Frugal Village Forums banner

could you survive? challenge

3K views 46 replies 15 participants last post by  forestdale 
#1 ·
could you survive? UPDATED

I am going to be very busy over the next three weeks, so busy that I've decided not to waste any time shopping.  I decided last night that we'll survive on what we have in the house and the backyard for those three weeks.

Does anyone care to join me in this challenge?  How long could you survive without going out to shop for groceries, bread, milk etc?  I see it as a very useful exercise to test my stockpile, my abilities for planning and resourcefulness and just making do with what I have.

Every day I'll post what we had for breakfast, lunch and dinner the previous day.  I'll also tell you if we need something we don't have and if I make do with what we do have.

Last night I made a huge pot of vegetable and barley soup with herb dumplings.  DH is now having tea and tomatoes on toast for breakfast, I'll have crumpets and tea soon.  I'll post about lunch tomorrow.

Anyone else onboard?
 
#2 ·
I am doing something similar but it won't last as long as you are going for........we leave on vacation on the 14th and I am not shopping for anything or bringing any new groceries into this house until we are back on the 24th.........we are camping on this vacation so I will have to shop once we go but not before! I plan to make as much use of my pantry and freezer as possible for this vacation as well!:)
 
#3 ·
good luck, Blanche, I hope you all have a great vacation.

It doesn't really matter how long the challenge goes for. I'm guessing everyone will set their own time period. The challenge is to stretch ourselves and make do with what we have on hand rather than running off to the store. It's practising the dicipline needed in times of hardship and also if we had a big disaster.

I'm pretty sure I can last two weeks but I'm challenging myself to go three. I'll do it or die trying. ;)
 
#4 ·
Rhonda has much as I'd like to do this I just can't. I can't justify using up my stockpile and then having to go out and buy more to build up my stockpile again along with my regular pantry. We're limited here has to how much we spend both on our regular groceries (pantry) and on my stockpile.

I'm also in the process of adding more to both my stockpile and pantry because in another couple months, fall will be here.

Good luck in your challenge.
 
#5 ·
Thanks CJ. I plan on using what I don't spend for three weeks on building up my stockpile again. I'm really not sure how much I will use from the stockpile - if I have too much of somethings and not enough of others. It will be a very useful exercise in that regard. It will also be useful to learn how to make do when I do run out of certain things.

Good luck adding to your stockpile. Stockpiling isn't really a seasonal thing here, like it is for you over there. Everything is available year round here. I do like the idea of canning and preserving our harvest for later in the year though and I hope we have another bumper tomato crop that I can make into sauce and relish.
 
#6 ·
Rhonda stockpiling isn't a seasonal thing here either. The reason I really begin stockpiling at this time of the year is because of our severe winters. We can purchase pretty much anything any time of the year (just more costly at certain times).

With our winters such as they are, many times you can't get out to the city to do a major shopping. I also don't like driving on icy roads. Thats my main reason for stockpiling. ;)

I do agree with you in that it can be very useful on making do. We lived on our stockpile for almost 2 years a number of years ago when dh was out of work. It can be done if you've planned well.
 
#7 ·
I would love to try this, another time. We have to get milk and bread a couple of times a week because I go through both of them so fast now. LOL
 
#9 ·
We could probably do this but would run out of milk and bread in no time flat. I haven't tried powdered milk on the kids yet, but I don't think they would go for it. Our garden is just beginning to produce enough to supplement our meals (carrots, zucchini, new potatoes, and beets at this point), but isn't enough YET to be the entire food source.

I will look forward to hearing how it goes for you Rhonda! Great idea.
 
#10 ·
I could do it but would need to go for milk for the kids and beer for Jack, lol.
If that's OK, I'm in.:)
 
#11 ·
Sure it is, Darlene. Good luck.

Lunch yesterday for me was a piece of toast with grilled cheese and black tea. I had an orange for afternoon tea.
Dinner with DH was vegetable and barley soup (already made) and herb dumplings. DH had an Amish Apple Brownie and custard and I had a banana.
Breakfast this morning will be crumpets and tea for me, DH will probably have eggs on toast. We'll both have black tea.

I've got enough soup for tonight's dinner too. I've also put some of it in the freezer for next week. I love milk but I don't like powdered milk so when the milk runs out, probably on Friday, I won't be drinking fresh milk for the rest of the three weeks. I have a few kilos of powdered milk for cookng or an emergency hot chocolate ;) .

I think I'll miss tomatoes the most. I have enough until the end of next week and although I have a few small green tomatoes on the bushes out back, they won't be ready for harvest for another month or so. I do have tinned tomatoes.

I'll be baking bread today. Everything else is still in good supply.
 
#12 ·
That last sentence was wrong. We might not have enough tea!!:eek: I have about 30 tea bags and some loose tea leaves. We also have several fruit and herbal teas but I don't really like them. I NEED black tea. This will be a problem for me if we run out. Let's see how that goes.

Yesterday's lunch for me was a tuna sandwich and a cup of black tea. I had water during the afternoon and an apple. Dinner was the veg and barley soup (again) lol. :rolleyes:

The challenge today is that it's a work day for me. I'm having tea and crumpets for breakfast. DH is having eggs on toast, and tea. I'll take the following to the store for lunch and snacks: a bottle of filtered water, a thermos of tomato soup, a cheese sandwich on full grain bread, one banana.

DH will cook tonight's dinner. Erm, it's soup - so it just has to be heated up. That will be the end of the soup. There is a small loaf of bread dough in the freezer, he'll bake that for some nice hot bread. We'll have strawberries from our back yard patch, and cream, for dessert.

It's going really well so far, except for the tea scare. I know that this is the easy period, it will get harder as the weeks progress. I'm still confident we can do it. :cheese:
 
#13 ·
How about some soup Rhonda?:laugh: :bolt: Oh no about your tea, that is something to be concerned about. I'm sure it will all work out though. Maybe you have a secret stash you forgot about or someone will gift you some.;)

Yesterday was baked ziti and today will be pork & rice casserole all made with things on hand. Dd made a chocolate cake to enjoy.
While Dd was out she bought some milk so that'll hold us with that for a few days.
 
#14 ·
I'm just interjecting here - I filled out my grocery list last night (I go shopping every 2 weeks) and the only things I needed was:

milk
eggs
dog food

I have enough for 2 weeks worth of meals stocked up :D
this is such a turning point for me, and it only took 2 months to get to this point.

I'm going to be increasing my stockpile this shopping trip, but it still makes me feel good that I can easily go 2 weeks without shopping.
 
#15 ·
that's great Mandi. I think it's a healthy thing not to be shopping so much at the supermarket.

I think my downfall, if there is one, will be that this challenge wasn't planned, I just decided on the spur of the moment. If I had planned it, I'd have a lot more fruit and tea on hand. It will be very interesting to me to see how I get around those two important requirements in my life.

As my wonderful mum would have said: what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. ;)
 
#16 ·
DH "forgot" about the challenge when he was out yesterday. He found a new german baker and bought a rye and sunflower loaf. :skept: We had that with our soup last night for dinner. We also had a few strawberries and some canned peaches.

This morning I'll have 2 poached eggs on toast, and tea, DH is having the rest of the rye bread with cheese, and coffee. Very continential (lol).

DH will be out all day so he can't make dinner. I'll make a homemade pizza when I come home. I'll put the fixings in the bread machine for the dough so that should be ready when I come home from work. The topping will be pasta sauce, cheese, peppers, mushrooms, garlic and onion. :pizza:

For lunch I'm taking crackers and cheese, banana, apple, water and an Amish Apple Brownie < recipe in the kitchen threads. I have tea bags at the store so I'll make tea there too.

Things are still going smoothly. No major upsets yet. :)
 
#17 ·
This morning I had toast and vegemite and tea. DH had bread and cheese and tea.

My lunch today will be tomato soup and I'm making a pineapple and coconut cake this afternoon, so I'm sure I'll have some of that for afternoon tea, with a cup of tea.

Dinner tonight will be canned salmon in a nicose-type salad - lettuce, tomato, onion, green beans, cucumbers, boiled eggs and herbs with homemade dressing. I'll also serve new potatoes with parsley and butter. A lot of the above is from our backyard -the eggs, lettuce, beans, herbs and the new potatoes. We might celebrate this excellent week with a beer each that DS left behind when he went to Canada. :cool: Dessert will be the pineapple and coconut cake.

Life's good.
 
#18 ·
Rhonda, I love reading posts like these. I don't know what it is about them, but I really do.

I'm in, but with my own version. We have to buy three gallons of milk, bananas, and apples once a week. Everything else we can eat from the stockpile/freezer. Okay, we don't HAVE to. We could use powdered milk and skip the fruit, but I'm not going to right now. My kids love fruit and I want to encourage that if I can. Milk is our drink of choice as well, again, something I don't want to forsake for the challenge. Otherwise, I'm in!
 
#19 ·
Welcome Amy. I'm pleased to have you in the challenge.

Darlene, you're being very quiet. How are you going with your challenge?

Okay, the milk ran out yesterday. I finished it off with a small glass of what remained. That will be the end of the milk until 27 July when I finish my challenge. :cowwave: I can make do with powdered milk which I have in my stockpile but I'd only drink it hot. We'll see how that pans out.

Yesterday I made pineapple and coconut cake from what I had in the cupboard. I used eggs from the backyard and powdered milk, I had cake flour, tinned pineapple, coconut and butter in the stockpile. I increased the recipe slightly and got 12 muffin cakes and a small bar cake. I gave 6 of the muffins to my DIL and the loaf cake is now in the freezer. I'll defrost it when the muffins are gone.

Breakfast today will be porridge (rolled oats) with a little bit of hot powdered milk, and tea. DH will have baked beans and toast.
Lunch for me will be tomato soup, lunch for DH will be cheese sandwiches and an apple. He'll make tea at the store. If there are any strawberries in the garden today I'll have them for afternoon tea, if not, I'll have the last banana.
Dinner tonight will be tuna bake which I'll make from scratch from stockpile ingredients and a few herbs and new potatoes from the garden. Dessert will be pineapple and coconut cake.

I make sure I drink enough water every day. I usually get around 2 litres in winter. We have a filter on our water tap in the kitchen so I never have to buy water, except for the crate of it we have in the stockpile as an emergency supply.

I'm starting to run out of some things - mainly milk and bananas. It's all going well though and I'm enjoying not going to the supermarket. :)
 
#20 ·
I've made one concession. I asked DH to bring home 2 litres of milk yesterday because we have a guest staying for a couple of days - and she LOVES our local milk. I hated doing that because I'm always very strict on myself when I do a challenge, and I HATE doing something I said I wouldn't do. :(

Having to provide food for a guest while on a challenge like this will keep me on my toes. Luckily Kathleen is almost vegetarian so she won't expect meat. As long as I have milk here, she'll be happy.

Breakfast for me today will be crumpets that I have in the freezer, honey and tea. DH is having eggs on toast. His lunch will be ham and tomato relish sandwiches, a pineapple and coconut muffin cake, he'll make tea at the store. He'll take the last banana and the last mandarin. I'll make bread for sandwiches for Kathleen and I - I have cheese, tomatoes, boiled egg, salad etc for fillings. We'll probably have tea or coffe with those but I took a can of pineapple juice from the stockpile last night, it's in the fridge in case we want a cold drink for lunch. Dinner will be spanish omlette and salad. Eggs from the backyard, potatoes, herbs, peppers, spinach, zuchinni all from our garden. We have cream in the fridge. I'll make an apple crumble from 6 pink lady apples and butter in the fridge and flour, powdered milk, sugar and spices from the cupboard. The crumble will be the vehicle for the last of the cream. :cool:

I'll defrost the small pineapple and coconut cake this morning. That will probably be eaten today and tomorrow.

How is everyone else doing?
 
#22 ·
Rhonda, we did something like this for a few weeks before we went on vacation. (I don't know if you remember, but I posted a thread looking for ideas to use the foods we had.) I did it mainly because we were going on vacation and I didn't want to buy any more food, but also because we only have one car now and shopping is a bit tough- the closest grocery store is about 7 miles away (a very expensive one at that), and I've never really used public transportation in my life. I wouldn't want DD on a bus without a car seat. Also, I thought it would be good to use up some of the food and put new food in to keep it well-rotated.

We did have to buy stuff for dd- yogurt, cheese, and fruit, but otherwise we did okay. I forced DH to eat up some of the canned soup in the cupboard. I prefer to make my own, but I don't often make him seafood soups, and I never make him soups with beef, so he buys those canned. And we STILL have a bunch in there!

Even so, when I went shopping the other day after we got back from vacation, there wasn't a whole lot I needed to buy. I stocked up on some loss leaders and clearance items (got huge jars of salsa, which I have yet to find a good recipe for, for only $1. 24 oz is normally $3, and these were 32 oz bonus jars. I cleaned 'em out.) I also bought some fresh fruit- blueberries, strawberries, bananas, plums, peaches, saturn peaches, and watermelon, as well as a few veggies- lettuce, cucumbers, and corn. That's pretty much all I got.

Anyway, it worked out okay. We weren't as strict with it as you, but we didn't buy a lot of groceries those last two weeks, and we used up anything that would go bad before we left.
 
#23 ·
Thanks Michele. Kimber, I thought I read about you doing something like this. I think it's a good way to use up unwanted and old goods, and a great way to rotate a stockpile.

All is progressing smoothly with the challenge. :) My friend thinks I'm a nut short of a fruit cake but I can live with that. ;) This morning for breakfast we are having grilled cheese on toast with tomato slices. Eveyone will have a glass of pineapple juice and a cup of tea. The tea is running low but how can you limit what you give a guest? I'm happy to have her here so we'll just have to deal with the tea shortage later.

Lunch today will be fresh home baked bread with egg salad and lettuce, and coffee. DH will take rye bread ham and pickle sandwiches an apple and the last of the pineapple cake to work. I hope to have time to make another cake this morning when I bake bread. If I don't, I'll make scones for afternoon tea. Our guest is leaving late this afternoon. For dinner, DH and I will have the rest of the tuna bake from 2 nights ago and any leftover scones or cake for dessert. If we have no cakes, I'll open a can of peaches. We'll either have water, tea or beer to drink.

I have some lentils and split peas in the cupboard which I want to use tomorrow. I'll have to look for some new recipes later.
 
#24 ·
I took my guest, Kathleen, to the mall this morning to pick up a couple of things she needed. I put her on the train about an hour ago and just went in to change the bed linen. There was a huge package of organic tea bags and a package of loose tea on the bed. Stuck to the tea was a post it note with a love heart on it.

Awwww. Good friends do my black heart good. :)
 
#25 ·
I knew somehow tea would find it's way to you to soothe your black heart. That friend knows you well. :thumb: You're doing great btw.

Sorry, I do have to make one more purchase, tissues. Everyone here except Jack has had a cold and I will not deal with hankies to launder. eew I suppose I could make due with toilet tissue but you'll have to explain all this to my kids, I won't. :toothy:

Things here are progressing fine, nothing exciting to report. We've been eating high on the hog & leftovers are planned. So choice of rotisseried roast beef, marinated grilled pork,Pesto noodles, baked rice and a salad from the garden to go with.

I am down to only 2 onions and potatoes are low too. I'll make do though. Sure will miss those onions as they add so much flavor to food...gonna have to substitute dried. :nerv2:
 
#26 ·
Wow Darlene. Your menu is fancy! When I run out of food, I might eat at your house. ;) I hope you don't run out of onions. That would be worse than running out of tea (maybe). I couldn't live without onions. :munch:

Isn't it great to have good friends. I remember you said that I might "find" some more tea. You were right! :cool:

It's just DH and I again today. I'm sitting here with a cup of tea.:rolleyes: Today we're having the following: breakfast for me will be two crumpets - they are the last of a packet that are looking very dry, so they have to be eaten today. I'll have some honey on them and a cup of tea. DH is having the last tomato and eggs on toast, and tea. My lunch will be a tuna and lettuce sandwich - tuna from the stockpile, lettuce from our garden. DH is taking tomato soup (from the stockpile) in the Thermos and a cheese sandwich. He's also having the last of the pineapple cake. I'll have an apple this afternoon and maybe some passionfruit from our vine. We are going out for dinner tonight. It wasn't planned as part of the challenge but it's DS Shane's birthday on Friday (he's working then) so we're taking him out to dinner at the restaurant he got his new job at. We haven't been there yet so we'll all enjoy going somewhere new.

There'll be no fresh tomatoes after today. :( The tomatoes we have growing are still weeks away from their harvest. I've been craving oranges but we have none. I'm going to pick some lemons off our tree this morning and make some lemonade to see if that stops my citrus craving.

It's getting more difficult now that things are running out. It's also making it more interesting for me to see if I can provide what we need and be happy with it.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top