My freezer could feed a family of 4 for 6 months. Its great for utilizing everything and not having waste when writing a cookbook but its also overwhelming. Fresh starts are good!
I feel your pain too as I had my grandmothers 50 plus year old Kenmore chest freezer die in the summer with 1/4 of a moose I had saved in it. I now have a freezer with an alarm. Good on you for looking at the positives though.
Hank… I felt your pain. Dealing with Hurricane Ian (complete loss of everything) I found a way to find the silver lining. I too have scaled down by only saving that one pack of walleye, a back strap, enough pheasant for one meal. It was in a weird way - freeing ☺️
I recently stayed at a friends cabin. He was having oatmeal and I decided to fry some eggs. I cracked the egg and it exploded. The stench was so bad I was gagging and we could smell it for days. Check those expiration dates.
People who owned ski lodges were dying of food poisoning while I lived in Vermont in the 70's. Electric went out frequently in the ski areas. One of our fellow fire women came up with idea to freeze a cup of water, then put a coin on top of it. If you owned a chalet and found your coin not on top we advised they empty and start again.
I felt the same (and had the same reaction) when our “manufactured-before-I-was-born” turquoise 6-foot tall freezer died. It was a painful but necessary gut-punch.
I too recently experienced the regret of losing a freezer as hurricane Helene moved through our area and we were without power for days on end. What has been a saving grace for us (in previous times) have been freezing liters or half gallons of water to form ice blocks within the freezer. This allows the freezer to maintain colder temperatures much longer after it has failed or, in our case, when we filled it too far for the seal to work.
I noticed this a few years ago in a fish camp: my cousin, who's using oversized commodity coolers, had multiple bottles of water that were frozen keeping the fish cold. I started using this soon after in my inexpensive coolers and they outperformed others in camps that had way more expensive coolers. They raved over how well the cooler performed, regardless of how I mentioned "it's the blocks of ice". In their minds, somehow, the Coleman was just "a great cooler".
I'm in the process of restocking: dove from the current season, a doe if I can scratch one out, and possibly ducks. The obligatory pizza be there too.
Bummer, that really hurts. We are sometimes gone from our house for long periods of time, and my freezers are full of meat and garden veggies. So, some years ago I bought an inexpensive temperature monitor system with a probe, so that I can monitor the freezer temps with my phone or laptop. Puts my mind at ease, at least somewhat. If a freezer fails, I can have a neighbor go over and transfer things to another freezer that is unplugged.
My freezer could feed a family of 4 for 6 months. Its great for utilizing everything and not having waste when writing a cookbook but its also overwhelming. Fresh starts are good!
I feel your pain too as I had my grandmothers 50 plus year old Kenmore chest freezer die in the summer with 1/4 of a moose I had saved in it. I now have a freezer with an alarm. Good on you for looking at the positives though.
Hank… I felt your pain. Dealing with Hurricane Ian (complete loss of everything) I found a way to find the silver lining. I too have scaled down by only saving that one pack of walleye, a back strap, enough pheasant for one meal. It was in a weird way - freeing ☺️
I recently stayed at a friends cabin. He was having oatmeal and I decided to fry some eggs. I cracked the egg and it exploded. The stench was so bad I was gagging and we could smell it for days. Check those expiration dates.
Whoa. Gross.
People who owned ski lodges were dying of food poisoning while I lived in Vermont in the 70's. Electric went out frequently in the ski areas. One of our fellow fire women came up with idea to freeze a cup of water, then put a coin on top of it. If you owned a chalet and found your coin not on top we advised they empty and start again.
I feel this in my bones.
I felt the same (and had the same reaction) when our “manufactured-before-I-was-born” turquoise 6-foot tall freezer died. It was a painful but necessary gut-punch.
I too recently experienced the regret of losing a freezer as hurricane Helene moved through our area and we were without power for days on end. What has been a saving grace for us (in previous times) have been freezing liters or half gallons of water to form ice blocks within the freezer. This allows the freezer to maintain colder temperatures much longer after it has failed or, in our case, when we filled it too far for the seal to work.
I noticed this a few years ago in a fish camp: my cousin, who's using oversized commodity coolers, had multiple bottles of water that were frozen keeping the fish cold. I started using this soon after in my inexpensive coolers and they outperformed others in camps that had way more expensive coolers. They raved over how well the cooler performed, regardless of how I mentioned "it's the blocks of ice". In their minds, somehow, the Coleman was just "a great cooler".
I'm in the process of restocking: dove from the current season, a doe if I can scratch one out, and possibly ducks. The obligatory pizza be there too.
I hope this finds you well otherwise.
Bummer, that really hurts. We are sometimes gone from our house for long periods of time, and my freezers are full of meat and garden veggies. So, some years ago I bought an inexpensive temperature monitor system with a probe, so that I can monitor the freezer temps with my phone or laptop. Puts my mind at ease, at least somewhat. If a freezer fails, I can have a neighbor go over and transfer things to another freezer that is unplugged.