What a very informative post, just loved it. Like yourself, here on our farm, we prepare for emergencies. It's not that we sit around waiting for the sky to fall, but being prepared sure gives one a sense of security.

The food we prepare and put in our large deep freezer comes mostly from our garden when it comes to veggies. We blanch everything and then vacuum seal our produce. Between the deep freezer and then vacuum sealing everything, things will keep good for more than a year and taste as fresh as the day we harvested them.

Most of our meats we purchase from two different local farmers who raise their animals in an organic setting.

The one thing we don't store away is any fruits. Dehydrating fruits and then freeze-drying them is something I have been wanting to look into for quite a while. Your post has motivated me to give this method of preserving food a try.

I love the apple peeler/corer/slicer, it sure does make things a lot easier and much quicker.