Who doesn't want free prep items. The more stuff we can get for free and cross off our prepping list the more money we have for the things we have no choice but to pay for. Below are a few ideas that will help you find free prep items. Starting with my own favorite ways and going from there.
.1 And the one that works best for me. Put out the word in your family and friends that you are looking for a few certain items and I bet they will either have one they will give you or know some one who will give you one for free. I have managed to get 3 small cast iron skillets, a old fashion hand operated meat grinder, a hand crank apple peeler, a couple of nice butcher knives, a water bath canner, 2 dozen 1/2 gallon canning jars, several one gallon pickle jars, several old sheets to use for quilt backing or making other things empty popcorn tins and other tins for food storage, 2 old fashion hand potato mashers, old metal fence posts for making trellis in the garden, a couple of gardening books, a few old medical books, lots of reading material for entertainment when SHTF, planters for gardening that some one didn't want any more, odd and ends of sizes glass jars with metal lids for mouse proof food storage, material and other craft items that people no longer want, scrap lumber to build with, cement blocks and the list goes on. If I let them know what I am looking for some how I always have it in a couple of weeks.
.2 Join your local Freecycle list. You can find all kinds of free things on there that can be used in your prepping. From used wood to make a chicken coop or chicken tractor, or build raised garden beds, bricks for making a rocket stove, cement blocks for making a raised garden bed, fence posts to make trellis or fence off your garden, books for reading, planters for planting, canning jars, an old gas cast iron grill that no longer works, you can take the insides out and use it as charcoal grill or wood grill for cooking. The list is endless of the freebies you can get for free. I have even seen people offer extra produce from their gardens when they have to much.
3. When you go out to eat save those extra packets of salt, black pepper, sugar or other condiments, any extra paper napkins and plastic silver ware they give you and add to your preps.
4. City Wide Trash Day. Most towns now have a one or two day city wide trash days where people can sit stuff out by the road for free pickup that the normal trash companies won't pick up. The list of items you can get by getting there before the trash guys do are limitless. I have gotten free building supplies, jars, metal tins, bookcases and other shelving units, empty 5 gallon buckets that I use for things other than food storage, dining chairs that are in good shape just don't have a mate, broken hand tools for the garden that my husband fixes for cheap.
5. Dumpster Diving. I know it might sound gross but it really depends on where you go. I have gotten lot of cardboard and old news paper to put down in my garden to block weeds and help conserve on water by keeping the ground from drying out so fast. I have found some neat shelves for storage behind stores and convience stores that they gave me for free. I take them home, clean them really good and then use them in my prep storage room. I know one family that lives next door to a Aldi's. This store has one dumpster for its boxes and one for its old food. This family goes and gets free food from the dumpster. May sound gross but the food is wrapped. They have gotten up to a 100 lbs of potatoes at a time by doing this. They go through pick out and bad potatoes and throw them away then they wash all the others and either cook them and freeze, can them or dehydrate them. They have gotten all kinds of produce this way. They have even gotten day old bread to use for making crutons and bread crumbs.
6. Getting free grade 5 gallon buckets for food storage. Visit you local bakeries and ask if they have any food grade icing buckets or other 5 gallon buckets you can have. You can also check with your local restaurants and Dairy Queen for the buckets and gallon pickle jars with metal lids.
7. Free wood. Check your local lumber yard for free scraps of lumber, chip bricks or anything else they have throw away. There is no telling what you may be able to get there.
8. Check with stores that sell, deliver and pick up old appliances. Or ask family and friends when you hear they are getting a new stove refrigerator, freezer or dishwasher. See it they will let you salvage for a couple of oven racks and gas cast iron burner rings. You can use them for a grill rack on a fire pit or rocket stove. You can use the refrigerator or freezer to make a root cellar, worm bed, or smoke house. You can take the racks from a dishwasher, hang them up from the ceiling some where and use them to hang herbs and flowers to dry. You can use the front panels from the door of the dish washer to make a solar oven. Just remove them from the dish washer, build a wood solar oven, paint the panels black and cut them to fit inside the solar oven. Glue on nail them in place, add a glass on top and there you have a cheap solar oven.
9. How would you like to find free food right in your own kitchen? Sound impossible? Well it's not. I do it all the time and it really is not hard to do. When you buy meat, cut the bones and fat away from the meat before you freeze it, Pack the meat in meal size portions and freeze, Take the bones and toss them in a freezer bag and freeze until you have enough to make a good pot of broth. Once you have enough bones, season them with a little salt, black pepper and onion, roast them in the oven when you are cooking a meal then boil the bones to get every bit of that delicious flavor for the best broth you will ever have. Don't forget to season it. Oh and don't forget to deglaze the bottom of the pan the bones were roasted in for even more delicious flavor. You have a great start for a soup, stew, gravy or pot of beans.
Do you ever get tired of seeing all those vegetable peeling in the trash just going to waste? Even if you compost them you are still losing food so here is a little something that will help stretch your food dollar and give you a little more free food. I prep most of my fresh vegetables on one day of the week. I wash them well, then peel them. I place all the peelings in a pot, add water, salt, black pepper, and what ever other seasons I want. bring to a boil then simmer for about an hour. Drain the broth, throw the peeling in the trash or compost pile or you can feed them to your animals and I have a good pot of nice vegetable broth for soups, stews or rice.
When preparing fruit for canning or to make a huge bowl of fruit salad I wash the fruit well before peeling. I place all the peeling in a pot, add a little water and bring to a boil then reduce the heat to a simmer. I let it simmer long enough to pull as much flavor out as I can then I strain through jelly cloth and reserve the juice to make either fruit flavored popcicles or ice cubes. You can heat the juice with a few herbs to make a fruit flavored herbal tea.
While I have not tried it yet I know it can be done. The root ends and seeds of certain vegetables and fruits can be used to grow your own food for free. Celery, onions, pineapple, potatoes, garlic and romaine are just a few of them. Be sure to look on the internet for how to do this and start growing your own free food.
Well those are the best of my free prep tips. I hope they help you as much as they have helped me. There is no telling how much or what all you can gather to add to your preps for little or no money at all. The only thing you will be out is a little gas and some time.
Prepping Granny
.1 And the one that works best for me. Put out the word in your family and friends that you are looking for a few certain items and I bet they will either have one they will give you or know some one who will give you one for free. I have managed to get 3 small cast iron skillets, a old fashion hand operated meat grinder, a hand crank apple peeler, a couple of nice butcher knives, a water bath canner, 2 dozen 1/2 gallon canning jars, several one gallon pickle jars, several old sheets to use for quilt backing or making other things empty popcorn tins and other tins for food storage, 2 old fashion hand potato mashers, old metal fence posts for making trellis in the garden, a couple of gardening books, a few old medical books, lots of reading material for entertainment when SHTF, planters for gardening that some one didn't want any more, odd and ends of sizes glass jars with metal lids for mouse proof food storage, material and other craft items that people no longer want, scrap lumber to build with, cement blocks and the list goes on. If I let them know what I am looking for some how I always have it in a couple of weeks.
.2 Join your local Freecycle list. You can find all kinds of free things on there that can be used in your prepping. From used wood to make a chicken coop or chicken tractor, or build raised garden beds, bricks for making a rocket stove, cement blocks for making a raised garden bed, fence posts to make trellis or fence off your garden, books for reading, planters for planting, canning jars, an old gas cast iron grill that no longer works, you can take the insides out and use it as charcoal grill or wood grill for cooking. The list is endless of the freebies you can get for free. I have even seen people offer extra produce from their gardens when they have to much.
3. When you go out to eat save those extra packets of salt, black pepper, sugar or other condiments, any extra paper napkins and plastic silver ware they give you and add to your preps.
4. City Wide Trash Day. Most towns now have a one or two day city wide trash days where people can sit stuff out by the road for free pickup that the normal trash companies won't pick up. The list of items you can get by getting there before the trash guys do are limitless. I have gotten free building supplies, jars, metal tins, bookcases and other shelving units, empty 5 gallon buckets that I use for things other than food storage, dining chairs that are in good shape just don't have a mate, broken hand tools for the garden that my husband fixes for cheap.
5. Dumpster Diving. I know it might sound gross but it really depends on where you go. I have gotten lot of cardboard and old news paper to put down in my garden to block weeds and help conserve on water by keeping the ground from drying out so fast. I have found some neat shelves for storage behind stores and convience stores that they gave me for free. I take them home, clean them really good and then use them in my prep storage room. I know one family that lives next door to a Aldi's. This store has one dumpster for its boxes and one for its old food. This family goes and gets free food from the dumpster. May sound gross but the food is wrapped. They have gotten up to a 100 lbs of potatoes at a time by doing this. They go through pick out and bad potatoes and throw them away then they wash all the others and either cook them and freeze, can them or dehydrate them. They have gotten all kinds of produce this way. They have even gotten day old bread to use for making crutons and bread crumbs.
6. Getting free grade 5 gallon buckets for food storage. Visit you local bakeries and ask if they have any food grade icing buckets or other 5 gallon buckets you can have. You can also check with your local restaurants and Dairy Queen for the buckets and gallon pickle jars with metal lids.
7. Free wood. Check your local lumber yard for free scraps of lumber, chip bricks or anything else they have throw away. There is no telling what you may be able to get there.
8. Check with stores that sell, deliver and pick up old appliances. Or ask family and friends when you hear they are getting a new stove refrigerator, freezer or dishwasher. See it they will let you salvage for a couple of oven racks and gas cast iron burner rings. You can use them for a grill rack on a fire pit or rocket stove. You can use the refrigerator or freezer to make a root cellar, worm bed, or smoke house. You can take the racks from a dishwasher, hang them up from the ceiling some where and use them to hang herbs and flowers to dry. You can use the front panels from the door of the dish washer to make a solar oven. Just remove them from the dish washer, build a wood solar oven, paint the panels black and cut them to fit inside the solar oven. Glue on nail them in place, add a glass on top and there you have a cheap solar oven.
9. How would you like to find free food right in your own kitchen? Sound impossible? Well it's not. I do it all the time and it really is not hard to do. When you buy meat, cut the bones and fat away from the meat before you freeze it, Pack the meat in meal size portions and freeze, Take the bones and toss them in a freezer bag and freeze until you have enough to make a good pot of broth. Once you have enough bones, season them with a little salt, black pepper and onion, roast them in the oven when you are cooking a meal then boil the bones to get every bit of that delicious flavor for the best broth you will ever have. Don't forget to season it. Oh and don't forget to deglaze the bottom of the pan the bones were roasted in for even more delicious flavor. You have a great start for a soup, stew, gravy or pot of beans.
Do you ever get tired of seeing all those vegetable peeling in the trash just going to waste? Even if you compost them you are still losing food so here is a little something that will help stretch your food dollar and give you a little more free food. I prep most of my fresh vegetables on one day of the week. I wash them well, then peel them. I place all the peelings in a pot, add water, salt, black pepper, and what ever other seasons I want. bring to a boil then simmer for about an hour. Drain the broth, throw the peeling in the trash or compost pile or you can feed them to your animals and I have a good pot of nice vegetable broth for soups, stews or rice.
When preparing fruit for canning or to make a huge bowl of fruit salad I wash the fruit well before peeling. I place all the peeling in a pot, add a little water and bring to a boil then reduce the heat to a simmer. I let it simmer long enough to pull as much flavor out as I can then I strain through jelly cloth and reserve the juice to make either fruit flavored popcicles or ice cubes. You can heat the juice with a few herbs to make a fruit flavored herbal tea.
While I have not tried it yet I know it can be done. The root ends and seeds of certain vegetables and fruits can be used to grow your own food for free. Celery, onions, pineapple, potatoes, garlic and romaine are just a few of them. Be sure to look on the internet for how to do this and start growing your own free food.
Well those are the best of my free prep tips. I hope they help you as much as they have helped me. There is no telling how much or what all you can gather to add to your preps for little or no money at all. The only thing you will be out is a little gas and some time.
Prepping Granny