Sans Refrigeration (farmer, wheat, grain, house)

[FreedomThroughAnarchism]

I've been mulling this over for quite a few years, but it's one of those things that may benefit from brainstorming among numerous people, to get ideas that might not have occurred to one before.

I decided some time ago that the prospect of having no refrigeration is probably not for me. While it's nice to have the knowledge of skills like canning, I have found canning somewhat disagreeable to me because it relies on making the food either: (a) too salty, (b) too vinegary, or (c) too sugary and syrupy.

I care for none of these (especially anything involving vinegar, which I am of the opinion is one of the more noxious substances, and I can't believe that people don't treat vinegar with all the reverence of ingesting Plutonium.)


Electing to live in a cold(er) state is obviously one solution, as the general rule is that the average temperature a certain number of feet underground is roughly equal to the average annual air temperature for that region.... so if you live in a place where the average temperature is between 32 to 38'ish degrees Fahrenheit, you could very well have a viable means to refrigerate your food year round.





And of course, if you live in an area (which so far as the U.S. is concerned is interior Alaska) where the average temperature is even colder, and where you have regular permafrost, you could even go beyond refrigeration and have something approaching a freezer.

The average temperature variation amplitude is small for depths of 12 feet, and at depths of 30 - 50 feet, the amplitude purportedly tends to zero. Therefore, a depth somewhere between 5 - 12 feet may be sufficient for most applications, from a practical perspective. Twelve feet is a lot if you have to dig it by hand. Five feet is more doable.

Incidentally, I would say that is a very big "plus" on the "pros versus cons checklist" that usually accompanies the never-ending "cold states" versus "warmer states" homesteading debate. True, it may be harder to grow vegetables in colder states, but I'd say self-refrigeration could be a worthy trade-off. Individual utility calculations will vary.


So the aforementioned two methods are ways to go about it, the other method is to almost entirely rely upon food which doesn't require refrigeration. There's no shortage of dry foods one can choose (freeze dried, dehydrated, and plenty of 'regular' dry foods), and of course store canned food is always an option (though canned food is extremely heavy)..... but what, if any, are some other options to pursue?


Like most people, there just seems to be too much food I like that requires refrigeration. Foods like honey, peanut butter, and mustard supposedly don't [technically] need refrigeration.... and that's nice..... but that's just three things (that people commonly refrigerate which don't actually need it).... seems somewhat limiting. Then of course there is also the question of what to do with beverages that require refrigeration.

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I was thinking a compromise somewhere between no refrigeration versus dropping a grande-plus on an expensive SunDanzer or SunFrost super-efficient 12V refrigerator..... I could go with something like this:

EdgeStar 12V DC Portable Fridge / Freezer - 43 Qt. - FP430

It's a 12 Volt refrigerator, but it comes in various compact sizes similar to a Coleman beach cooler. A SunDanzer or Sun Frost would be nice, of course, but the option I was thinking about is more portable, which happens to be a requirement I have because I can't tote a full-sized refrigerator to the location I have selected (even getting building materials there is extremely difficult).

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Anyway, what's your plan in this respect? Have you put much thought into it?

[MTSilvertip]

I for one have considered the need for refridgeration without power, and as I live in the heart of the purple zone on your map, a root cellar is an option. We are pretty dry here most of the time, so damp isn't a huge problem, correct venting can handle what moisture that does collect.
I will be building one at my site 3 as there is no power up there and I want secure cool storage for foods as there are a lot of bears up there as well and a cement cellar with a good door will take care of my problem.

A second option for meats is sugar curing or salt curing. Ancient method of preservation, not hard to do and can work pretty well. The salt or sugar dissacate the meat and remove a lot of the juices, and kill bacteria so in a cool place a thick chunk of meat like a ham can last a long time. Prosutto (sp) ham from Italy takes years to cure, so it can last longer than a conventional cut in the freezer or refridgerator.
Once inside the rind, I don't find the meat is all that salty or sweet as the sugar/salt crystals are on the outside not impregnated into the meat itself.

Another option is smoking, similar to salt or sugar cure, you basically cure the meat through exposure to smoke to kill bacteria and start the drying process for preservation.
Corning or pickling meat is another option. Yes it can be salty because what you are doing is putting meat in salted water to preserve it. However, if you soak the cut overnight in fresh water and rinse well prior to cooking, I don't think it is that bad.

One old option I don't see mentioned much is a springhouse. Those were small buildings with water from a stream or creek running either under it or through it in a trough. If you have a cold water spring, and a tightly sealed springhouse, the runnning water will absorb warmth from the ambiant air in the house and keep the tempuratures nice and cool. Used to be that a lot of dairy farms kept a springhouse with place where they could put the old milk cans and cream cans in the water to keep them cool. (That works for beer too..)

Depending on where you are, we have old mines and caves scattered around that blow full of drifting snow during the winter, and don't melt during the summer, so if someone has access to one of those, you have a walk in freezer, or we can climb high enough in the mountains to bury a cache in a snowbank, (we do have glaciers here too), and a snowbank can last all through the summer, but it is kind of inconvenient for running out for a midnight snack

Basically where I am, we only have about 2 months of hot, (90 F +) weather, and about 6 - 7 months where the ground is frozen or the temperatures fall below freezing every night.

Refridgeration isn't my big problem, staying warm is!

[Themanwithnoname]

Look into chest refrigerators, many are so efficient (WITHOUT spending $1K on a sunbeam) that (With a little extra insulation) they will stay frozen (Run a genny to frieze them) off a single solar panel.

-Buddy who knows a good bit about electronics assures me of this.

I'll be testing it within a year.

[MrRational]

harvest your methane to operate a gas refrigerator.

[FreedomThroughAnarchism]

Originally Posted by Themanwithnoname

Look into chest refrigerators, many are so efficient (WITHOUT spending $1K on a sunbeam) that (With a little extra insulation) they will stay frozen (Run a genny to frieze them) off a single solar panel.

-Buddy who knows a good bit about electronics assures me of this.

True. A while back I was planning on modifying a generic (though still fairly energy efficient) chest freezer [I was looking for one with a stock rating of 110 - 175 kWh/yr range, which I would then try to lower] by adding:

(a) quite a quite a bit of extra insulation. It might not look pretty, but it would get the job done.

(b) installing a different temperature switch that would let me set it a bit warmer than the stock setting, and

(c) was thinking about installing a more efficient compressor... but the latter involves getting into areas of the refrigerator/freezer I am not as familiar with.


I ran into this article a few years ago, and was going to do something similar:

http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Conservation/chest_fridge.pdf (broken link)

[SCGranny]

All I can say is with canning, you might be doing it wrong. There are good things about vinegar (one is that it helps with the body's need for acid) and you can pickle anything - garlic, tomatoes, onions, as well as the 'normal' things... Experimentation with different consistencies in canning, like canning 'blanched' vegetables, not cooked ones, in a pressure canner without a lot of salt, could change your mind.

We make a lot of jerky and dried meats; you can smoke or dehydrate pretty well here - it was far more difficult when we lived in an area where the humidity usually ran about 100% most of the time. Smoked whole hams store well if done properly; you can hang them in a dry basement or shed after they are processed and just go cut a hunk off for dinner. I do prefer sugar-cured to salt-cured.

I'll dehydrate anything; from apples and tomatoes to herbs and onions. You don't need a big fancy dehydrator, you can do it in a turned-off gas stove with just the pilot light lit. Again, it depends on your local ambient humidity and how thin you slice the vegies or meats as to how long it takes.

As for refrigeration, we have a full cement-block basement with a double exterior door at each end of the outside-leading corridor. It stays pretty cool in the corridor all year round, and in the 5-6 months of winter it gets below freezing. The first room off of the corridor is our 'cool room', it is closed off from the rest of the basement and stays cool. It used to be where the farmer who built this house used to carry his milk down to be cooled and processed; you can still see the marks in the cement floor of the old generator he used to run the separators.

[1957TabbyCat]

Before mechanical refrigeration systems were introduced, ancient peoples, including the Greeks and Romans, cooled their food with ice transported from the mountains. Wealthy families made use of snow cellars, pits that were dug into the ground and insulated with wood and straw, to store the ice. In this manner, packed snow and ice could be preserved for months. Stored ice was the principal means of refrigeration until the beginning of the 20th century, and it is still used in some areas.
In India and Egypt evaporative cooling was employed. If a liquid is rapidly vaporized, it expands quickly. The rising molecules of vapour abruptly increase their kinetic energy. Much of this increase is drawn from the immediate surroundings of the vapour, which are therefore cooled. Thus, if water is placed in shallow trays during the cool tropical nights, its rapid evaporation can cause ice to form in the trays, even if the air does not fall below freezing temperatures. By controlling the conditions of evaporation, it is possible to form even large blocks of ice in this manner.
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Alot of extra insulation in a refrigerator would help, but the more efficient compressors are not durable and the metal tubing is thinner and rots.
The stock switch could keep the unit too warm without changing it out.

There pictures of huge refrigerating units in from anceint Iraq Iraq. they still exist. The just don't use freon but rely on air movement.

In older times people really could get ice cream, cold drinks and had the ability to keep food from spoiling. My oldest son and his girlfriend make yogurt all the time. I have forgot some in a truck for over a month in the heat of summer and it still tasted fine. Funny though yogurt is kept in the refrigerator in stores.

There really and abundance of ways to eat well and preserve food. Many largely forgotton

[FreedomThroughAnarchism]

Another 'makeshift' idea I had that's a step between no refrigeration and buying a refrigerator or freezer, was to get one of those relatively small tabletop ice makers (about the size of a toaster oven), and then just fill up a large Coleman cooler with the ice (with extra insulation lining the cooler) once in a while.

It's somewhat surprising how long ice lasts in those coolers, even in hots temps. I do a lot of camping, and find that even in 85 degree Fahrenheit temps, the ice and water is often still cold for upwards of 2 days, so its a doable option to consider.

My only concern there is with the reliability of the ice maker. If it goes, your screwed, and you then need a Plan B real quick. Of course, the same could be said of a real refrigerator or freezer, but I suspect the tabletop ice makers are made like crap, unlike a $1000 fridge.

[Nor'Eastah]

Yup, we have been having the same concerns. Did you know that the only canned items that require lots of salt, vinegar, or sugar are the ones put up in a steam or water-bath canner? If you can with a pressure canner, none of those things are required. We commonly can fruits and tomatoes with a pressure canner, and do not have to add anything to them.

But having a sturdy root cellar will take care of a lot of problems. We decided that we'd build a cool spot that would not freeze in winter, and stock it with potatoes, carrots, squash, apples, turnips, etc. which we use as winter staples anyway. Onions could go in the uninsulated part of the attic, as they need cool but dry.

Then we really started to look at how much refrigerator space we used, anyway. Opened cans, pitchers of water and juice, leftover dishes, some meat...nothing requiring a whole lot of space. That leaves us 2 options: a small 12VDC fridge, a small propane fridge, or a dorm-sized AC fridge. In truth we have not decided yet, but probably the propane model is out as a choice. I doubt if we need even 2 cubic feet of space.

If we get a deer or slaughter a couple hogs or 20 chickens at once, there are rentable freezer lockers in many towns. If there are none nearby, we do have a nice compact front-door freezer that we can run off our limited AC via inverter and battery bank. However, it only has a capacity of about 8 cubic feet. We're still thinking this one through.

[ChrisC]

The only thing I'd really miss without refrigeration is milk. I do love milk. There's always powdered milk, I guess. Other than that, I'm perfectly fine with dry goods, grains, beans, potatoes, freeze-dried foods, canned fruit/veg, cured meats, etc types of foods. I'm probably good to go with root cellaring to keep foods cool that need it, considering my minimal cold-storage needs.

I'm lucky in one respect in that I'm not at all particular about the foods I eat and I tend to be very repetitive in my eating habits. I really don't eat foods that require refrigeration all that much. I favor grains and grain-derived foods. And oddly, I never get tired of the things I eat constantly. I actually have to keep reminding myself to eat a diversity of foods. Otherwise I'd probably only eat oats, rice, wheat (breads), other grains, potatoes, and a few other things 100% of the time. Breakfast has consisted of only rolled or steel-cut oatmeal for many, many years. Not having oats is a scary prospect--I've got many buckets of it tucked away!


As a side note: Meat. My idea would be to only hunt small animals as needed. Rather than needing cold-storage for a large animal (as a deer), let the small animals (rabbits and such) preserve themselves until they are needed for food.