Great War Purchases
Stock in case of war, the imagination draws itself so. No, your stocks will be more modest!
The panic associated with coronavirus was, on the one hand, very funny, and on the other hand, very instructive. The population in many countries, not only in Russia, rushed to shops and markets to buy all kinds of goods.
The funny thing was that one of the main subjects of lust was toilet paper, the meaning of which in such a situation cannot be rationally understood. There are many jokes on this subject. There was a national flavor. I was told that during the food panic, residents of nearby villages came to Bishkek, often right on horseback, and swept everything off the shelves. What picture! The horseman drove right into the market row, threw a lump of catfish to the merchant, without bargaining, grabbed a sack of flour like a cockpit lamb, threw it through the saddle - and he was like that. You can still warm up with Kamchka lovers to grab someone else's. They said that merchants at that time sold everything, including expired products.
The instructive moment is that some part of the population reacts to some critical situation completely inadequately. Well, yes, with the threat of the spread of the virus, running into the crowd in the store or in the market is what you need to do first. It didn’t occur to the alarmists that just one infected person who sneezes in the crowd is enough for a significant part of them to become infected. In general, the crowd in panic is a source of serious danger, it is better to shun them.
Another instructive moment is that a kind of doctrine happened that created a situation very close to the beginning of a big war. It will be something like this: there is no immediate threat, but acute tension is already in the air. It is clear that economic difficulties will soon arise and something needs to be purchased in order to survive these difficulties as easily as possible. But what exactly? Well, certainly not toilet paper!
Therefore, based on extensive military experience, it’s worth writing something like a guide on the topic of what civilians should buy in reserve in case of a big war with the inevitable upset of the economy and various difficulties.
The most important thing is shoes
The first thing to take care of in such a situation is not buckwheat, flour or butter at all, but completely different shoes. The value of shoes for civilians in wartime is far from obvious, but in fact it is extremely significant. I would call shoes the alpha and omega of pre-war purchases. The reason is very simple. In shoes you can find food for yourself, purchase, receive by distribution or for work, but without shoes - no. Without shoes, there is an extremely serious risk of disease, and in winter without shoes you will generally become attached to your home and seriously risk, for example, malnutrition due to lack of nutrition.
In Russia, shoes are now mostly imported, and when the war begins, supplies will cease. Then, of course, they will organize the production of cheap shoes for the population, at least the same canvas boots or boots. But this takes time. About a year there may be an almost perfect absence of shoes that wears out quickly.
Therefore, to have spare two or three pairs of shoes for each person in the family, that is, pairs that are not worn constantly now, is a necessity. It is advisable to include a pair of durable work shoes in these pairs, such as tarpaulin boots or berets, to your taste. By the way, an extra pair of shoes is a good investment, since then they can be exchanged for food. Well-worn but still good shoes should also not be thrown away.
You can also advise to purchase and put in the far corner several pairs of slippers, slates or flip flops. They can be worn in the summer, preserving good shoes, and can be worn even in not too cold weather in the fall and even in the winter, wearing woolen socks and a plastic bag or medical shoe covers on top so that your feet do not get wet. In a situation where there is no shoes at all, and it will do.
It is also worth stocking up glue, pieces of leather and rubber for repairs. When buying shoes in stock, it is worth checking how the sole is glued. To do this, press the edge of the sole with your finger. A good gluing lasts, and a bad one moves away from the skin of the top. A lot of low-quality shoes with poor gluing appeared, in which the sole begins to fall off after a couple of months of socks.
Apparel
The second most important after shoes in our cold climate is clothing. There are no special problems with her now, unlike blessed times. But still something worth stocking up.
The first is a winter outfit. Warm jacket for severe frosts, warm pants and a sweater, some tracksuit for a poddevka, warm socks, a pair of hats.
The second is fast-wearing items of clothing such as socks, underwear. A particular problem with socks that break very quickly. Although you can darn socks several times, for which you need a supply of thread and sewing accessories, but the possibilities for mending are limited. Therefore, it is worth stocking fabrics for footcloths, in case there are not enough socks.
The stock can be made up not only of new or specially purchased, for example, second-hand clothing, but also already worn old clothes. It needs to be repaired, cleaned and put in the closet. Clothing that has become small, for example, shirts that have become tight at the collar, can also not be thrown away, but put aside. Then these clothes can be exchanged for food or some necessary things. The thirst for great-grandmothers, who had stored old clothes that had not been worn for a long time in cabinets and chests for decades, had the basis of military experience.
Food
Some food supply is better to have than not to have. But you need to understand that it will not work for a long time to live alone. Own stock allows you to survive supply interruptions of several days or a week, and also allows you to make an addition to what you managed to get in wartime. Therefore, own stocks are auxiliary nutrition, and nothing more.
In the composition of the stock you need to select products that contain the main nutrients: carbohydrates, fats and proteins. From this point of view, millet is very good - a classic of the fight against hunger genre. Many people during the hungry years were saved by millet. The millet from which millet is made is unpretentious, drought tolerant culture, and in the hungry years, millet crops sharply increase.
The second criterion is the shelf life of the product. The longer the product can be stored, the better. Of course, you can eat foods with an expired shelf life, but without guaranteeing their nutritional value and with a serious risk of severe food poisoning. The longest-stored product is stew in jars. Its standard shelf life is four years, and in glaciers the stew is stored for decades, while remaining suitable for food.
In second place are pasta: vermicelli, pasta, spaghetti and the like, from durum wheat with a shelf life of two years, as well as freeze-dried potatoes with a shelf life of three years. In sealed packaging and in a dry place, pasta can be stored for a long time. It is better to keep the supply in a cool place, since pasta gradually deteriorates when warm. It must be remembered that pasta has a low fat content, and it is better to supplement them with broth concentrate like the famous Gallina Blanca cubes or their analogues, which contain more fat. For the same reason, it is worth considering the stew not as a separate product, but as a fat supplement.
Various soup concentrates for cooking are very good. Their shelf life is usually from 12 to 24 months and their nutritional value is enough to prepare a very decent soup. The best sample in this category is briquette pea soup concentrate, giving a thick and nutritious soup.
Cereals, such as millet, buckwheat, rice, usually have a shelf life of 9 months and also require airtight packaging, a dry and cool place to store. Cereals also require extra fats due to their low content in the product.
By the way, a good idea is to refill the products into plastic bottles. They are screwed tight and tight, do not let gas through. The main reason for food spoilage is oxidation, so storage in such a sealed container can increase shelf life and preserve product shelf life.
Last place is flour with a standard shelf life of 3-4 months, depending on the variety, requiring a dry and cool place of storage. At higher temperatures, it can quickly go rancid and become unfit for food. Flour, however, is the most versatile food product, suitable for use not only in the form of bread, tortillas, but also in the form of zatiruha, paste or flour mash. Please, please, do not repeat the mistakes of people who tried to eat flour just like that. Flour can hammer a throat and lead to death by suffocation, there are many such cases. If it is not possible to cook, add water to the flour, stir, roll the balls and eat. This is zatiruha - a classic dish of explorers and hunters in Siberia, known from written sources at least from the XNUMXth century.
Is there a large margin to do?
The question of stock is determined by the size of consumption and the availability of space for the proper storage of products. In a private house with a basement, you can create a very extensive supply, which is enough for a year or two. There is little storage space in the city apartment, the conditions are unsuitable (the temperature is too high for food), so in cities the reserves will be involuntarily less.
Based on a person per day: pasta - 100 grams, cereals - 70 grams, fat in the form of stew - 50 grams, it can be calculated that the monthly supply will be the following values. Total: 3 kg of pasta, 2,1 kg of cereals and 1,5 kg of stew (rounded 5 cans). To calculate stocks per family, multiply by the number of eaters. So, a family of 4 people will need 12 kg of pasta, 8,4 kg of cereals and 20 cans of stew per month. Optionally, you can add 2-3 kg of flour, 3-4 kg of sugar and some other little things.
When I live in a big city, I don’t see any particular reason for procuring more than a month's supply of insurance. Anyway, one way or another, food will depend on the transport and distribution of food.
The above amount of food for a monthly supply can be quite safely purchased for several trips to the store, without creating panic and not standing out at all.
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