Community Cooking: A More Practical Approach To Prepping

So we’re finding ourselves in a rush once more. The reality of a pandemic is setting in and people are buying up as much freeze-dried supplies as they can get their hands on. But while I don’t think the physical consequences for an overwhelmingly large percentage of healthy persons will be severe, I do think that the economic disruptions, and the trickle down interruptions in our food supplies, have the potential to be far-reaching. Then again its one of the very real reasons that a good number of people I’m friends and neighbors with have taken every opportunity to move towards a more sustainable lifestyle. Its not just about having solar power or ‘living off the grid’ for my own sake, but a creation of better resiliency against these sort of inevitable disasters. So you’ve got all those beans and rice put back, but how are you gonna cook them? And are you cooking off-grid? I draw on lessons I learned from my childhood growing up in the rural south and as an adult living in the third world, among Iraqis and Afghans, where a supply chain wasn’t taken for granted. Top among those lessons was the value of cooking for a whole community.

Discada- a giant steel disk that people have been effectively cooking on for over a millennia.

In America we’re culturally predisposed to thinking individually, permeating all the way down to our eating habits. This has led to incredible amounts of wasteful practices, but its also led to us isolating ourselves to a large degree. In many respects this filters down to our own preparedness practices; the things we buy, the things we buy in bulk, and the justifications behind them. It is an attitude of “I GOT MINE!” negating the reality that hungry masses are motivated masses- and they’ll simply take what you have when they get desperate enough.

On the other hand, a community protects what a community values.

The annual stew.

Every fall in the rural southeast communities have a stew. Every church, every volunteer fire department, and many civic clubs. Its a good fundraiser but its a hell of a lot more than that. Its a tradition and a symbol of our cultural connection with the land. Back in the less-modern era people ate a diet based on what they had at the time. Vegetables followed the harvest seasons, meats followed the livestock slaughter schedule, and at the end of the year and through the winter, stews were made from whatever was left over to prevent spoilage. Crops and livestock were hard earned like everything else. Waste not, want not.

Its a tradition that my own family and friends still follow today, and one that I always look forward to. The Fall is my favorite time of the year for a lot of reasons, and making a hearty stew, chili, and chicken mull is a big part of that. But that annual stew wouldn’t be possible without a few critical tools. I have a large cast iron stew pot, its iron stand, a large steel disk wok, a large dutch oven and a medium dutch oven, all cured with lard and easy to cook on off-grid. With these tools I can make nearly any meal and feed large groups of people in the process.

Corn tortillas and four cups of boiled white rice. Dirt cheap meal that can feed a lot of people.

There’s a strong parallel to this and those cultures overseas, especially in Afghanistan. In most rural cultures around the world you’ll find a community kitchen in the small villages or groups of mud huts. In the center you’ll typically find a firepit, a few pots, usually a pressure cooker, and in some places a large metal disk much like the discada that I use. Its cooking gear that they’ve been using for generations, much like we did not that long ago.

Marinaded chicken, bell, poblano and serrano peppers and mushrooms. All locally sourced, cooked off grid, prepared for eight adults.

The community kitchen, so to speak, is built to feed everyone- not just individually. A group learns to live off what they have, source their food from their environment, and know what goes a long way to sustaining the most, quickly and efficiently. Rice and beans are a staple food in most parts of the world. Cooking them is fairly straightforward and its a cheap food to stock up on. You can pick up a 20lb of rice and another 4lb of red beans for just over $30 total- and that will feed a small group of people for a good while. All you need is clean water and wood for the fire, and you’re good to go. Add in some bullion cubes for flavor and have some canned meat for long term storage and you’ll be the rock star of your group when people get burned out on freeze dried food or MREs.

Maybe its the attitude I hold towards greater sustainability, maybe its my ongoing love of re-wilding, or maybe its partly trying to squeeze everything I can out of my hard earned money, but my approach to prepping and survivalism is to know how to provide and prepare that next meal for my family- not just tomorrow, but forever. There’s a learning curve to it, but for me at least its worth it on many levels to have and practice the skills to survive rather than simply bank on prepared foods alone to carry us through. I have those too, but they’ll be the last in the rotation after I’ve exhausted every other option. No matter what the crisis, I’ve got the tools and skills to use it. And you should too.

Don’t panic. Just prepare.

 

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About the Author: NC Scout

NC Scout is the nom de guerre of a former Infantry Scout and Sergeant in one of the Army’s best Reconnaissance Units. He has combat tours in both Iraq and Afghanistan. He teaches a series of courses focusing on small unit skills rarely if ever taught anywhere else in the prepping and survival field, including his RTO Course which focuses on small unit communications. In his free time he is an avid hunter, bushcrafter, writer, long range shooter, prepper, amateur radio operator and Libertarian activist. He can be contacted at brushbeater@tutanota.com or via his blog at brushbeater.wordpress.com .

11 Comments

  1. anonymous March 2, 2020 at 07:33

    Good topic. Uses far less wood per meal, each participant bringing a few pieces of wood. That disc appears to be a great way to cook over an open fire.

  2. Rucksack Rob March 2, 2020 at 09:28

    A couple of things here…

    1) Great Article!

    2) I’m familiar with the Discada but when I was in Afghanistan, our ANA had a 3’x4’x 3/8″ steel plate their ‘cook’ put over the ‘fire box’ (this was rectangular as opposed to a typical fire ring or pit) and they grilled their Goat meat and veggies directly on this along with their Nan bread, and I must say, it was pretty darn good.

    3) I have, (I believe) a 24″ Griswold (brand) cast iron skillet that I picked up at a yard sell in Alaska back in the 70’s for $10. (close to $100 new) It weighs around 25lbs and is a bear to pack, store and lug around but once it’s on the fire, comments from fellow campers start flyin’ and mouths start waterin’.

    and 4) in the first paragraph, one line refers to ‘family and neighbors’ who HAVE “moved towards a more sustainable lifestyle”, most of us have family and neighbors who have NOT! In the meantime, I may lecture them, condemn them and even (quietly, to myself) mock them but as a Christian, I won’t turn most of them away, I will ration what I have and share, (and they will work for it, believe me!)
    One way around this are CHARITY BUCKETS: A (clean food grade) 3 or 5 gallon bucket ($1 at my local mega-lo-mart bakery) with a cooking pot that fits inside, bought at the local Thrift Store, 2 lbs of beans or split peas, 2 lbs of rice, some bouillon cubes, some flour or cornmeal in a vacu-sealed-bag, an empty 1 qt cleaned juice / water bottle, some pool shock, etc… These I will hand out on an as needed basis. I currently have 10 in my basement. Not enough to feed a large suburban neighborhood (I live rural with 9 families on a 2 mile road), but 10 family’s that won’t starve the first 3 weeks after a disaster when the food in their meager pantry has run out. Just my way of doing things…

  3. James March 2, 2020 at 09:37

    NC,thanks for the slew of articles in regards to be better prepped ect.I do not believe am being told the truth about Corona(have heard the beer sucks which I found out to be true!)/economy ect. but articles like these are giving folks new/renewed ideas of how to get by a little better.I have noticed some small holes(and am sure large ones I have never thought of!)in my preps and am going out today to fill them and just get a idea of how the shelves look ect. in the few stores will be hitting.I am also just getting some extra items for neighbor he asked for which I see as no problem as we will be working together to help keep things going no matter how this or another event go.I will drop a line on how the shelves look at least in my part of the New England region.

  4. Rucksack Rob March 2, 2020 at 10:35

    as per my above comments, the $100 for a new 24″ skillet is for a Lodge brand, Griswold has been out of business for 40, 50 years or more.

  5. Travis March 2, 2020 at 17:29

    Awesome article, we still do the “fall stews” in my rural part of S.C. It’s a great community building exercise.

    • NC Scout March 2, 2020 at 20:51

      Very cool! There’s just something about it, ain’t it? Everyone coming together, having a good time, sharing a meal that connects us on many levels.

  6. Scurvy March 3, 2020 at 17:49

    One thing to do now to “train” up for community cooking is to volunteer at your church kitchen to see just how to prepare and present in a sanitary manner large quantities of food. The old hands will be happy to show the ropes to someone who is interested in learning to serve his fellow man. Be ready to peal ten pounds of potatoes. It may not be “the way we do it at home.” But you may learn some tricks to prepping all the fixings for a five gallon batch of beef stew in a space with eight other people scurrying around you.

    Go ahead, you might make a couple of new friends and meet some interesting patriots.

    • NC Scout March 3, 2020 at 18:37

      Could not agree more brother. As a friend and guy in several of my classes has said, who makes the coffee on Sunday mornings before service?

  7. […] What did we do before the benefits of modernity? Can you boil water off-grid, with natural fuel sourced in your environment? How about cooking your food? That’s certainly one big step in the right direction. Do you know how to clean your clothes without a washing machine? Do you know how to barter? What hard skills do you have? Having tools like a Grain Mill and a sausage grinder will be well worth their weight in the long run, as will the Foxfire Series. […]

  8. […] Like I’ve said in other posts, a lot of hard lessons may be about to be re-learned here in the the land of plenty. Although its going to suck, I pray it won’t be as bad as it could be. But that said for now your role should be getting your neighbors and extended family up to speed. Whether that’s food, water, building materials, or whatever else, you also have to have a way to protect it. And with that said those same lessons are familiar to anyone who’s lived in the third world- even down to things like weapons and equipment. […]

  9. Anonymous August 6, 2020 at 14:35

    4.5

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