Bishop Koyle was shown a devastating famine that would affect countries all around the world. This will be similar to the great famine that took place in Egypt back in the days of Joseph. The following article helps put things into perspective and makes it clear that it's wise to prepare now. It was written by Jim Phillips, inventor of the cold weather foam clothing.
An experience with butter, cheese and honey
By Jim Phillips
Recently my wife and I had our own financial famine that lasted almost four months. We barely were able to keep our home, and had little to nothing left over to pay for gas or food. Lucky for us we had our food storage so feeding ourselves and our five children wasn't a problem. Boy, we had a LOT to learn! The basic one year food storage of legumes, rice, wheat, and powdered milk will keep you alive, but, it is not pleasant. We learned from this experience that the recommended minimum food storage items (online Food Storage Calculator) for one year will keep you alive but just barely. It truly is what they call a recommended minimum.
During this time of famine we ate what we had and made the most of it. Despite having olive oil, whenever we had a few dollars my wife sent me to the store to buy butter. We used it to bake with. The caloric content of the butter was a huge plus spread over our baked whole wheat bread. It was more than that, it tasted good, and taste had a huge impact on our overall family morale. During this hard time, food became a comforter even more than usual, because of the added stress.
Making things taste good and appealing was especially important for our four children and my pregnant wife. Did I mention my children are all under the age of seven? Do you know how difficult it is to get a three year old to eat oatmeal everyday without some sort of sweetener? We used honey in almost everything to help the taste. As a treat our children would get teaspoonfuls of honey. Our children scraped our lone honey bucket clean by the middle of the second month of this famine. We wished we had more. In-fact with the next few dollars my wife paid $55 (way too much) for a little 14 lb pail of honey from a local food storage place. That was soon gone as well.
I can remember the day cheese finally made it back into our home. This was after the famine was over and we could buy it again. This long lost friend was soon gobbled up by my children. We missed the calories, the taste and especially the casein content (casein trips the pleasure center of the brain). I found myself walking into the kitchen periodically to slice off a sliver to savor. What a welcome resource this would have been during our personal family famine.
One last thing. During this period, the only work I could find was grueling and physically demanding. I became a log peeler for a log cabin construction company. Log peeling ranks right up there with stone cutting and cement work for physical exertion. So during a time of lack, my body's nutritional and caloric needs almost doubled which is similar to what would be expected in an emergency situation. It became even more important during this time of emotional and physical stress that my body have the fats, fuels and comforts to meet the new demands.
My wife and I are grateful for this experience and all it taught us. Lucky for us when our personal family famine was over we could go to the grocery store and buy what we needed and missed most. I could eat my fill and replenish my body. Had it been a local, or national crisis of an extended period of time there would have been no store to go to and no outside help. That is a sobering thought. Better to prepare now by understanding our true needs and priorities than suffer from acute 20/20 hindsight with an empty stomach.
From my own experience I learned the value of storing honey, butter and cheese to enhance our basic food storage and this is why we are offering these three items for the current Group Buy.
