The importance of food storage (I broke the Vegetable Challenge)

The wind blew these down, but I hope they still make seeds, September 2019

I broke the Vegetable Challenge a month early.  I broke it on 5th October, buying onions, carrots, swede, and two bags of frozen veg.  Instead of lasting seven months as planned, it lasted six months, the same as 2018.

I didn't break it because we're desperate for vegetables.  We still have plenty of chard, potatoes, several pumpkins, some tomatoes and runner beans...the list goes on.  However.  For several months I have been considering breaking the challenge early because the end date coincides with the date for Brexit, by which time we are not assured that there will be vegetables (or even anything else) in the shops.  We have been slowly building up a stockpile of canned and jarred foods for the last year:  mainly meat and fish, but other staples we use like tomatoes and beans.  I have been filling up a shelf with dehydrated foods too, catalogued here on the blog.

For the next few weeks I'll be buying the cheapest in-season veg and storing them for winter.  I think most will be dehydrated (or stored in a cool cupboard), but we'll stash a few more bags in the freezer too.  I don't plan on serving any of this veg until we reach the official Challenge end date:  2nd November.  We'll also continue adding to our general food stockpile.

I really do hope that these precautions are not needed, and that the beginning of November will go on with no interruption to national food supply.  Regardless, I know from past experience the value of having food storage:  when I was a child we sometimes had to rely on food my parents had stored.  And in my adult life, we have had bad snow which prevented us as well as delivery trucks from driving--the longest period was around two weeks without access to any shops (any shops with food in them, that is).