Today, officially, our milk went out of date. On May 1st, the oldest dated milk in the store was officially today. Audrey has been doing a wonderful job with our rationing and dating of supplies. She has even recruited Kelsey and Amber into helping her to make them feel more integrated to the group.
I know this is the “sell by” date. It is not like all the milk immediately spoils on the day that is stamped on the jug. And we have been making sure to drink the closest dated milk first. Truth be told, we knew we were going to run out eventually. And secretly, I really thought we were going to lose power (knock wood) and lose our refrigeration anyway. So we have been doing a lot of cereal eating for the morning breakfasts.
One unique thing we did very early on was stake claim to certain cereals. The store features probably over 100 different brands of cereal but everyone got to choose their favorite to be their private stash. After that, things just kind of went up for grabs. We had a full draft where everyone drew numbers for their selection order.
Hey, when it came time to choose I was happy because Cocoa Krispies were still available. Suckers. They don’t know what they are missing. Alex got his Cap’n Crunch so he is stoked. One fool actually chose Total as their draft pick. I won’t say who but LOSER! You wasted your draft pick on a kicker when you clearly could have taken a linebacker early and the kicker probably would have gone undrafted…
Some cereals like the Chex varieties and the other Rice Krispies have been held back for things like Chex Mix and Rice Krispie Treats – recipes that do not require milk.
Now there is that military ration milk-in-a-box that is highly pasteurized and has dates that go well into February. And we do have that powdered milk for when things really start to turn desperate. My theory is that we will use that for cooking down the road once we deplete our supply or it turns sour.
We have also been eating a lot of sandwiches and sliced deli meats for lunch as those have a limited shelf life too. Our bread only lasted about two weeks before it started to get really stale. Thankfully, we have a baker that can literally make us fresh bread with all the flour and yeast that we have on hand.
So we have really been smart about watching our dates. Produce is almost gone (as we expected) and Sharon has really been working overtime with Charles to smoke, cure, and dehydrate or meat supplies so that they do not go to waste. I have never really liked jerky but I guess I am going to have to learn to like it.
We are also going through as much of the frozen foods as we can (again, because of the fear of losing power and thus refrigeration). This will leave us with only canned foods left but I still believe that with proper rationing, we can make it a year. Our supermarket is a pretty big place, even with twenty-two people living in here. The canned food aisle (soups, beans, potted meats, etc.) measures 68 feet in length and stacked five shelves high. And that is just one side. With rationing, we will make it. Still better safe than sorry…
