[MommaDuck01]

I never thought about the insurance thing. There are a lot of people around here who are standing in line for disaster food stamps to replace lost food from the hurricanes. We only lost power for 22 hours (we were lucky) so I am not claiming anything.

Before Gustave, my mom came to my house with a huge ice chest of food and placed any food she left in the freezer in a large bag. My brother said he doesn't want to go through the freezer again like he did after Katrina. DH and my brother went and buried the rotting food in the backyard. It stunk so bad they ended up burying a few plastic containers b/c they were tired of dumping them!

A friend of my mom's told me she had just bought a new carton of ice cream before the hurricane. She put the ice cream container into another container filled with water and froze that. She said it showed no signs of melting when she got back and they were without power for days.

Of course, these suggestions are for when you know you might be without power. One precaution you can take is fill gallon jugs (or I often use Powerade bottles) with water and fill the empty spaces of your freezer. The less empty space, the better chance of everything staying cold. And the extra ice will help keep it cold, the containers won't leak, and your own block of ice for an ice chest when you need it.

After one hurricane, we got power back before they a friend so they brought their whole freezer to our house!