serving. Most can be eaten right from the can. Canned foods also contain a fair amount of water, which can come in handy in meeting your daily water needs. Due to their water content canned foods are heavy when compared to dehydrated foods, but you probably won't be hauling your home stash around anyway. Canned foods come in convenient sizes, so an opened can will probably be consumed without leaving leftovers which would require refrigeration. They also stack well making it easy for you to rotate your stores. You can gradually and economically build your home food storage stash by purchasing a few extra canned goods each time you buy your groceries.

In my opinion canned foods should make up the bulk of your food storage program.

The metal shelf pictured above, which I use for storing canned goods in my basement, has been assembled with the shelves upside down. This gives each shelf a lip around the edges to prevent the cans from sliding off the shelves during an earthquake. Note also that I have used metal strapping tape to fasten the shelving unit to a wooden joist in the ceiling above, adding further stability and preventing it from toppling over. On each shelf I store a different type of canned food—starting at the top with canned fruits and continuing down with soups, vegetables, beans, fish and nuts, meats and finally sauces on the bottom. That way, a quick glance reveals the types of canned foods we need to pick up on our next visit to the grocery store, helping us maintain a balance of each food type.

Special foods packed for long-term storage, like the powdered milk substitute and the whole powdered eggs pictured above, are produced just for survivalists. These foods are processed for very long shelf lifes and canned in nitrogen gas in large #10 cans. They have a recommended shelf life of at least 10 years. The only problem I have with them is they ignore the "store what you eat and eat what you store" rule. They are not as easy to rotate into your daily diet as regularly canned foods.

Since your home-canned foods are stored in glass jars, it is particularly important to protect them from breakage. Whenever possible, your jars of food should be stored in the original boxes that the jars came it, along with the cardboard partitions inside which will keep them from banging against each other. The jars that are not in boxes are wrapped with bubble wrap or separated with cardboard.

The photograph above shows how we secure the doors of the shelving units that we use to store our glass jars, to prevent the jars from falling out during an earthquake, by simply sliding a small board through the handles. To keep the shelving units from toppling over they are securely fastened to each other and to the wooden supporting beam behind them with screws.

Frozen Foods

Freezing is an easy and convenient method of food preservation. It is also very good at retaining the nutritional value of your food. There is one huge and obvious disadvantage to freezing: What happens when the electricity goes off? You can invest in a gasoline or propane-powered generator to keep your freezer running during power outages. But eventually you are going to run out of fuel for your generator. For that reason I suggest that you do not rely on your freezer for your primary method of food storage. If you are a hunter or have a garden and prefer freezing to canning that is fine. Hopefully you will have a generator and will be able to consume your frozen foods before you run out of fuel. But you should also have a stash of foods that do not require freezing for those longer emergencies.

When the power goes out the food in a full freestanding freezer will be safe for about two days, providing you don't open the door too much. A chest-type freezer is much more desirable than an upright freezer because it will retain the cold longer. Remember that the foods at greatest risk are meat, poultry and foods containing dairy products. We will discuss freezing in more detail in a later section of this chapter.

Freeze-Dried Foods

Freeze-Dried Foods are commercially prepared foods that have had their water removed by a technique that involves several steps: First the food is frozen. Then it is placed in a vacuum container and heated while the air is removed from the container. The heat causes the ice crystals to melt and the vacuum removes the moisture from the food and the container leaving only the dried food behind. Freeze-dried foods are preserved in much the same way as dehydrated foods and will keep a long time without refrigeration. Freeze drying is a good method of food preservation, but freeze-dried foods are too expensive to use as your primary stash. If you want you can include a few in your bug out bag. Like dehydrated foods, they are compact, lightweight and do not require refrigeration. But I do not recommend that you rely on freeze-dried foods for your primary food stash.

Commercially-Prepared Dried Goods

This category includes just about every food on your grocery store's shelves other than canned goods, fresh foods and refrigerated items. They are prepackaged and for the most part ready to go directly from the store's shelves to the shelves of your home stash. Obviously shelf-life is an important consideration and some foods will keep much better than others. Good examples of foods that will keep well are sugar and powdered "instant" milk. Some items, like wheat flour for bread making, are best purchased in a less processed form. Rather than storing flour it is far better to store whole wheat berries. Flour has a shelf-life of only a few months, while whole wheat berries, when stored properly, have a shelf-life of a thousand years. (Viable wheat berries thousands of years old have been found in Egyptian tombs.) You will also need to stash away a hand-operated grinder to grind the wheat berries into whole wheat flour when it comes time for baking. (More on this in the next section.)

When considering which commercially prepared dried goods to store, and how much to store, remember our Golden Rule (which I repeat because it is so important):

Store only what you use, and use what you store.

Most commercially-prepared foods have limited shelf-lives and you must have a program for rotating them into use on a regular basis.

Does your family use milk? If so, do you buy it in the bottle or carton or do you buy powdered "instant" milk? If you use the former, may I suggest that you start using the latter? Powdered "instant" milk is an excellent survival food. Milk is high in nutrition, particularly protein (which may be in short supply during a prolonged emergency.) Instant milk stores well and doesn't require refrigeration until it is reconstituted with water. You can easily reconstitute a little at a time, as it is needed, avoiding refrigeration entirely. If your family is used to drinking milk from the carton they will have to make an adjustment to the slightly different taste of instant milk, but the adjustment is easily and quickly made because instant milk tastes just as good as regular milk. It is just slightly different.

My family does not drink a lot of milk, but we use some in cooking, I add a little to my coffee, and I use it to make homemade yogurt and frozen yogurt. I keep a full year's supply of instant milk in my stash at all times, which for us consists of nine 4 pound (1.81 kg) boxes. The key again is rotation. Whenever I empty a box of milk, I purchase another one at the grocery store, but I am careful to put the new box at the very back of the shelf, moving every other box toward the front so that the oldest box (which by now is at the front) will be used first.

All of your stored foods, including your canned goods and even your frozen foods, should be rotated in this manner. Always put the newest item at the very back, moving every other item forward so that you will use the oldest first. That way, as long as you are storing what you use, and using what you store, your stock will always remain fresh and your food will never go bad.

Other dried goods that you might consider storing include:

Dried beans, corn, rice, couscous and other grains.

Coffee - It is best to store whole roasted coffee beans rather than ground coffee. You will need a coffee grinder. (Don't use an electric one. What will you do when the electricity is off?)

You can grind your whole roasted coffee beans with a hand-operated coffee grinder, like the one shown above. Or you can use the same hand-operated grinder that you use to grind your wheat berries.

Sugar and Salt are important staples that should be stored in sufficient quantities. Both have a shelf-life of 100 years or longer, as long as they are sealed from air and protected from moisture.

Just about every food that you purchase from the grocery store, other than refrigerated items, fresh produce, and fresh bakery goods, can also be stashed away in quantity, as long as you remember to store what you use and use what you store.

Action Step 9: Food Check Lists - Food Storage

Turn to the page in you Action Planner where you have begun your "Get" and "Do" lists for Food and begin making your lists. As you progress through this chapter, and the remaining chapters of this web site, you will think of additional items to add to your lists. When you acquire an item or accomplish a task check it off your list. That way it will be very easy to see your accomplishments and to monitor your progress. This will give you additional incentive and motivation and you will accomplish your preparedness goals in a surprisingly short period of time, and in an efficient and almost effortless manner.

Here's a way to quickly and systematically build up a one-week (or longer) supply of emergency food:

Each time you buy groceries, for one or two of the nonperishable items on your shopping list, buy twice as many as you need. Instead of buying one bottle of ketchup, for example, buy two. Put the extra bottle in your pantry. When you are running low of ketchup, rather than using the extra bottle, put ketchup on your grocery list as you normally would and buy another bottle. Just don't forget to rotate the older bottle of ketchup out of the pantry, using it first and putting the new bottle on the shelf behind it. If you will do this each time you buy groceries, for just one or two of the items on your list, in no time you will have accumulated a one-week stash of emergency survival food. If there is ever an emergency, and the grocery store shelves are empty, or if you can't get to the store for a week, your family will not go hungry. When it comes to emergency preparedness you will already be way ahead of most people. You will also have taken the first step toward establishing your survival food stash. After your one-week storage goal is complete, you can work at increasing it to a two-week supply, or a one-month supply, or whatever your goal is for your home food stash. And while you are at it, you can use the same procedure to stock up on nonfood items like soap, toilet paper, personal items, etc.

Certain other foods, if stored properly, can keep for 5 to 10 years or even longer. All stored foods should be dated so they can be rotated out when the time comes to replace them.
Other cereals, such as oats
Dried Beans
Dried Corn
Rice
Coucous
Whole Spices

Before I discuss the best way to store these foods, lets take a brief moment to review the major reasons why stored foods spoil. Food is spoiled primarily by the growth of microorganisms. In order to grow and reproduce, most microorganism require two things, water and oxygen. When foods are canned they are preserved by killing all the microorganism in the food and the storage container by sterilization, and by keeping the container completely impervious to the entry of additional microorganisms. When foods are preserved by dehydration nearly all of the water is removed. The microorganisms that are in the food are not killed but without water they can not grow and reproduce. When foods are frozen the live microorganisms remain in the food, but the extremely low temperature stops their metabolism so they do not grow and reproduce. (Your refrigerator does not stop the growth of microorganisms, but their metabolism is slowed enough to prevent the food from spoiling before it can be consumed.) Pure honey and molasses are special because they naturally contain ingredients that prevent the growth of microorganisms.

The best way that I have found to store whole dried foods, like whole wheat berries and dried beans, is to seal them in completely airtight mylar bags made specially for the purpose of long-term food storage. Other plastic bags will work but the mylar bags work the best. First you must start with foods that contain very little moisture, or you must remove the moisture by placing the food in a low temperature oven for complete drying. The oxygen is removed from the bag and the mylar bag is sealed completely airtight with a hot iron. Mylar bags are strong but they are not puncture proof. They must therefore be enclosed in a strong, preferably airtight, container such as a 5 or 6 gallon plastic bucket with an airtight lid, such as the ones that you can purchase at hardware stores.

There are two good ways for removing the oxygen from the airtight mylar bags. The easiest way is to throw in a couple of oxygen absorbing packets just before you seal the bag. These can usually be purchased from the same supplier who supplied your mylar bags. The other way to remove the oxygen is to use carbon dioxide to replace the oxygen in the bags.

The easiest way to employ carbon dioxide is to use dry ice, which is frozen carbon dioxide gas. Dry ice can be purchased from the same ice dealers that sell blocks of regular ice. You will find them in your Yellow Pages. Dry ice is extremely cold and must be handled carefully. If it touches your skin it can cause a "burn." It must therefore be handled with gloves. Fill your storage container to within about a half inch (1 cm) of the top. Put a piece of dry ice on top of the food and put the lid on but do not seal the lid yet. As the gas evaporates (or sublimates) it will cause pressure to build in the container which could rupture it. You have to wait for the dry ice to evaporate completely, turning completely into carbon dioxide gas, and then you seal the container. As it sublimates it will drive the air out of the container. Carbon dioxide is heavier than air and so it will remain in the container if you do not disturb it too much. One to two ounces (50 g) of dry ice is all that is needed for each 5 to 6 gallon (20 l) bucket of food.

Oxygen-Absorbing Packs

My favorite way to remove the oxygen is by using oxygen absorbing packs. The food most commonly used for long-term storage is whole wheat berries (Winter wheat) so I will use it as an example. Below is how I do it from start to finish:

I purchase organically grown whole wheat berries (Winter wheat) from a natural foods grocery store that sells in bulk. Whole Foods Market is a national chain that sells bulk foods but there are others including local sources. Rather than buying from the bulk department of the store, I place my order with the store manager and receive my wheat berries in 50 lb bags. They give me a discount of about 10% when I order by the bag. I also purchase other grains and beans for long-term storage in this manner.

As I mentioned earlier, the 5 or 6 gallon (20 l) plastic buckets that you can buy in hardware stores are a convenient size in which to store your bulk items. These buckets are made out of two different types of plastic, one is food-grade and the other is not. I seal my foods in mylar bags so they don't come in contact with the plastic bucket so it doesn't matter to me whether they are food grade or not. If you store any of your bulk foods in direct contact with the plastic bucket you will want to use food-grade buckets only. Those that have already been used to store foods, like the ones that restaurants use, are perfectly fine, and you may be able to acquire these for little or no money.

I order my mylar bags from Walton Feed, Inc. online at http://www.waltonfeed.com/. They come in many different sizes but I have found that the 20 in x 30 in size is perfect for 5 or 6 gallon buckets. I place the mylar bag in the plastic bucket and fill it with the wheat berries. Then I throw in three oxygen absorbing packs, squeeze the excess air out of the bag (or suck it out using a plastic hose) and then seal it with a hot iron. You have to work quickly to avoid overly exposing your oxygen absorbing packs to air, which will decrease their effectiveness. Next I trim off any excess from the top of the mylar bag and firmly seal the lid on the bucket using a rubber mallet. The wheat berries are now ready for long-term storage in my basement.

I use the same technique to store other items that I buy in bulk, including pinto beans, corn, oats, etc. Most other items will not have the 100 year or longer shelf-life that the wheat berries have. If you start with whole foods that have a very low moisture content, most foods will have at least a 10 year shelf-life when stored in this way. Obviously you should label each bucket with its contents and the date it was sealed. It would also be a good idea to put a "Use by" date on the bucket, in case you forget what the shelf-life is or in case it is opened by someone else.

Here's a hint for helping you seal the mylar bags with a hot iron: Take a 30 inch (or 80 cm) 2x4 board and wrap an old towel around it a few times to make an "ironing board." You can staple or nail the towel on the underside of the board to keep it in place. When you are ready to seal your mylar bag lay this ironing board across the top of the bucket and lay the mylar bag over it to make your job easier (as demonstrated in the photograph.) Make sure your seal is complete, and then trim off any excess from the top of the mylar bag. You will have to experiment a little with your iron to determine the ideal temperature. Trim off a small strip from the top of one of your mylar bags and try sealing it with your iron to determine the best setting.

The list below gives the approximate shelf-life for some common bulk items when stored in this manner. These numbers are conservative. It is quite possible that the foods will keep longer. However, all foods lose some of their nutritional value when stored over an extended period of time. The longer they are stored the more nutrition is lost. You should therefore try to rotate these foods out, replacing them with new stock, according to the shelf lifes suggested below. If you open a container and find that the food is moldy, it will most likely be because it contained too much moisture when you sealed it, or else it was exposed to air due to a faulty seal. Throw it in your compost.

If you are wheat intolerant then obviously you will want to store other grains. But keep in mind that most other grains will not have the shelf-life of wheat and so you will need to rotate your stock.

Hard Grains (wheat, corn, kamut millet, dry flax spelt, triticale) 15-20 years
Soft Grains (rolled oats, oat groats, rye, barley, quinoa) 8 years
Rice: White rice will store for 8 - 10 years. Brown rice will only keep for 1-2 years
Beans (soy, adzuki, blackeye, barbanzo, kidney, great northern, lentils, lima, mung, pinto, etc.) 8-10 years
Dehydrated vegetables (broccoli, carrots, celery, cabbage, onions, peppers, potatoes, etc.) 8 - 10 years
Dehydrated fruit 10-15 years
Dried dairy (powdered eggs, powdered milk, whey powder, cheese powder, cocoa powder, powdered butter or margarine) 5-10 years
Flours and ground products (All Purpose Flour, unbleached flour, whole wheat flour, white flour, cornmeal, cracked wheat, gluten, wheat flakes, mixes, etc.) 5 years
Pasta (Macaroni noodles, spaghetti, etc.) 10-15 years
Pure honey, salt, sugar, and sorghum molasses can be kept indefinitely as long as they are kept free from moisture. (Make sure that your honey does not contain additives. Sometimes water or sugar are added to honey. Pure honey will crystallize when stored for a long time. Impure honey will not.)
Garden seeds or sprouting seeds will remain viable for 2-3 years (The exception is alfalfa, which will keep for at least 8 years.)

How to use your wheat berries

You can roast your wheat berries, sprout them and even grow wheat grass. But the most popular way to use wheat berries is to grind them into flour, along with other grains or dried beans if you like, and use them to make bread, pancakes, or any number of other baked goods.

You will need to have a good hand-operated grinder for making flour from your wheat berries and other grains and dried beans. Cookbooks are available containing recipes for using the grains that you have stored. A couple of my favorites are mentioned in the Additional Resources section at the end of this web site and under "Recommended Reading" at the bottom of this page.

Whole Wheat Recipes

Nutritional Supplements

Do you take a multivitamin? There are so many nutritional supplements on the market today that trying to decide which ones you need can be confusing. While there are many supplements that may be helpful for individual needs, there is one that I consider essential for everyone. If you take nothing else you should take a good high-quality multivitamin/multimineral supplement on a daily basis. Most vitamins are fat-soluble and can be stored by your body. (The exceptions are Vitamin C and B-complex, which are water soluble.) Trace minerals, which are grossly lacking in the typical American diet, are also very important for maintaining your health, and like fat-soluble vitamins they too can be stored by the body. How much better could your body survive hard times if it is well stocked with these important nutrients when the emergency occurs, as opposed to beginning such a stressful situation with an already deficient supply? When we are under stress, our bodies use up our nutrient stores faster, and therefore we may need even more than usual. An adequate supply of these important nutrients will allow you to endure stress more easily, increasing your resistance to mental and physical disease.

As I have already mentioned, the longer foods are stored the more nutritional value they lose. And we all understand that one of the keys to sound nutrition is a highly varied diet. But during times of emergency we will no doubt be restricted in the variety of foods that we have available to us. In fact, we might be eating a lot of the same foods over and over. These factors, along with the fact that our bodies need more vitamins and minerals when under stress, mean that it will be even more important to take a multivitamin/multimineral supplement during times of emergency than during normal times. So I consider a good supplement to be an essential part of any emergency food stash.

Vitamins have a shelf-life of at least two years. Minerals are literally rocks that will keep forever. After the recommended two-year shelf-life has been exceeded, the vitamins will still be viable. It's just that they will have lost some of their potency. The older they are the more potency they will lose. You do not have to discard your vitamins after the expiration date. You can continue taking them. They may not be as potent as when you purchased them but they will be better than nothing.

I keep a one year supply of Super Supplemental Vitamins and Minerals in my emergency food stash. Everyone in my family takes this supplement so we do not have a problem keeping our stock fresh. We just have to remember that when we empty a bottle and purchase a new one it has to go to the back of the shelf, and every other bottle has to be moved forward. When we take a bottle off the shelf we are careful to grab the oldest one, which will be the one in the front. That way all of our vitamins always remain as fresh as possible. Super Supplemental contains some calcium, but since we try to take a higher amount of this important mineral, along with additional magnesium, a mineral that is heavily lost in food processing, we store a year's supply of Calcium-Magnesium as well. You may choose to store additional supplements (and essential medicines as well.) Just remember to store what you use and to use what you store—and above all, don't forget to rotate your stock!

After a local emergency, if we are lucky things could be back to normal within a few days. But other disasters could drag on for many weeks or even months. There is no way of predicting how long a national or global emergency could last. If you are ever involved in a prolonged emergency, your food stash, no matter how large, could eventually run out. If a prolonged disaster is on your list of concerns you should think about ways to replenish your stores by growing some of your own food. Even if you are not able to meet all of your family's needs, your stash will certainly last longer if you are able to supplement it.

Two skills that every survivalist should learn are vegetable gardening and fruit growing. Both involve trial and error so don't wait until an emergency occurs to start learning these important survival skills.

Shown above is a ginger plant growing in a 12 inch (30 cm) pot. (When the green leaves turn brown and die off the ginger root is ready for harvesting.) Even people who live in a high-rise apartment can grow a few vegetables, fruits or herbs in pots or containers. No matter how small, your property is capable of producing some homegrown foods. If you have a small back yard you can grow quite a bit, especially if you plan your garden carefully.

Go Organic!

We have seen that an important part of survivalism is self-sufficiency. The less you rely on the chemical industry the more prepared you will be when their expensive fertilizers and pesticides are unavailable. As a survivalist you should learn organic growing techniques. Not only will you be more self-sufficient, but your family will live healthier as well, and you will be contributing to a cleaner and safer planet. If you are new to gardening, or even if you are not, you will want to invest in one or more good "how to" gardening books. Be sure to choose books that emphasize organic methods. In the Additional Resources section at the end of this web site I have suggested some good gardening books. Learn how to fertilize your garden without chemicals, and how to control garden pests using natural methods.

Composting

Every organic gardener knows the benefits of composting. Composting allows you to recycle vegetable matter from your kitchen, as well as your yard and garden wastes, to convert it, with the help of beneficial bacteria and industrious earthworms, into an excellent material that you can work into your garden soil to aerate and fertilize it. Composting can be done anywhere, even in the city where space is limited. You can even keep a small earthworm compost bin just for kitchen scraps in your basement or garage. I do not add meat scraps or dairy products to my compost, preferring to keep the material of vegetable origin only, in order to eliminate odors and flies. The exception is egg shells which can be added to compost without creating any problems. The calcium in egg shells is also great for your soil. Even if you do not have a garden you should compost your vegetable trash and yard waste to produce less strain on our overflowing land fills and garbage dumps, and to be less reliant on city services, which may be interrupted during a prolonged emergency. (We will discuss waste disposal in a later chapter of this web site.)

The two compost bins that I keep behind my garage are shown in the photograph above. This type is normally too expensive in my opinion, but I was fortunate enough to acquire these two at estate sales for only a few dollars each. You can easily make your own compost bins by forming hardware cloth or chicken wire into a cylinder, leaving it open at both the top and the bottom. (Note the two rain barrels also in this photograph.)

Fruit Trees

Planting a tree? Why not make it a fruit tree? The dwarf varieties also make excellent ornamental trees. I have a very small front yard, but it was large enough to plant two dwarf fruit trees—an apricot and an Asian pear. Dwarf trees reach a maximum height of only 15 to 20 feet (4 to 6 m), but they produce about the same amount of fruit as full-sized trees that would require a much larger space. Semi-dwarfs are also available that grow to heights somewhere between a dwarf and a full-sized tree. It is also easier to harvest your fruit from a dwarf or semi-dwarf because you don't need a tall ladder.

It would be hard to find an ornamental tree that could exceed the beauty of a dwarf apricot tree. My apricot tree produces a bounty of fruit each year—far more than my family can consume, even though we preserve much of our fruit by canning and dehydration. Apricot trees are among my favorites not only because of their delicious fruit, but also because they produce beautiful and fragrant flowers in the early Spring. The photograph above shows a honey bee pollinating the blossoms of my apricot tree. A bee hive will provide plenty of delicious honey—a natural sweetener and healthful sugar alternative—and as an added bonus the industrious little workers will insure that all the blooms of your fruits and vegetables are pollinated, which will maximize production.

This beautiful dwarf Asian pear tree in my front yard (above) also produces a bounty of delicious and healthful fruit. Growing many different types of fruit not only provides variety, but the work of harvesting and preserving is spread out since each ripens at a different time.

Even though my property is in a suburb of a major city, and is only average in size, I also manage to grow a peach tree, two apple trees, two cherry trees, another pear tree and a paw paw tree in my back yard. This is in addition to a long row of 10 blackberry vines, another of 10 grape vines, and a nice-sized vegetable garden.

It is amazing how much of your own food you can grow, even on a small property. If you live on a larger lot you can of course grow much more, maybe even corn, wheat and other grains. Nut trees are also excellent if you have the space and are willing to fight the squirrels for your nuts.

Blackberries (above) are easy to grow if you have a sunny location. Check the prices in the grocery stores (even when they are in season) and you will understand why this is also an excellent cash crop!

Vegetable Gardening

Fruit trees are incredibly easy. For most varieties all you have to do is plant them, prune them once a year, and then collect your bounty of fruit. Vegetable gardening involves a little more work because the ground has to be broken and the garden has to be tilled, planted, hoed, etc. But the small amount of effort is well worth it.

It is not the purpose of this web site to give details on how to grow fruits and vegetables. There are many good books available, including the ones in the Additional Resources section at the end of this web site and under "Recommended Reading" at the bottom of this page. I suggest that you acquire a few good books and start learning now. If you are new to gardening you may find that some of your efforts will not pan out at first. But through time, with experience and learning, you will build your skills and develop your repertoire of favorite plants. You will get better with each season and when the emergency occurs you will be ready.

Save Your Seeds

Store-bought seeds will remain viable for at least 2 to 3 years, although their germination rate will decrease through time. Store your extra store-bought seeds by keeping them cool and dry in airtight containers such as mason jars or plastic bags. Refrigerating or freezing your seeds is not recommended. You should also save your own seeds from your garden. Just be sure to dry them thoroughly in the sun before storing them.

Dealing with Thieves

Even during normal times I find that there are sometimes people who will help themselves to the bounty of my labor, particularly to my fruit. Imagine how much more of a problem thievery will become when there is a shortage of food during a prolonged emergency. You might want to give some thought now to camouflaging or hiding at least part of your garden. I have seen people hide their gardens by growing edible plants in flower beds close to their house. There are so few people these days who know how to live off the land that most people don't even recognize a common edible plant when they see one (although everyone knows what a fruit is for.) Some foods, like parsnips, potatoes and carrots, grow underground and are even less obvious to the uninitiated.

Livestock

To help meet your protein needs you might also want to keep some type of livestock. There are many animals to consider, depending on space and local zoning laws. Goats will provide milk as well as meat. Chickens will provide eggs and meat. For city dwellers the most practical animals to keep are pigeons and rabbits. Pigeons are too messy for me so I greatly prefer rabbits.

Rabbit meat is delicious and healthy. Rabbits are extremely prolific and will eat just about any plant materials. Don't throw your corn husks into the compost! They are a favorite food for rabbits! Rabbits do not take up much space. They are quiet and easy to hide from your neighbors. We have a small one-car garage where we keep six rabbit hutches along with my garden tiller, lawn mower, a stash of twelve 20 lb propane tanks and a few bails of hay—And we still have room for our car as well!

Florida Whites are the best breed to keep for survival food when there are space limitations to consider. It is a compact breed that has been developed especially for meat production. They are a medium-sized breed, but they produce the greatest amount of meat per pound of feed consumed. And the meat is excellent! They also require much smaller hutches than the larger breeds and so they take up less space. They are perfect for city survivors.

I built these six hutches (above), each measuring 2x2x3 feet, for my Florida Whites using the instructions found in my favorite rabbit book, Storey's Guide to Raising Rabbits by Bob Bennett. To get the most from my limited space the hutches are hung from the joists in the ceiling of my garage. Worm bins underneath the rabbit hutches help keep odors and flies to a minimum. Worms love rabbit manure and are happy to speed up the decomposition process producing rich soil for the garden.

Rabbit manure is the best fertilizer available for your garden and is highly prized by growers everywhere. It can go directly from beneath your rabbit hutches to your garden without any danger of burning your plants. Even if I didn't eat meat I think I would keep rabbits just for this "black gold" for my garden.

These Florida Whites are "sharing" a plantain leaf. The best food for your rabbits is the pellets that you purchase at hardware and feed stores. These should form the bulk of their diets, but you can supplement with hay, "weeds" (that have not been sprayed with herbicides), and vegetable waste from your kitchen. Rabbits enjoy the parts of the vegetables that you would normally throw in the compost, including corn husks, carrot tops, cores, skins, etc. They absolutely love blackberry leaves, grape leaves, plantains and dandelions. Comfrey is an excellent food and a medicine as well and is easy to grow in your garden. Blackberry leaves are also good medicine for your rabbits, particularly good for diarrhea (which is probably due to overfeeding your rabbits—the most common mistake that rabbit owners make.) It is a good idea to keep a few bails of hay (not straw) on hand for supplemental food, nesting material, and for emergency food for your emergency food.

Action Step 10: Food Check Lists - Growing Your Own

Turn to the page in you Action Planner where you have begun your "Get" and "Do" lists for Food. Add to your lists the items that you want to acquire and the things that you want to accomplish to help you prepare for growing some of your own food. You might include items such as gardening equipment, and books pertaining to organic gardening and growing livestock. As you progress through the remainder of this web site you will think of other things to add to your lists. When you acquire an item or accomplish a task check it off your list.

A few generations ago most people knew a lot about wild edible plants. When European settlers first arrived in the New World they found many plants which were unfamiliar to them. Discovering which ones were good for food or medicines was a matter of survival. The Native Americans who had inhabited the continent for thousands of years had acquired a lot of knowledge about the native plants, and the first European settlers were eager to learn what they could from them. When Lewis and Clark made their famous Westward expedition from St. Louis, one of their objectives was to learn as much as they could from the natives about the indigenous plants. Many plant samples were gathered throughout their journey and brought back along with notes regarding their uses.

Unfortunately the average person today has almost no knowledge of edible wild plants. We have become so dependent on the commercial food distribution system that we are not even aware of the edible plants that commonly grow in our own yards. Fortunately we do have something that Lewis and Clark did not have. There are many excellent reference books available today that can help us identify edible plants and provide instructions on how to use them. A few of these books for North America are listed in the Additional Resources section at the end of this web site and under "Recommended Reading" at the bottom of this page. I suggest that you acquire a good book for your location and begin now to learn about the plants that are growing in your area. Don't wait until you are hungry!

Most people are surprised when they discover how many edible wild plants are growing within walking distance of their homes. In the remainder of this section, I will discuss only a few, which I give as examples to illustrate just a tiny bit of the bounty that is available for those who will do a little research and gain a little knowledge about this important subject.

Two of my favorite examples are dandelion and plantain. I like to mention these because most people consider them to be the most bothersome of weeds. Americans spend millions of dollars attempting to eradicate these humble weeds, managing only to poison our streams and lakes with the runoff from their deceptively immaculate lawns. When I see a "perfect" green lawn, no doubt the pride of the homeowner, I think about the dead stream nearby, where the toxic chemicals that have drained from this "perfect" lawn, and others like it, have killed off the fish and amphibians. This toxic stream then flows into a toxic river which then flows into a toxic ocean. As a result of the chemical fertilizers and herbicides that have been poured upon our lawns and fields there is now a huge "dead zone" extending for miles out into the Gulf of Mexico from where the Mississippi River flows into the Gulf. What a price to pay for our immaculate lawns! I greatly admire a lawn that supports a variety of plant species—the way Nature intended!

What is a weed?

The definition I like best is "an herb whose virtues remain unappreciated."

Dandelions

Dandelion is a member of the sunflower family. Its common name is derived from the French dents de lion, meaning "teeth of the lion," so named because of the jagged edges of its leaves. Its botanical name, Tarazacum officinalis, comes from the Latin for "remedy for disorders." It is native to Europe and naturalized in North America.

Every part of the dandelion plant is edible. The young leaves are an excellent addition to a green salad. As the leaves get larger they become bitter, so it is preferable to collect only the small young leaves for salads, and the white leaves just below the surface which have not yet turned green. Dandelion leaves or "greens" can also be cooked like a vegetable, similar to spinach. Dandelion flowers have been used to make dandelion wine, although they can be consumed raw as well. The roots can be cooked and eaten as a vegetable; or roasted, ground and brewed for a healthy coffee-like beverage. Dandelion root is a tonic, so "dandelion coffee" can provide a mild stimulating effect without the caffeine.

Nutritionists know the herb as one of the most nutrient-rich in the plant kingdom. It contains potassium, sodium, phosphorus and iron. The leaves are a richer source of vitamin A than carrots and contain some amounts of vitamins B, C and D. Herbalists value the herb mostly for its benefits for the urinary and glandular systems and as a liver and kidney tonic, due to its ability to enhance the efficiency of the body's eliminative and detoxifying functions. It is a mild laxative and diuretic. It has traditionally been used as a tonic, blood purifier, for constipation, inflammatory skin conditions, joint pain, eczema and liver dysfunction—including liver conditions such as hepatitis and jaundice. As a tonic dandelion strengthens the kidneys and may be helpful for conditions such as water retention and high blood pressure. It does not deplete the body of potassium like many diuretics.

Plantains

There are nineteen kinds of plantain found in the U.S. Narrow-leaved or English plantain (Plantago lanceolato), also known as ribgrass, is shown above and common plantain (P. major) is shown below. Another plantain not illustrated here is seaside plantain (P. juncoides or P. maritima) also known as goosetongue. Plantains are found all over the world and all are edible. They are also an important food for wild animals and birds.

Narrow-leaved or English plantain came to the New World with the settlers from Europe. The Anglo-Saxons referred to it as the "mother of herbs." Like dandelion, the leaves should be collected when they are very young, otherwise they will be too stringy. They can be eaten raw, used in a salad, or cooked like greens. (Be careful not to overcook your wild greens.) Herbalists value plantain for its astringent ability, resulting from its high tannin content. Astringents help draw tissues together and stop bleeding. Plantain has been used for cuts, burns, sores and for inflammation. It has also been used to treat snake and insect bites. Plantains, as well as dandelions, are also a favorite food of rabbits. If you decide to keep rabbits, be sure to fatten them up on this abundant and free rabbit chow from nature. (There is a type of green cooking banana that is also commonly called plantain. It is not a true plantain and should not be confused with the herbs mentioned above.)

Cattails

Cattails are clearly king with it comes to survival food. They are abundant, easy to identify, highly nutritious, found just about everywhere, and some part of the plant is available and edible year round, no matter the season. In the Spring the pollen can be collected by placing a plastic bag over the flower heads. This can be added to flour, using as much as 50% cattail pollen, and baked into bread. The Spring is also the time to collect the green flower heads which can be cooked as a vegetable. These must be collected before they start turning brown. In the early Spring, the new shoots can be collected as they emerge from the soil and cooked like asparagus. During any time of the year the roots can be dug up and eaten as a vegetable. They can be sliced and boiled or steamed as you would cook a potato or any other tuber. Cattails are not only highly nutritious but delicious as well.

In this section, in an effort to whet your appetite, I have mentioned only a few of the wild edible plants that are likely to be in your area. Many other useful wild plants are described in the chapter on health care. It is important for you to follow up on this information by acquiring a field guide to the edible wild plants in your area. I have listed my favorite ones in the Additional Resources section at the end of this web site and under "Recommended Reading" at the bottom of this page. This is required reading for all survivalists! Don't just buy the book and put it on your shelf. Use it as your bible to the great outdoors. Become proficient at identifying plants and get familiar with the wild edible plants in your area. Collect some edibles and try them! In the process you will be developing one of the most important survival skills that you will ever acquire. Survivalism consists of much more than just storing provisions for an emergency. Survivalism is a life skill. Your food and water may be taken from you, but no one can rob you of the knowledge and skills that you have stored in your head.

Wild Game

Many types of wild game, both large and small, are readily available for survivalists. If you are a hunter or angler you are well ahead of the game. (Pardon the pun.) You will already know how to clean and butcher an animal. Even if you live in the city you will find wild animals available for food. Rabbits, squirrels and pigeons are convenient because they are small animals that will provide one family one meal with few leftovers that need to be refrigerated or preserved. Deer are common, even in the suburbs (where they can be surreptitiously harvested using a bow or crossbow), but the problem with a large animal is that they will provide a lot of meat, so unless you are feeding an army, there will be a lot that will need to be preserved. During times of emergency there may be no electricity to run your freezer. Meat can be preserved quite well by pressure canning it in mason jars. It is also very easy to dry and smoke it making jerky. We will discuss food preservation techniques in a later section.

In a survival situation it is important that you do not put more effort and energy into an activity than you get out of it. Survivalists writer, Ragnar Benson, refers to this as the "Rule of Survival Thermodynamics." Hunting and fishing are two activities that take a lot of time and effort, and unless you are assured of finding game in a short period of time, they are usually not practical in an emergency situation. There is simply too much to do, and you must not waste your time and energy in activities that provide little hope of a sufficient return. For that reason, trapping animals and setting out unattended fishing lines are far more practical. Rather than wasting an entire day hunting or fishing, you can simple set out your traps or fishing lines and go about your daily activities checking on your traps and lines from time to time.

Trapping Small Game

Commercially-made traps are available, but one of the best ways to trap small game is with homemade snares made from thin wire or fishing line. If you have seen the French movie, Manon des Source (Manon of the Spring), you have seen wire snares at work. Manon, the stunningly beautiful sauvage, uses homemade wire snares to trap birds using dead insects for bait. Slightly larger snares will work for trapping squirrels and rabbits. (More on suburban trapping and snares can be found at http://www.survival.com/suburban.htm.)

The simplest snare is made by creating a loop of wire with a slip knot which allows the loop to tighten around the ensnared animal's neck, strangling it as it tries to escape. The end of the snare is anchored to the ground or a stationary object such as a tree or bush. Snares should be set out where animals run, situated where the animal is likely to run through the loop, which should be large enough for the animal's head to pass through but too small for the body.

Snares and traps can be dangerous because they do not discriminate. Pets and even small children can become entrapped. If you use a snare, or any other type of trap, be sure to adhere to the following important "trapper's rules:"

1. If you kill it, you eat it!
2. Be careful not to set traps where they may pose a hazard to pets or people, especially children.
3. Check your traps frequently.
4. Always remove all of your traps when you no longer need them.
5. Remember that a wounded animal can harm you.
6. Don't eat diseased animals.

The small animal trap pictured above is available in different sizes. This smaller version is excellent for catching squirrels and rabbits. The doors on both ends fall simultaneously when the animal hits the lever in the middle where the bait is placed. The animal is captured alive and unharmed, which is great if you want to fatten them up or start a rabbitry. Domestic rabbits, such as the previously mentioned Florida Whites, are much better for eating than their wild cousins, but any rabbits will do in an emergency.

Fishing

Quite often the best place to find food is where there is water. Fish, frogs, crayfish, turtles and water foul may be found there, and they will probably be easier to catch than roaming land animals. Your survival kit should including some basic fishing gear, including hooks, line and bait. It is far better to set out your fishing lines and traps, checking on them from time to time, than to waste your precious time waiting for them to bite.

Fish Traps

Traps are a very efficient way of catching water animals. A fish trap consists of an enclosed cylindrical basket of wire or bamboo with a conical or funnel shaped opening at one or both ends which extends part way into the basket. The trap is submerged with bait inside. The fish swim through the funnel shaped opening into the basket and once inside can not get out. Anglers often use small fish traps, (see photograph below), to catch minnows for bait. The size of the basket and the opening will depend on the size of the fish you are trying to catch. Fish traps can be easily made using chicken wire or hardware cloth. When using hardware cloth choose a size that will allow smaller fish to pass through so they can fatten up, retaining only the larger fish in your trap. Use road kill for bait, or punch a lot of small holes in an unopened can of dog or cat food.

Skinning, cleaning and butchering animals is a skill that all survivalists should know. There are good instructional videos available at hunting and outdoor stores. I will briefly explain the procedure using a rabbit as an example. It is the same procedure for a squirrel, or a rat, and essentially the same procedure for larger animals.

I will assume you have trapped a rabbit in your snare and that it is not yet dead. To kill the rabbit, hold it up by the hind legs with your left hand, take the head in your right hand (reverse if you are left-handed) and forcefully snap the head sharply back and slightly downward to break its neck. Alternatively, you can give the animal a sharp blow to the back of the head with a hard object, such as a hammer. (I prefer the latter method.) Then use a sharp knife to cut the head off just below the skull. Make small incisions between the Achilles tendons and the bones on both hind legs and hang the animal upside down on hooks or nails through the incisions to allow the blood to drain. Immediately make a cut on both legs, all the way around the leg, between the ankle joint and Achilles tendon being careful that you do not sever the tendons that you are using to suspend the animal. Now make incisions, cutting through the fur and skin but not into the muscles, from the first incision down the inside of the legs to the genital area. Cut off the tail and join both incisions. Pull the skin away from the muscles of the legs. Then slowly pull the skin down and off the entire animal, turning it inside out as you go, just as you would pull off a pullover sweater turning it inside out in the process. When you get to the front legs cut off both front paws at the first joint. Put the pelt aside if you plan on keeping it for tanning. Now make an incision down the belly of the animal from the anus to the ribcage being careful not to cut through any of the internal organs. Slip the two first fingers of your left hand underneath the skin, carefully cutting between your fingers, to keep from cutting through the intestines. At this point the guts should practically fall out of the animal. Cut away anything that is attached to remove the entire inner organs in one mass. Save the kidneys and liver (carefully remove the gall bladder from the liver), and clean out the rest of the animal. You can also save the heart and the brains if you want. Clean the animal well, inside and out, using cold water. If you have ice, cool the entire carcass down by submerging it in ice water for a few minutes before butchering it. Cut the animal up any way you like for cooking or preserving.

Save the fat! It could come in handy during a prolonged emergency. You can use if for fuel, for waterproofing fabrics, for candle making, soap making, and of course you can use it for cooking. Fat goes rancid very quickly so it must immediately be rendered. (Rendered fat is known as tallow, except rendered pork fat which is known as lard.) To render fat, chop it up or grind it and heat it in a double boiler until it is a liquid. Then pour it through fabric, or cheese cloth, until the liquid comes out clean. You can pressure can the tallow or freeze it.

Action Step 11: Food Check Lists - Foods from the Wild

Turn to the page in you Action Planner where you have begun your "Get" and "Do" lists for Food. Add to your lists the items that you want to acquire and the things that you want to accomplish to help you prepare for gathering food from the wild. For example, you might want to purchase a good field guide to the edible plants that grow in your area. As you progress through the remainder of this web site you will think of other things to add to your lists. When you acquire an item or accomplish a task check it off your list.

Conservation of Food

Food can be thought of as a form of stored energy. Plants store energy from the sun and animals get it from plants. Since the beginning of life, survival has depended on the organisms ability to efficiently use and conserve energy.

Until recent years humans have by necessity been conservative users of energy, but the availability of cheap and abundant fossil fuels has changed that. Chemical fertilizers made from natural gas and farm equipment powered by diesel fuel has allowed industrialized nations to produce an abundance of inexpensive food. People at one end of the nation have been able to enjoy fresh foods that were grown at the other end, and at extremely low costs thanks to refrigerated trucks. After decades of such a cheap energy bonanza, Americans, and others living in industrialized regions, have developed wasteful habits.

It has been estimated that American families throw out from 8 to 20% of the food they buy. That adds up to about $4.5 billion worth of wasted food a year. But even more is wasted by food wholesalers, distributors and retailers. Billions of dollars worth of good food—from the slightly bruised apple to the misshapen zucchini—is simply thrown out. One broken egg and the whole dozen is discarded! As a result of this waste, grocery store dumpsters are often loaded with good food, which many economically-minded people have discovered, some even going as far as making regular forages through grocery store dumpsters to reclaim some of this discarded bounty.

As a result of decades of abundant cheap energy, we have come to expect our grocery stores to be stocked with fresh produce regardless of the season.

During a prolonged emergency we will need to discard our wasteful habits rather than our good food. Foods that we cannot eat can be used to fatten up livestock, which will provide a source of protein. We can compost what the animals won't eat to recycle the nutrients and minerals back into the garden, eliminating the need for chemical fertilizers.

During an emergency there will be many other ways that you can conserve food, especially if you have made a few preparations. For example, when a large animal is butchered there is likely to be a great deal of meat that you will not be able to consume immediately. If you are without electricity you will not be able to freeze it either. However, if you have a heat source you may be able to pressure can some of the meat. Meat is cooked in the process of pressure canning so it will be ready to eat right out of the mason jar. Meat can also be salted, smoked or dried and made into jerky. This can even be done using solar energy.

Most Americans give little thought to food conservation. Experience has shown that old habits are hard to break, so even during lean times there will be individuals who will waste good food while going hungry. Their loss may be your gain, if you are willing to scrounge. Recently a deer was struck and killed by an automobile down the street from my home. A neighbor witnessed the accident and, being a deer hunter, knew exactly what to do. That meat did not go to waste

Let's say that you have just acquired a fresh kill. But it is a large animal (i.e., deer) and there is no electricity, so your refrigerator and freezer are not options. You could build a fire and have a huge barbecue for your entire neighborhood. But you would rather preserve some of this meat to feed your family during the coming months. Well, you can cut the meat into thin strips and dry it or smoke it making jerky. Or if you have a pressure canner and a heat source you can pressure can it. But first you will have to dress it!

Field Dressing

An animal must be field dressed or "gutted" immediately after it is killed—on the spot! Otherwise the meat will go bad very quickly. Even in very cold weather the inside of a large animal will stay warm for a long time after it dies. That heavy coat of fur that keeps the animal warm through the winter also keeps its insides warm for a long time after it has been killed. The digestive systems of all animals contain billions of microorganisms that do no harm when the animals are alive. But when the blood ceases to circulate and the immune system ceases to function, those microorganisms will cause the animal to deteriorate very rapidly. To protect the meat the "guts" have to be removed immediately—in the field—a process known as field dressing. The process is essentially the same for all animals. As an example I will briefly describe the basics of field dressing a deer. There are good videos available at hunting and outdoor stores that describe the process in detail, and a picture is worth a thousand words, as they say, so if you don't already know how to field dress an animal I would recommend that you acquire such a video and learn how to do it now. One that I recommend in DVD format is Practical Game Processing and Deer Butchering by Timothy Flynn and Gary Zick. Don't wait until you have a fresh kill on your hands. You will have to act quickly, which means that you will need to know what to do in advance.

If the animal is a buck, first cut off the genitals with a sharp knife. Then slit the underbelly of the animal from the genitals to the ribcage, being careful not to cut the intestines. After your initial incision slip two fingers under the skin to hold the skin up slightly away from the intestines to keep from nipping them. Pull all of the organs out of the body cavity, using your knife to cut away anything that is attached. Save the liver. The kidneys will be located in the flank of the animal. These should be cut away and also saved. Under the rib cage is a muscular diaphragm separating the abdominal cavity (which you just emptied) from the chest cavity. Cut around this diaphragm to remove the chest organs, which consists mostly of the heart and lungs. Reach up inside the chest cavity as high into the throat as possible with your knife, and cut the windpipe and then pull all the organs of the chest out of the animal in one mass. Save the heart. Rinse out the inside of the animal with cold water being particularly careful to wash out any intestinal contents that may have leaked into the carcass, which is now ready for transporting.

Next, make slits behind the Achilles tendons of both rear legs so that you can hang the animal upside down (as seen in the photograph above.) You can hasten the cooling down of the interior of the animal by propping open the internal cavity with a stick so that cold air can get to the inside. The animal may now be skinned and butchered.

During normal times my preferred method for keeping meat is in my freezer. For our purposes, however, I will assume that electricity is not readily available so I will describe two methods of preserving meat which require no refrigeration.

Smoking Meat & Making Jerky

Before refrigeration people relied on salt and smoke to preserve their meat. Most people lived on family farms and the "smoke house" was as familiar as the outhouse. Refrigeration changed the way we did a lot of things, but one thing it did not change was our taste for the flavor of smoked meat. Consequently, smokers are readily available today and recipes abound, including those for smoking your meat in your backyard grill. But one thing that nearly all of these recipes have in common is: the meat is cooked and so the end product will require refrigeration.

To preserve meat that will not require refrigeration a process known as Hard Smoking is required. Hard smoked meat is similar to jerky. It contains a lot of salt, and it is smoked at a low temperature until there is very little moisture left in it. It is kind of like the dehydration method used for fruits and vegetables, but done with smoke and the addition of salt and usually other spices as well. The salt helps preserve the meat by inhibiting the growth of microorganisms. Sometimes the meat is so salty that you may even want to soak it for a few hours before eating it to remove some of the salt. (People used to save this water and reclaim the salt by allowing the water to evaporate.)

The smoked meats and jerky that you buy in stores today contain preservatives called nitrites, so their moisture content may be slightly higher and their salt content slightly lower. Their recommended shelf-life is one year. Nitrites are known to cause cancer so their consumption should be limited. The jerky that you make at home, if preserved properly, should keep indefinitely even without nitrites, but as with any preserved food its quality will deteriorate over time. It would best be best to consume it within six months to a year.

Spices have been highly prized over the centuries, with certain spices at times being worth more than their weight in gold. You might recall, from your American history class, that when Christopher Columbus discovered the New World he was actually looking for a shorter trade with India, primarily for spices. We enjoy spices because they impart interesting flavors to our foods. But before the days of refrigeration they were also highly valued for their ability to preserve food. By using certain spices that have strong antimicrobial actions, we can reduce the amount of salt needed to preserve our meat, making it more palatable and healthier at the same time.

Spices with antimicrobial action include garlic, ginger, black pepper, clove, oregano, thyme, nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice, bay leaves, mustard, rosemary, bishop's weed, chilli (also called cayenne or red pepper), horseradish, cumin, black cumin, pomegranate seeds, onion, celery, geranium and many others. Some spices by themselves have weak antimicrobial effects that become much stronger when combined with other spices. (These combinations are said to be synergistic, because the combination is greater than the sum of the individual parts.) Chili powder is a synergistic combination typically consisting of red pepper (cayenne), onion, paprika, garlic, cumin and oregano. Five-spice powder is a synergistic combination of pepper, cinnamon, anise, fennel and cloves. Most people think that the combination of spices known as curry powder originated in India. But curry is actually a Western blend devised during colonial times combining the best spices from India. Curry powder recipes vary slightly, but turmeric is always a key ingredient in the blend. The usual recipe for curry powder in the West consists of turmeric, cardamom, cumin, fenugreek and chilles. Other herbs that are commonly included in curry blends include ginger, garlic, coriander, cloves, nutmeg, mustard, black pepper, fennel, and others.

We can extend the shelf-life of our homemade jerky with the judicious use of spices. Salt and pepper, either black or red, are key ingredients. The other spices that I prefer include garlic, ginger, and turmeric. I also like the spice blends mentioned above, curry powder, chili powder and five-spice powder. If a liquid marinade is to be employed soy sauce may be used as the source of salt.

Safety Precautions

Jerky is considered a very safe and effective method of preserving meat. However, over the years a few incidents of food poisoning have been reported as a result of improperly cured jerky. This can be easily avoided if a few commonsense precautions are followed:

1) Cleanliness is rule number one. It begins in the field when the animal is field dressed or gutted. Try to keep the meat from coming into contact with the contents of the intestines. Rinse the inside of the animal thoroughly with water if possible.

2) Before preparing any food wash your hands thoroughly using soap and water. Use a mild chlorine bleach solution (one tablespoon of bleach to a gallon of water) to clean all surfaces and materials that will come into contact with the meat. (By now it should be evident that chlorine bleach is an important survival item that should be stored in sufficient quantities.)

3) The use an oven thermometer to insure that your smoker/dryer maintains the proper temperature is recommended.

4) Jerky must be completely dry, since bacteria require moisture to grow. Properly dried jerky should crack when bent in half, but not necessarily break into two pieces. Allow the jerky to cool to room temperature before testing.

5) Avoid Cross-Contamination by not allowing your finished product to come into contact with surfaces that have been contaminated by raw meat

6) Store jerky in airtight jars or plastic bags to prevent it from absorbing moisture and bacteria from the air. Allow the jerky to cool to room temperature before placing it into airtight containers.

7) If moisture appears on the inside of the storage container the jerky is not dry enough. Dry it longer.

Drying/Smoking Temperatures

There are a lot of opinions regarding ideal drying/smoking temperatures. Some differences of opinion are the result of safety concerns, and some have to do with what you intend to do with the meat. Those who plan on storing their dried meats in a refrigerator or freezer tend to cook their meat as well as dry it. It is important to remember that cooked meat is not suitable for long term storage and must be stored in a refrigerator or freezer or else eaten within a few days. When properly cured and dried, without cooking, meat will keep indefinitely, (although its quality will begin to deteriorate after a few months so it should probably be eaten within a year.)

Because of the natural preservative nature of smoke, smoking meat can be safely done at a lower temperature than that used when drying meat without smoke. Also, meat properly cured with salt and spices can be safely dried or smoked at a lower temperature. In general, I believe that it is best to use the lower temperatures, by using the smoking process rather than drying alone, and being sure to cure the meat with salt and spices beforehand.

The USDA recommends drying/smoking temperatures of 145^o F for 7 hours or 155^o for 4 hours. Care should be taken not to exceed 155^o F or the meat will get cooked rather than dried. Lower drying temperatures of 125^o F for 10 hours or 135^o F for 8 hours are recommended by some, and I have even seen recommendations as low as 95^o to 130^o F.

I recommend that you begin the drying process at a lower temperature, say around 125^o F, and then gradually increase it each hour until the maximum temperature of 145^o to 150^o F is reached for the final hour or so. This will insure that the meat is thoroughly dried through and through without getting cooked. Check the meat for doneness by allowing a piece to cool down and then bend it.

To convert degrees Fahrenheit to Celsius subtract 32, then multiply by five and divide by 9. Or use the following approximations:

The Drying/Smoking Process

Smoking the meat is not an absolute necessity, but in my opinion it is highly desirable—not only because the smoke imparts a nice flavor to the meat, but more importantly because the smoke is a natural preservative. Jerky can be made in an ordinary oven by leaving the oven door open slightly to allow the moisture to escape. It is important that the temperature does not exceed 155^o F because you want to dry the meat rather than cook it. Cooked meat is not preserved. You should set an oven thermometer on the oven rack toward the back to monitor the heat. Obviously this is best done in the cold months of the year when the heat escaping from the oven can be used to help keep your house warm, rather than increasing your air conditioning bill.

Drying jerky can also be done in a food dehydrator. Again a thermometer may be advisable to monitor the heat. Even if your dehydrator has a temperature setting, these are often inaccurate. A solar dehydrator is also an option. The Native Americans (who taught the European settlers about jerky in the first place) used to dry their meat in the open air and sun. In some cultures the meat is actually hung in the sun on the thorns of shrubs. So, despite all of these seemingly complicated instructions, never forget that making jerky is not rocket science!

As I have mentioned my favorite way to make jerky is in a smoker, using the natural preservative nature of the smoke to help preserve the meat. Ordinarily smokers contain a pan of water, which helps keep the meat moist. However, the end product of most smoking recipes will require refrigeration. Our intention is to use the hard smoking process to make jerky, with a very low moisture content, that will keep indefinitely without refrigeration. So skip the water! I also recommended that you monitor the temperature, keeping it below 155^o F, so that your meat will be dried rather than cooked. Many commercial smokers are available, using gas, charcoal or wood. They can also be easily made using inexpensive materials.

The recipes and directions that come with most smokers, like the one pictured above, will result in the meat being cooked rather than hard smoked. The end product will require refrigeration. Our intention is to make jerky that will not require refrigeration, so we want to use the hard smoking process which is accomplished by using smoke at a lower temperature.

I have seen a very effective homemade smoker made by a deer hunter. He used his smoker to process his entire deer into jerky in a matter of a couple of days. It consisted of a large wooden box with screened shelves that would slide out. (If you make your own smoker or dryer don't use metal screens. They are galvanized with zinc which is not suitable for contact with food.) He would dig a fire pit about 6 feet from the smoker. On top of the pit he put a 6 foot length of 6 inch galvanized vent pipe (the kind you use to vent your furnace) on a slight incline leading from the fire pit to a hole in the lower side of the smoke box. He would start a fire in the fire pit and then cover it with a piece of sheet metal to keep the fire smoldering and to direct the smoke through the vent pipe and into the smoke box.

Another ingenious method suitable for the cold months of the year makes use of a wood burning stove in your house, with the stove pipe running to the outside of your house and into your smoker. Since smoke rises, the smoker must be at a higher level than your stove. Sufficient stove pipe should be used to insure that the smoke cools enough before entering the smoker, otherwise the meat could get cooked rather than dried. A heat reclaimer on the stove pipe inside the house can also increase the efficiency of such a unit, further reclaiming the heat for the house and cooling down the smoke sufficiently for the smoker at the same time. This is the procedure that I use (illustrated in the photograph above) using a wood stove in my basement with the stove pipe running through a basement window and into my smoker on the outside. Needless to say great care should be taken to avoid setting your house on fire. Never leave such a unit unattended!

There is a variety of opinions regarding the best wood to burn in your smoker. I don't think it matters a lot, so use what you have available. Any hardwoods will do. Fruit trees like apple will do very nicely. When I prune my fruit trees I save the trimmings to use for my smoker. I have never used pine but I have heard others say that it should be avoided.

Making Jerky

Select the leanest cuts of meat for making jerky and remove all visible fat. Fat does not preserve well and can adversely affect the taste and quality of your jerky. For a product that does not require refrigeration you are going to want to remove as much moisture from the meat as possible. This can be accomplished more easily by slicing the meat very thin. Slice the meat across the grain (at a right angle to long muscles) for the most tender jerky, or with the grain for a more chewy jerky. Cut it into strips no more than a quarter of an inch (6 mm) thick. This is more easily accomplished if the meat is slightly frozen.

Basic Brine recipe: Two cups of salt, 1 cup of sugar, 1 tsp. ground black pepper, 1/2 tsp. ground cloves, 1/2 tsp. of garlic powder and 1/2 tsp. of turmeric powder. Other herbs and spices may be used according to availability and tastes. The only ingredient that is absolutely essential is the salt. To make a liquid for cold marinating or for a boiling marinade add this dry mixture to 2 quarts of water. The mixture can be made slightly weaker (more water) for a boiling marinade. For a dry marinade mix the dry ingredients without any liquids.

Cold Marinade

Soak the strips of meat in the marinade in a refrigerator overnight, or for at least three hours. This is most easily done in a plastic bag. At least once during the marinating process shake the bag and turn it over to insure that all the meat comes into contact with the marinade. After the meat has been marinated, remove it from the marinade, shake off the excess and put it in the dryer or smoker. Some people are concerned about bacterial growth in the cold marinade. Certainly this step should be done in the refrigerator. If refrigeration is not available, alternative methods include boiling marinade and dry marinade.

Boiling Marinade

As an extra precaution, the USDA recommends that meat be precooked to at least 160^o F before drying. This is accomplished by skipping the cold marinade, and instead, the raw meat is dipped into a boiling marinade until the it turns gray (one to two minutes.) Then it is dried or smoked as usual. Care should be taken not to cook the meat too much. No other marinating is necessary because the heat causes the marinade to penetrate the meat very rapidly. I don't think that such a precooking step is necessary, but a boiling marinade may be a desirable alternative if your refrigerator is not working. I prefer the following dry marinating process instead.

Dry marinade

During a prolonged emergency the dry marinating process may be the best choice, not only because it requires less energy, but also because it makes the most economical use of your marinade. The dry marinade is mixed well and sprinkled generously onto a large cutting board. The strips of meat are laid on the dry marinade, first one side and then the other, to coat both sides well. Then a wooden mallet is used to pound the marinade into the meat. If your refrigerator is working, or if it is very cold outdoors, the strips can be stacked one upon the other, put in a plastic bag or closed container, and put in the cold for a few hours or overnight to allow the dry marinade to soak into the meat. This step is not necessary, since you have pounded the marinade into the meat with the wooden hammer, so if the temperature is warm it may be best to immediately shake off the excess marinade and put the strips in the smoker or dryer.

Pressure Canning Meat

Canning meat in mason jars is also an effective way to preserve meat. Unlike tomatoes and fruits, which may be canned in a boiling water bath, meats must be canned at the higher temperatures that are only achievable by a pressure canner. Any pressure cooker can be used for pressure canning, but many pressure cookers are too small to be of much use in canning. A pressure canner is simply a pressure cooker that is large enough to hold a practical number of mason jars. It is certainly a good investment if you are interested in pressure canning. Instructions for pressure canning can be found with any good pressure canner and in many cookbooks as well. I will discuss pressure canning in further detail in a later section of this chapter.

Preserving the Bounty from your Orchard and Garden

At the beginning of this chapter, in our discussion of food storage, I introduced several methods of food preservation to consider for your long-term storage needs, including dehydration, home-canning and freezing. In this section we will take a closer look at these three methods as they pertain to the preservation of your homegrown foods.

Dehydration

As we discussed earlier, dehydration requires the removal of most of the water from the food using a drying technique involving air circulation and low levels of heat. Sometimes a fan is used but more often the circulation is produced by the simple effect of rising warm air. Most dehydration units have an electrical element in the bottom to produce the heat. The unit is vented at the bottom and top. The hot air rises passing around and through the foods, which are placed on screens to allow maximum circulation. To insure adequate dehydration the foods are generally prepared for the drying process by slicing them very thin. The warm air picks up moisture from the food and carries it out the top of the unit, while cooler and dryer air flows in from the bottom. For best results the temperature should be raised very gradually over a period of hours. Otherwise the outside of the food could become dry, locking the moisture in the inside and preventing the food from drying completely. Inexpensive food dehydration units for home use are readily available and are very effective. Solar energy also works very well as a heat source for dehydrating foods, and many foods are dried simply by placing them out in the open air in a sunny location (preferably with some protection against insects.)

Dehydrated foods do not require refrigeration. Without moisture the microorganisms that are responsible for food spoilage can not grow. Care must be taken to insure that most of the water is removed or spoilage, usually from mold, could become a problem. Dehydrated foods will keep for a year or longer when stored in airtight containers or plastic bags. The dryer the food the longer it will store. As with all preservation techniques some nutritional value is lost during the drying process, but dehydration remains one of the best ways to prepare food for storage without refrigeration or sterilization. Dried foods are light and compact making them ideal for backpacking and food storage. You can restore dehydrated foods by soaking them in water for a few hours before using them, but most dehydrated fruits are eaten as-is. You will probably want to reconstitute your dehydrated vegetables before eating them. Dehydrated vegetables are great for soups and stews.

It is not necessary to peal fruits before dehydrating them, but pealed fruits will dry faster. This handy countertop apple peeler also cores the apples and slices them into very then and uniform slices ideal for dehydration. You can also use it to slice and core your apples without pealing them. Thin and uniform slices will dry quicker and more efficiently.

The thinly sliced fruits or vegetables are placed on the screens in single layers, with no overlap, which allows for maximum air circulation. The temperature is set at the lowest setting at first and then gradually increased over the next few hours to prevent the outside of the fruit from drying first, locking moisture on the inside. The fruit or vegetable must be dried all the way through for proper preservation and storage preparation.

The dried fruits and vegetables are cooled to room temperature and then place in airtight containers such as plastic bags or glass jars. Glass jars could break in an earthquake so plastic storage containers may be preferable.

Canning

Canning requires the complete sterilization of the food and container. The naturally occurring enzymes that would cause deterioration of the food in time are also destroyed by the heat used in the canning process. Special glass jars (e.g., Mason jars) and two-piece lids are used for home canning. The lids completely seal the jars with a vacuum inside which keeps all microorganisms out. Properly canned foods will keep almost indefinitely, but their quality begins to deteriorate after about a year so it is recommended that they are consumed within a year or so.

Canning in a 10 minute boiling water bath is adequate for high-acid foods such as fruits, tomatoes and foods pickled in vinegar. Nonacid foods such as meat, fish, fowl and vegetables require a higher temperature which is obtainable only in a pressure canner. (The photograph above shows a boiling water bath canner on the left and a pressure canner on the right.)

Complete instructions for home canning will be found in the instructions that will come with your canning equipment or in any good canning recipe book. Some good canning books are listed in the Additional Resources section at the end of this web site and under "Recommended Reading" at the bottom of this page. The first step for canning fruits or tomatoes in a boiling water bath involves sterilizing the glass jars by boiling them in water for 10 minutes in a large pot. The lids are placed in a separate pan of water which is brought to a simmer (180^o F) but not boiled. At the same time that the jars are being sterilized, the food is also sterilized by boiling it for 10 minutes in another pot. The hot food is then added to the hot jars and the lids are placed on the jars with the bands screwed on finger tight. The final processing involves boiling the jars of food for another 10 minutes completely submerged in the boiling water bath. If you live more than 1,000 feet above sea level you must increase the boiling time using the following formula: At 1-3,000 feet add 5 min.; 3-6,000 add 10 min.; 6-8,000 add 15 min.; 8-10,000 add 20 min.

After the boiling water bath the jars are removed and allowed to cool down. During the cooling process the lids should seal, which is indicated by an indentation in the center of the lid. Jars that are sealed are now ready for labeling and storage. Any jars that did not seal can be placed in the refrigerator for immediate consumption or boiled again in the boiling water bath. For jars that don't seal the problem will usually turn out to be food between the rim of the jar and the lid, so the rim should be checked and wiped clean before the second attempt.

Some recipes call for additional ingredients. Most jellies, for example, will require pectin and sometimes lemon juice for acidity as well. You will probably also want to add sugar to most fruits. Pectin usually comes with good recipes for making jellies and jams.

Pressure Canning

All meats, including fish and fowl, and foods that contain meat, such as stews, must be processed at 240^o F, which is obtainable only with steam under 10 pounds of pressure (psi.) This pressure must be increased if you live more than 1,000 feet above sea level: At 1-2,000 feet use 11 psi; 2-4,000 use 12; 4-6,000 use 13; 6-8,000 use 14; 8-10,000 use 15. If your pressure canner uses a fixed weight that is only adjustable in 5 psi increments use 15 psi if you live over 1,000 feet above sea level. It is not necessary to pre-sterilize jars and lids when the processing time will exceed 10 minutes. Meat should be cut into convenient sized chunks and precooked without flour until the red color changes to brown. The jars are then packed with the meat and filled will boiling broth leaving a one inch head space to allow for expansion.

Vegetables, due to their low acid content, will also require pressure canning but most only require a half inch head space in the jar. Starchy vegetables such as corn, peas and beans will require a one inch head space for expansion. (Tomatoes, which are technically not a vegetable, may be canned in a boiling water bath as described above for fruits.)

After packing the jars with food the lids are screwed on tight. They are placed on the rack in the pressure canner in about two quarts (2 l) of hot water. The cover is place on the pressure canner and the heat is turned on high. The pressure regulator weight is left off or the petcock valve is left wide open to allow air to escape from the canner as the water comes to a boil. When the water starts to boil steam will begin escaping from the canner. Allow steam to escape for 10 minutes to eliminate all air pockets and then completely close the petcock valve or place the regulator weight on the canner. It will take about 5 more minutes for the canner to reached full pressure. After it becomes fully pressurized turn the heat down and begin timing. Usually the lowest setting is adequate to maintain the pressure. When canning meat, pint jars should be processed for 75 minutes and quart jars for 90. Dried beans should be soaked and cooked first and then processed for the same amount of time. Greens should also be processed for the same amount of time as meat, but most vegetables, such as asparagus, beets, and carrots, are best processed for 30 minutes for pints and 40 minutes for quarts.

Refer to your canning recipe book for additional instructions for the foods that you are canning. Whether you are canning with a boiling water bath, or a pressure canner, the instructions should be followed closely. If your canning instructions or recipes vary from the general instructions given here, you should use the instructions that came with your canning equipment or recipe book. Food poisoning from home canning is rare, but improperly canned foods can cause botulism which can be life-threatening. You do not need to worry as long as you follow the instructions carefully, particular with regard to sterilization procedures and processing times and temperatures.

Freezing

Freezing is an easy and convenient method of food preservation. It is also very good at retaining the nutritional value of your foods. To prepare fresh vegetables for freezing they must be blanched first to stop the enzymatic activity that can cause the nutritional value and quality of your food to deteriorate. To blanch vegetables drop them into a pot of boiling water. Leave them for a minute or two to allow the water to come back to a boil. Then quickly stop the cooking process by removing them from the boiling water and dropping them into ice water. Once cooled they are ready to put into freezer bags, squeezing as much air out of the bag as possible, and then into your freezer.

There is one obvious disadvantage to freezing which we discussed at the beginning of this chapter. When the electricity goes off so does your freezer, unless you have invested in a gasoline or propane-powered generator. If you are a hunter or have a garden and prefer freezing to other preservation techniques that is fine. Hopefully, during an emergency, you will be able to consume the foods in your freezer before they spoil. But you should also have a stash of foods that do not require freezing for those longer emergencies.

If you do use a freezer to store some of your food, remember that loss of power does not have to mean the loss of your food, even if you don't have a generator. The food in a full freestanding freezer will be safe for about two days after the power goes out, providing you don't open the door too much. A chest-type freezer is much more desirable than an upright freezer. Cold air is heavier than warm air, and the cold air tends to stay in a chest-type freezer longer. When you open the door of an upright freezer all of the cold air "falls out" of the freezer in a matter of seconds. A half-full freezer will keep your frozen foods safe for about one day after the power goes off. If your freezer isn't full, group the frozen foods together forming a pyramid so that they can protect each other. Put meat and poultry to one side so their juices won't contaminate the other foods when they begin to thaw. (Do this beforehand because when the power goes off you will want to have the freezer door open as little as possible.) Remember that the foods at greatest risk are meat, poultry and foods containing dairy products such as milk, cream, sour cream and soft cheese.

If your freezer is not full, it is a very good idea to fill some of the empty space with plastic bottles filled about three quarters full of water. (Don't fill the bottles completely because water expands as it is freezes.) Two and three liter soda bottles work great. Once the water is frozen, it won't take any additional energy to keep it that way, and the fuller your freezer is the more efficiently it will operate. When the power goes out your frozen foods will remain frozen much longer (the same as if your freezer were filled with frozen foods.) The frozen bottled water may also serve as emergency drinking water.

A Final Thought About Food: Recycling

Other than the obvious (i.e., eating "leftovers"), just how do you recycle food? Remember that food is stored energy, and energy is the key to survival. Even the parts of our foods that we do not eat contain stored energy as well as useful nutrients. As we saw earlier one way to recycle this food is by feeding it to livestock. Corn husks can be fed to rabbits, for example. Due to their unique digestive systems rabbits can digest plant parts that humans can not. In turn the rabbits will provide a source of high-quality easily digestible protein.

As we also discussed in another section of this web site, you can recycle food waste by composting as well. Composting makes use of naturally occurring bacteria to break down food, and other organic materials, turning it back into rich soil. The composted soil can then be worked into your garden providing natural fertilizer.

I should mention here that one thing that I do not recommend recycling is human fecal matter. Human waste contains harmful bacteria that can cause dysentery or cholera which can make you very sick or even kill you. Do not use human waste as a fertilizer for any plants which are going to be consumed by humans. Animal manure is an entirely different story. Rabbit manure, as we have seen, is the best fertilizer available and won't burn your plants even when worked directly into the soil. The manure of other herbivores, such as cows and horses, is also very desirable for your plants. The manure of meat eating animals, such as dogs and cats, should be avoided in your compost and in your garden because they can harbor dangerous parasites.

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