What would happen in your household if the electricity went out, the water stopped running, or a storm forced you to leave home unexpectedly? Most of us have experienced some interruption to our normal routines. Sometimes it lasts a few hours, and sometimes several days. Being prepared doesn't mean expecting the worst. It means understanding what our household depends on and having a reasonable plan when those things aren't available. I'm working on an Oasis Builders 72-Hour Emergency Preparedness Program and Checklist, and I'd like to involve our community in developing it. The idea is to help households become reasonably self-sufficient for the first three days of an interruption, whether staying home or temporarily evacuating. Here is our starting checklist: Water and Food: At least one gallon of drinking and sanitation water per person per day for three days, with additional water for pets and individual needs. Include familiar, shelf-stable foods that don't require cooking. Light and Communication: Flashlights, extra batteries, a battery-powered radio, charged phone power banks, and a written emergency contact list. Health and Sanitation: First aid supplies, essential medications and a plan for obtaining or safely storing them, personal hygiene supplies, toilet paper, and a way to manage sanitation if water services stop. Clothing and Shelter: Weather-appropriate clothing, sturdy shoes, blankets, and supplies for staying warm or cool safely. Important Documents: Copies of identification, insurance information, emergency contacts, some cash, and spare keys. Individual Needs: Supplies for children, older adults, people with medical or mobility needs, and household pets. We also need to distinguish between supplies kept at home and a smaller, portable bag that we can take if evacuation becomes necessary. But having supplies is only part of preparedness. Do we know where everything is, can we use it, and can every household member who needs access find it?

If we gathered onions, garlic, leeks, and parsley from our gardens today, we would be bringing together foods named in Mayster Jon Gardener’s instructions preserved from around 1440. The spelling looks different, but several names are recognizable. His opening lines include “leke,” “ownyns,” “garleke,” and “percely.” Across nearly six centuries, these are still familiar garden crops and kitchen ingredients. What interests me is how easily we can picture using them. Onions and garlic might begin a meal in the cooking pot. Leeks could become part of a soup, and parsley could supply leaves for a sauce. Medieval English cooking records also connect these plants with soups, sauces, and other preparations. Mayster Jon gives parsley particular attention. He describes cutting it repeatedly during the season, while leaving plants intended for seed uncut. This was a crop to manage for continued use, with some plants serving the kitchen and others providing seed. That does not mean his parsley or onions were identical to the varieties we buy today. The familiar crop name does not establish the same size, appearance, flavor, or growing behavior. Nor does one gardening text tell us what every household grew or ate. Still, these recognizable foods give us a practical connection with the past. We can begin with something we know, then ask how people grew it, prepared it, and carried it into another season. For our next look at Mayster Jon’s garden, I would like to follow these familiar foods a little further, from the growing bed toward the household table. Which of these four do you grow, and which earns its place most often in your cooking?

Before we decide how to prepare an herb, how much to use, or what tradition says about it, we need to know what plant we actually have. A common name is a useful beginning, but it may not be enough. The same common name can be used for different plants. Different regions may use different names for the same plant. Labels may also shorten a name until an important distinction disappears. A botanical name helps narrow the identity, but we still need to know the plant part. Leaf, flower, root, bark, fruit, seed, resin, and essential oil should not be treated as interchangeable. They may differ in chemistry, preparation, strength, traditional use, and safety. That means a useful herbal label should tell us more than the word herb. Look for: - The common name - The botanical name - The plant part - The grower, supplier, or source - The harvest or purchase date when known This applies whether the herb came from a store, a garden, a friend, or a jar in the cupboard. Traditional records are most useful when they identify the plant and part being described. Current research and safety information also depend on knowing what material was actually studied. Correct identity does not automatically mean that an herb is suitable for every person. Preparation, amount, duration, health conditions, medications, age, pregnancy, and individual response matter. Identity is simply where responsible learning begins. A safe fifteen-minute activity is to inspect one herb you already own. Read its package or garden label. See whether you can verify the botanical name and plant part. When something is missing, mark the jar or record the question rather than guessing. A family can do this with a familiar culinary plant. Children can compare a known leaf, flower, fruit, and seed without tasting anything unidentified. In the Northern Hemisphere, flowers, fruits, and seed heads may currently provide helpful identification clues. In the Southern Hemisphere, dormant plants and early shoots may make records, labels, and known sources especially important.

I've been interested in planting some of the things that long ago people used to grow, such as: Skirret, Good King Henry, Sea kale, Turkish rocket, Sorrel, etc... Have you looked into any of these? Are you growing any of them?

Do you water your garden where the foliage and soil get wet? Please add clarification in the chat... Thank you