Wait a minute, Salty, you want me to believe that the act of giving away food that I grow in my garden is actually a prep?
Seriously?
Why yes, my doubting reader, I sure am. Let me explain.
One of our picking bowls during a night’s harvest in the garden.
When we plant a garden in the early spring, we plant it for maximum production. We expect it to far outproduce what we will eat during the months when the garden is in full production. A lot of this production we plan to store, via pressure canning & waterbath or through dehydrating and freezing.
We have what is literally a MOUNTAIN of canning jars that are filled every year. In good years, like this year, our garden outproduces that, so what do we do?
We give our garden produce to our neighbors.
Consider for a minute… our garden, while neat and clean, is geared towards heavy production of food, not looks. It is, in fact, fairly unattractive as neighborhood features go. Our neighbors get to look at it all summer long.
Not the world’s prettiest sight.
Additionally, when the tomato plants are going nuts and all of the fruit trees are bearing, they can see mounds of fresh organic produce right in front of their eyes. Honestly, it’s a bit mouth watering.
SO… when we show up on their doorsteps with a bag full of fresh goodies, then neighborhood goodwill is reconfirmed for another season.
Remember, if the SHTF and you are not bugging out, your neighbors will be up the creek with you. If hard times arise and they need to put in gardens of their own, you are there to help them… the more food that is available, the better EVERYBODY is.
Additionally, if they develop a taste for your good fresh home-grown food, it will encourage them to grow some of their own.
It also leaves open discussions like “Hey man, food is short, and you had that garden, what happened to all that food?” where you can reply “what, you mean the extra food I gave to you and all the other neighbors last year?”
Giving away food is a good thing to do for many reasons, and it’s also a prep.
