Alcohol and Prepping

a reply to: Irishhaf

I'd probably have to fend off neighbours wanting to raid my coal store !

( Smokeless, of course. )

a reply to: chalybeate

Sounds like your golden to stay at home.

Most folks stateside have maybe 3-4 days food in the house (not counting frozen food) and maybe 1-2 days water on hand (assuming water isn't being pumped into the house).

Prepping at your stage sounds like just asking yourself might be useful to have at the house that you don't have on hand.

Personally, growing tobacco (and other things) are already part of my SHTF plan.
Same with corn. (and a still)

I want to be able to PRODUCE these goods, vs. a stockpile.
A stockpile can be seized in a raid. But, if you are a maker and supplier, YOU have the value. Your know-how, etc. Puts you in a position to make deals.

As for alcohol to keep, anything above 60% or 120 proof can be used for surgical and disinfectant purposes. You can go a little lower, if just for disinfecting, but vodka, rum, and whiskey are probably your best for stockpiling.

During the Y2K scare, I stocked up on cigarettes. Lost money afterwards on it, but had it gone bad, I would have been rolling in buying power. Cigarettes are great for SHTF, as they are small, easily divisible, can carry a lot with you, and have no value to me, but have tremendous value for others.

Go With Scotch and other quality Whisky, as far as I know Wine and Beer actually degrade in quality in the bottle if not properly preserved. A barrel of whisky was found in Antartica enduring -30 fahrenheit and colder and was still liquid and drinkable, go with the Water of Life! but dont blow your whole budget on our lovely lady liquor. Good thread!

a reply to: ladyvalkyrie

learn to make it.... Better than stashing some...

:-)

originally posted by: purplemer
a reply to: ladyvalkyrie

learn to make it.... Better than stashing some...

I agree. If you learn to capture yeast from the air, you can both bake bread and make booze. Beer making was a part of Mesopotamian and Egyptian culture, and stemmed from baking bread. Whiskey is just distilled beer.

I do not know the properties of different alcohols, but from personal experience from this culture room, I would recommend storing vodka in bottles. It can be 40% but as bottles take up more room, I would suggest using stronger (60 or even 80% bottles) + if you wanted to barter you could easily make these less stronger by adding water, as when it comes to vodka, it is basically pure alcohol mixed with with water (40% vodka consists of 40% pure alchol and 60% water). It is common to joke round here that when you take vodka shots, that one is basically drinking water, as 60% of the drink is water.

For generations, in this part of the world (Northern as well as Eastern Europe) vodka has been used for different reasons. Of course, I can not deny people do not drink a lot in this area, although vodka does have many other useful purposes, especially when it comes to medical purposes. It is common to use it fr cleaning wounds due to its purity. The process of creating different alcohols (which go better in time), involves different bacteria, which might even make the wound infected more. Also it is common round here (however funny it might sound) to use vodka for lowering high fever by using "vodka socks" by treating socks with vodka/water mix and letting the ill person wear them for the night. It is less common among younger people as antibiotics and doctors are at hand any time nowadays, yet among previous generations, especially in countrysides, it is still common in this area. In addition to previously mentioned vodka (or any alcohol) is useful in small amounts when the temperatures are low, as the create the feeling of it being warmer.

Generally alcohol is useful to stock up due to the ability to either barter them or use them for medical reasons (or for entertainment for some). From personal knowledge I would suggest stocking up on vodka, although my knowledge of other alcohols and the technologies used to create them is not high, so...

a reply to: Cabin

Wow! Thanks for your input! Vodka socks to reduce fever....that one is definitely going in my 'Homeopathy' mental file.

Like I said in a previous post, my grandmother (96- still does her own yard work) soaks avocado pits in tequila, then uses the concoction topically for her arthritis.

Based on the excellent info provided by you awesome ATS members I think I'm going to go 50% Everclear/50% mix of whiskey, scotch, tequila and vodka...all in bottles of course. I will probably get a book on how to brew/distill my own stuff and maybe some yeast (will have to look up yeast storage techniques) just for a back up.

Plus I've been interested in raising my own honey bees. If I can get that going I will definitely have to work out the recipe for honey mead!

a reply to: TheChrome

you dont need to catch yeast from the air it exists on most things you want to ferment....

Don't know if your being a clown or not, but lets say your not. Your theory as to the practicality of alcohol stockpiling is a sound one. If the world comes crashing down, alcohol, medications ie. painkillers and marijuana certainly would have a value in whatever market was left after such a collapse. Alcohol and marijuana would be something you could cultivate in a sustainable manner, since you could grow the marijuana and also the crop necessary for the alcohol production in a still. Scraps from the still could be fed to chickens or pigs in limited numbers.

This might not be practical in an urban environment, however it would be well suited in a rural local. I'm guessing everyone thinks of 'bugging out' if the collapse does come. Guarding your little enterprise might be more of an issue than you are ready to address however. There are strength in numbers though.

PS .... I live in North Carolina, and some people do still make liquor called shine. usually flavored with some kind of fruit. They make it in pressure cookers some how. I'm not privy to the process, but by the friends I have that do make it, they are not rocket surgeons ...lol..... I'm sure youtube has a video in "Pressure Cooker Stills"

a reply to: Cabin

The "Vodka" socks...never heard of that, however in Veterinary medicine
we have different ways of bringing high temps down in animals.
One way is alcoholing their pads on their paws....plus cold bah & etc but
you cannot bring it down to fast & do NOT want to go below normal. I
won't go into all that as it is long...
Anyway great to know that trick for humans as an alternative...

Animals that come in with ethylene glycol poisoning (anti-freeze) & the owner
cannot afford the antidote (extremely expensive) get put on Vodka IV drips.
Now after double checking meself I see there have been humans saved by this
method as well.

There are SO many uses for alcohol. I bet if you googled the many uses of alcohol
you would find a trove of wealth.
Great thread!

Cheers
Ektar

Sounds like you might be in the south with a humid basement....
Alcohol is a great comodity

a reply to: Plotus

I'm not being a clown, I'm dead serious. Basically I've got multiple bases covered, so don't worry about food/water/weapons...the basics. And I'm not really dedicated enough to learn a new, complicated skill. I've just got space in my basement for a utility shelf (lets just say 6'Tx3'Wx2'D). Clearly I've seen what happens to canned food after 15 years, so I don't want to waste my money on that. A lot of other prepping supplies deteriorate over time as well- latex gloves, water filters, etc. Obviously the best investment you can make is guns and ammo, but this isn't THAT kind of thread. Heirloom seeds would be a nice addition, but would require a LOT of time and effort to become useful (seed->plant->food). Silver and gold is great in case of an economic collapse....but if things got really ugly- and I mean zombie apocalypse ugly- I think a bottle of Jack would go a lot further than a silver dollar.

I've already got my plan in mind, but please keep the ideas coming!

a reply to: Ektar

Yup, Texas. It stays relatively cool down there, but moisture is a major issue. As before stated, I am working to resolve that, but in the meantime I need to stay away from 'sensitive' items.

My main problem is that I live in a log cabin....with several rotting spots. That's how the water is leaking in. So I've been clearing out the rot, letting it dry out really good, then building it back up with mortar mix. Lmao! I call it 'petrification'. In a few more years I'll have a concrete house in the shape of a log cabin!

I just know that I would get drunk and send smoke signals to my Ex.

I think vodka or everclear would be ideal and multipurpose. People may be mocking, but it's true what you say about the multiple uses it would have. I try to stock some, but end up drinking it. LOL

originally posted by: Plotus
If the world comes crashing down, alcohol, medications ie. painkillers and marijuana certainly would have a value in whatever market was left after such a collapse. Alcohol and marijuana would be something you could cultivate in a sustainable manner, since you could grow the marijuana and also the crop necessary for the alcohol production in a still. Scraps from the still could be fed to chickens or pigs in limited numbers.

I have seen stuff on medicinal marijuana on the net lately, are the medicinal compounds to be found in ordinary hemp as well or does it have to the be mind altering kind? Firstly I don't want to get high, but in a situation where the medical system we have come to rely on is not available, herbal medicine will have to be it, so if hemp has the same properties that might be way to go. Secondly if it isn't going to get you high, you wont have as much trouble protecting your crop.

I found a bottle of puerto Rican rum in 1976 in an old cabinet outside an apartment complex. It was still sealed, and had a cork and paper date strip over the cork. It was dated 1949. It was the bottle that had a bat on it. I was only 19. and stupidly opened it and shared it with friends. It was so smooth! It tasted great!
I could only imagine what a top notch bar would pay now adays for that bottle, or how much they would charge for a shot. I dont care much for rum, but this stuff was off the hook good. I still have the empty bottle around here somewhere.

a reply to: Cinrad

For medicinal purposes you need the 'high' kind. It's the 'high' that helps alleviate pain, nausea etc. Now as for helping with seizures and such, I believe those are still the 'high' kind, but they've been selectively bred to to have higher levels of this and lower levels of that (I don't know the specifics, I've never had to deal with seizures so I've never researched it).

The problem with trying to stock MJ is storage and longevity of your stores. I guess if you got a nice brick of it and vacuum sealed it with heavy duty plastic it would last a while.

People don't realize how quickly prep stores deteriorate. I've had to spend hours cleaning out rotten old prep stores here in the basement....leftover from Y2K, so 15 years old.....canned food? now black slime oozing out of rusted cans...anything plastic or rubber? (such as latex gloves) so brittle they disintegrate at the touch....medicine? expired to the point of being ineffective, with the packaging rotting just as badly as everything else I've mentioned.

Now there was a bunch of really good, heavy duty jars of water that seem just fine. I'm not sure about the QUALITY of the water, but hey, in the zombie apocalypse you take what you can get right? Lol!

MJ concentrates can be dissolved into alcohol and stored They can also be vaclocked and deep frozen