Freezing food

[ADOZ]

Hi everyone ! I wanted to share with you my very recent experience with freezing food.

I went into the garage to get bread out of the freezer to find out that my freezer was "dead" !

It was full of fruits, bread , meat etc... I was devastated!!! I gave some to family and put some in my fridge freezer but I lost must of my food.

My lesson ; no more freezing food. I need to learn to do more canning.

[signseeker]

Yeah, how would we know when the freezer 'dies' before it's too late?

Personally, I'm done with freezer jam. Not that it would go bad immediately, but I find the taste and consistency of canned jam is much more agreeable.

I'm going to do dehydrating this summer, too. That's supposed to last a long while, easy to do, and very lightweight in the end.

[LEVE]

I walk by our freezer several times a day and have trained myself to look at the little light telling me it's working. However, if it were in my detached garage... I'd have a remote alarm on it to warn me if it fails.

We're thinking of putting a half a beef in a freezer in the garage... that's a lot of money/resources to loose if it fails. I've told the wife that we can keep the stuff frozen with dry ice until we can get it canned in the case of freezer failure. In the case of TSHTF... we'll have to scramble to save it.

[Buffie]

I'm so sorry, Adoz. I've had freezers to go bad, too, and I know what a mess it can be. I listen to mine every time I walk past. If anything is wrong, I call Sears for an emergency repair. Once it stopped running and we had to take everything out so it could be repaired. The repair only took about twenty minutes, and we put everything back inside and nothing was lost.

I've never frozen jam or bread. Being totally Southern, I love vegetables and that's what I freeze: okra, corn, turnip greens, at least six kinds of beans, and squash. I understand the limitations of freezing in a survival situation, but every year I freeze 4-5 bushels of beans in addition to all the other stuff. To me it just tastes good.

[prairiemom]

If your freezer isn't in the house or where you'll see it a couple time a day, invest in a freezer alarm. For under $10 it'll start beeping if the inside temp gets too high. If it's out in the garage where you might not hear the alarm, use a baby monitor to broadcast into the house. (We do that with our sump pump alarm--have a baby monitor on it.)

It's so sad to lose food like that.

There's a lot that I won't freeze--jam, most fruits, most veggies. Drying or canning are my preferred methods--precisely for that reason.

[ADOZ]

Thank you for all your comments, but I tell ya that I have learned a huge lesson. When the CHTF and the electricity goes, then what??? If you have a generator that can only work as long as there is gas but once that is out I don't think you can refill cause gas pumps are electric aren't they?

I really want to learn to can meat and veggies.
All I want in the freezer now is ice cream and so when the freezer fail....Oh happy day!!!! we'll eat the ice cream until it's all gone!!! *LOLOL*

I also want to learn to make jerky!!! yummy!!!

[signseeker]

When the CHTF and the electricity goes, then what??? If you have a generator that can only work as long as there is gas but once that is out I don't think you can refill cause gas pumps are electric aren't they?

Dude. Consult the electricity after TEOTWAWKI thread. :l0 (29):

But yeah. Ice cream's good. :thumbup:

[ADOZ]

Dude. Consult the electricity after TEOTWAWKI thread. :l0 (29):

Never been called a Dude before but that's ok :) *LOLOL*

[phylm]

We try to keep enough empty canning jars ahead to can our frozen meat and vegetables if the power is going to be gone indefinitely. We do have a large refrig/freezer in our 5th wheel, so figure we can freeze big water bottles to keep some food in our 5-day coolers until we can get it canned, or dehydrated in our gas oven.

[signseeker]

Never been called a Dude before but that's ok :) *LOLOL*


Okay, I realize you used the word "devastated" in your first post - that should've been my first clue. :bonk: But you must admit, ADOZ is kind of a manly name. I call my girlfriends "dude" too. :d0 (47):