I have a gas stove so if the power does go out for a bunch we can get by with the stovetop (oven won’t light though - closed up electric start thingie)
We aren’t near a gas line on the street so we have propane for the stove - wish we could get gas here...there’s nothing like cooking with gas!
Nope - very quiet here - sprinkled a little an hour ago - but no wind or anything - hopefully this thing peters out...
It was fun watching all the ‘newbie preppers’ buying cases of water yesterday - I was in a bunch of stores in 3 southern New England states(job)
Potato Chips, Bread and Bottled Water - the ‘No-Power’ food group -lol
I have one daughter who would be very happy with a diet of water and potato chips for quite a while! She would be in even better shape with the bread as she has been known to make potato chip sandwiches too! LOL!
The rest of us however prefer to eat something more substantial, especially the guys in the family. We don’t have the luxury of a gas stove at the moment, so we have to either go outside and cook on the BBQ or cook inside in and around the fireplace when the power goes out. We almost always have our power outages in the winter months, so it is nice to be able to cook inside in the fireplace instead of having to go outside in the cold to cook on the BBQ.
I have a big cast iron spider style pot, so I can set that inside the fireplace with some of the embers underneath and on top of it and cook just about anything you could make while camping. When the power goes out I try to use up all the stuff in the refrigerator first, although if I have a bit of notice I can freeze lots of ice ahead of time so I can usually keep things cold for quite a while.
I can easily make a large batch of beef or chicken stew in the cast iron pot and some cornbread or biscuits in my cast iron skillet. For variety I can cook up pasta in my wide mouth thermos or another cast iron pot and we can serve any leftover stew over the top of the pasta.
We have an old popcorn cooker we used on my family camping trips as a child, so we can also make fun snacks in the fireplace. I have found that young girls find it sort of a fun adventure to be able to cook in the fireplace, so it keeps us occupied doing something fun together instead of missing the TV, computer, etc.
Whenever we know in advance of a storm coming our way where we could lose power I plan ahead by making coffee, hot water for tea, and hot cocoa in my regular thermos bottles and I can easily heat more water in my camp coffee pot, to keep them refilled and ready for anyone who needs something to drink to warm them up inside.
But what about chocolate? Gotta have chocolate!