To feel totally overwhelmed about Be Prepared?

[Witchhunted]

Sorry im sure there are hundreds of posts about this but I used Search and couldn't find what I was lookimg for.

I'm not really looking for a conspiracy theory type discussion about whether something terrible is coming. I'm trying to keep really calm and thinking - we don't really know either way. But it seems sensible, on balance, that if lots of governments across the world are telling people to have a bit of a stash in plus some things like torches, radios etc - in the interest of my family I probably should. If I don't need it, hurray, and if whatever happens is too awful for a 1 week supply then...well, canned food will probably be the least of our worries.

SO my AIBU is just that I'm totally overwhelmed with what to get? I want to get a one off bulk shop really, with budget of max about £150. Would rather spend less because it's nearly Christmas and could do with that money elsewhere! We are a family of 2 adults, 2 teenagers. What would we need for 1 week that's vaguely palatable and wouldn't require either water or electricity to cook?? We do have an old school bbq so I guess if I get some bags of charcoal, could heat things on that if it isn't raining outside. Also - what can I get that will genuinely keep for a really long time as I stocked up for Covid and there was soooo much wastage; really don't want that situation again where everything just gets thrown out.

I've looked on the Preppers section but that all seems quite hardcore and survivalist! What does the absolute average Joe family buy who isn't prepping for the apocalypse, realistically won't survive a worst case scenario, but wants to be prepared if there are 1 week of power cuts etc? Specific brands, foods, recipes hugely appreciated!

I’m taking it moderately seriously mainly because summer was so hot that I’m sure we will have some awful cold snaps, storms and power cuts this winter.
I am not a “prepper” but I’ve bought a few extra of the following
tortilla chips
cereal bars
crackers
tinned fruit
chocolate
tuna

I’ve also charged up my mini power bank and got some extra batteries (but I usually stock up on those before Xmas anyway!)

I bought 2 large bottles of water 5L. Some cereal bars and some baked beans. I might get a radio but not sure I can be bothered

Is this for real? The suggestion is you have three days food supplies, some water, a radio, and some torches and candles. Which the vast majority of households will have anyway.

Candles and a torch.

Also a top tip is that you can soak pasta in cold water for two hours and it will ‘cook’, so you can make a cold pasta salad if you have no means of cooking.

What’s the saying, prepare for the worst, hope for the best. I lived in a country with hurricanes and would have to be prepared just in case - I’d take a similar approach. You don’t need to go mad, but I think being sensible is a good idea.
Main items would be: non perishable foods, water, torches/batteries, power banks. A gas hob isn’t a bad idea if you don’t want to eat cold food, that may be better than a bbq! Make sure you have any prescriptions. Keep your car over half full with petrol. Have some cash on you. These things are just from the top of my head.
There must be other examples of what to buy food wise and to feed a family - a lot would be dependent on what you eat, but as much as I hate cold beans, I’d eat them in a worst case scenario if it was that or going hungry.

I've bought two 5l bottles of water (about £150 each) and some more gas cansiters for my camping stove and lamp. I have a battery transistor radio already which lasts for a couple of months on 3 AA batteries, so I'm not sure why everyone has gone crazy for buying wind up radios.

I know a lot of peope aren't in as fortunate situation as many of us, but my thinking is, I only shop for store cupboard items like tins of beans and frozen vegetables and fruit every couple of weeks so I reckon I've got enough stock of them for a few days. I get fresh things - mainly bags of salad, yoghurt, eggs, and fruit maybe twice a week at most but I could live without them for a few days if necessary. I have pre-prepared portions of an onion/garlic/ tomatoes in the freezer to which I add pulses/vegetables etc are my normal main dinner source so I'd carry on eating them as they would go off eventually anyway.

I should probably get some cash out and I think I'll stock up on crisps and wine.

Yep, just stay calm!!

Prioritise water.

It would be good to have at least a couple of torches and one battery operated radio, and spare batteries. Batteries in a radio last for ages & to be perfectly honest if some catastrophe outlast the batteries in the radio and a spare pack I'm fucked anyway.

Then food, just buy things you would ordinarily eat and keep it rotated. In your position, I would definitely get a single gas burner so that you can boil water (outside) then if you have typical teens, a good supply of instant noodles

I'm vegetarian and low-carb, with health issues & no longer have teens to feed. So what I have got in won't really help you!

When my sister was in an earthquake in LA she used her car radio for news. I have about two weeks worth of food in my cupboard anyway - it will be repetitive but we won’t starve! Gas hob, bbq in a pinch.
We live in London. I think a lot if the warnings are really for people who live more rurally without access to shops etc. Many of the countries that are suggesting longer supplies are meant for that audience.

Fluid is the really important thing. Food can be bland and repetitive if needed.

My top tip for something a bit different is bulgar wheat and passata - the bulgar wheat can "cook" cold by soaking in the passata with spices, then be warmed up if you have a camping stove, or else be eaten cold.

The car radio is a good tip! I couldn't convince myself to bother with a wind-up radio and that settles it - everything else is just more of what we have already.

I've bought a few tins - baked beans, stew, soups, tuna. So I've got enough food to last a couple of weeks.

Have filled 2L bottles with water

Bought a Power Bank.

Got candles, matches, charcoal (will use large roasting tin with wire rack over, on top of cooker).

Haven't got a radio yet

I'd start with water. Then maybe 10 tins of shelf stable protein you can eat cold as is, such as tinned fish or corned beef. And candles. That should feel manageable to start with.

Tuna is a good one as people have said. Easily eaten in a sandwich or with cold soaked pasta - protein and carbs. Honestly though it depends what angle you come at the advice from. If the disaster is heavy snow meaning the shops have no deliveries (which does happen up in the Pennines where I grew up) then you just cook what you've got, but if it's no power at all that's quite different.

You can make a meal from a plate of tortilla chips, salsa, some cheese and so on so don't neglect the snack cupboard.

Beyond that - USB power bank, always charged. I think that's good practice anyway.

It's been my habit for years to stock up for winter anyway. Starting in about mid-September, I start buying extra cans of things, and making sure the freezer is well stocked.
I always think back to "Beast from the East" in about 2018. We lived in a flat up a bit of a hill at the time, and were trapped in by snow and then ice for almost a week. And because I've always been a stocker-upper, we were fine.

The only thing I've done different this time is getting some water in. We've got a large garage, so storage space isn't an issue, luckily.

Got candles, matches, charcoal (will use large roasting tin with wire rack over, on top of cooker).

@BMW6 I hope you don’t mean you’re going to make a bbq on top of the cooker in your kitchen? Charcoal bbqs give off loads of carbon monoxide, and should only ever be used outdoors.

Do you think the government will let everyone die if they haven’t had the means to prep? It’s just all a bit silly imo.

I've just got 2 5l bottles of water and a six pack of long life milk. I have candles, a BBQ and quite a lot of cans and frozen meals anyway. I might get some matches and put them in a plastic bag and that's it. I need to ditch stuff though like old batteries and electrical stuff so we're not scrabbling around so will book a trip to the recycling centre.

£150 for water? A 2 pack of 5L bottles are less than £10 on Amazon.

Do you think the government has magic stores with enough food to feed 70 million people? What do you think would happen? Andy Burnham would knock on with a pizza delivery?

I haven’t done anything extra about this. I’m amazed the panic that people have about this

I agree it's sensible to get some bits in, and I think it's completely natural to feel a bit overwhelmed, but try to remember it is really just common sense advice, that plenty of European countries have been given as standard for years.

The actual checklist is pretty straightforward: Why should I stockpile and what will I need? - BBC News

We've just got a few big bottles of water to keep under the stairs, made sure we've put a torch and batteries somewhere easy to find and stocked up on some extra cans of tinned fruit, beans, tuna, some dried fruit, some nuts, a big jar of peanut butter, a few boxes of cereal bars and some packets of microwaved rice (they're pre-cooked so you can eat them as they are if needs be). We're also going to try and be a bit more mindful of not completely running our food down between big shops, just in case of supply chain issues. Might invest in a wind up radio, but haven't yet. I saw wet wipes suggested on here, too.

Don't panic!

If the power cuts out start using up the food in your fridge/freezer which will likely get you through 3 days anyway. Freezers stay cold for a while without power and food doesn't immediately go off. Start with the ice cream! Bbq the rest.

As to prep, keep on top of your supplies of things you standardly use e.g. oats/eggs/cereal/milk etc so you aren't out of those things before any emergency begins. Also have some tins e.g. beans, fish, fruit, evaporated milk. Long life milk and bottled water. Loo roll, wet wipes, basic first aid kit, batteries, portable chargers. Pet food. Essential medication.

We have a gas stove, a bbq and DH unearthed his old camping stove which still works so we bought some gas cannisters for it.

We have a couple of torches anyway, I've bought a spare pack of batteries. I did get sucked into the hype a bit and bought a wind up torch and radio combined - it was less than a tenner though so god knows how reliable it will be. I located our power banks and made sure they're charged, which I'll try and remember to do regularly.

We generally have enough food in for 2 weeks or more, just how I shop. Yes more fresh/ frozen stuff but you'd use that on day 1/2 surely? And then tinned stuff, bulgur wheat, cereal etc which we have plenty of in anyway. I bought a couple of extra tins of fish, some longlife (oat/ almond) milk and a carton of longlife juice, plus bottled water. I did pick up some of the merchant gourmet pouches of mixed grains/ lentils/ beans etc.

I don't want it all to go to waste either so only bought stuff we're going to eat/ use as a matter of course and we're just going to keep using it and replacing but plan is to always have a back up. So for example we eat qute a bit of tuna, I'll buy a multipack of cans in the weekly shop usually. I've bought an extra this time, and then as the first one has been used up I'll keep buying another so there's always one being worked through and one 'in stock'. Trying to do that with most things. Otherwise I'll do, like you say, the same as the COVID think of buying everything, putting it away 'for emergencies' and letting it sit there till it's out of date (which I probably wouldn't care about in an actual emergency to be fair!)

You mention budget and Christmas coming up - I've already bought the tins of chocolate, the baileys, the wine, some crackers, olives and biscuits that we'd have in for Christmas, as well as some cans of soft drink which only happens at Christmas here. My thinking is, if something happens before Christmas we'll cheer ourselves up by working through that little lot, and replace when things are hopefully better. If not, well I've got our Christmas treats which we'll use then, and we can stash some of the chocolate/ booze that gets gifted against any January issues.

I think the opposite as those of us who live rurally are always well prepared for winter, whereas I think people in cities are more used to being able to pop to the 24 hour Tesco whenever they wish.

i had to smile at a recent poster in London who had had a five minute power cut and spent it catastrophising (their word). Five minute power cuts are a regularity where I live and my only though is usually "bollocks, I'm going to have to reset the microwave clock AGAIN".

Best to let it all blow over with a nice pint.

Yes, I'll see you in the Winchester!