Helping you live a better life, if times get tough or even if they don’t
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Today its Friday so it’s time for the expert council show. To ask a question for a show like this, just send an email to me at jack at thesurvivalpodcast.com with “TSPC Expert” in the subject line.
Today on The Survival Podcast, the expert council answers questions on data privacy, a/v production, apps, working with developers, first aid kits, intermittent fasting, funding education and more.
In the body of your email first tell me the council member your question is for. Second ask your question concisely in one to two sentences maximum. Third any and all details after that. This is the formula to give you the best chance of getting on the air.
I do what I can to get as many of your questions as possible on the air but can’t always get to all of them. Our council is made of a wide variety of experts in everything from the tactical to the practical and everything in between.
To get more information on our Expert Council visit our “Meet the Expert Council Page” to learn more about them and their specific areas of expertise.
Join Me Today As Our Experts Discuss…
Resources for today’s show…
Websites of the Expert Council Members
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK (866-658-4465) and you might hear yourself on the air.
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Remember in addition to discounts to over 40 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
Every day I bring you an item on Amazon that I personally use or has been purchased by many members of the audience and I have researched enough to recommend.
Today’s TSP Amazon Item of the day is The Ringer Cast Iron Scrubber. As a long time user of cast iron I was pretty interested when I first heard about this little gadget. I picked one up figuring I would try it out and likely it would be like many gadgets, sure it sort of works but big honking deal and it would end up in the junk drawer.
Um, WRONG! This thing is awesome, and it is one I am frankly late to the party on. I have had a lot of folks over the house and if I used cast iron to cook for them, I always show them the ringer, most are like, yep got one of those. Why? Because it fricken works and it makes your cast iron better over time.
Here is what I do, I generally heat up my pan with what ever crud is in it to medium hot, I then dump in a cup of water or two, it deglazes the crud. I take the hot pan over to the sink and dump out the water, add a bit more and give it a scrubbing with the ringer. This with a well seasoned pan is all you really need, just heat dry and oil and you are good.
What I do a lot of times though, especially if there is a small amount of crud left is put in a big pinch of kosher salt, it acts like scouring powder and give it a bit more scrubbing with the ringer. This not only cleans it perfectly but it is doing micro sanding of the iron and patina at the same time.
I have a lot of old school milled cast iron, but one thing I have never found is a dutch over like that, well one I didn’t need to sell a kidney to buy anyway. So I have a modern Lodge Dutch Oven, and with this technique even it is almost as good as old school cast iron.
So if you cook with cast, either old or new, consider getting The Ringer Cast Iron Scrubber into your kitchen today. At only 15 bucks it is a great deal, I have had mine about 2 years now and it is still as good as new.
Remember you can always find all of our reviews at TspAz.com
Today on The Survival Podcast, I take your calls on business, project management, guns, getting started prepping, finding others of like mind, food storage, UBI and more.
Remember to be on a show like this one just pick up your phone and call 866-65-THINK.
The best way to improve your chances of being on the air is ask your question or make your point up front, then provide details. Also please do your best to call from a quiet area with a good connection and speak up so you can be well heard.
While I can’t put all calls on the air but I do my best to get as many of them on as I can.
Join Me Today As Our Experts Discuss…
Resources for today’s show…
Websites of the Expert Council Members
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK (866-658-4465) and you might hear yourself on the air.
Join the MSB Today
Want Every Episode of TSP Ever Produced?
Remember in addition to discounts to over 40 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
Every day I bring you an item on Amazon that I personally use or has been purchased by many members of the audience and I have researched enough to recommend.
Today’s TSP Amazon Item of the day is the Lodge Carbon Steel Seasoned Skillet. These are my go to for searing and if you ever go to a professional restaurant where a lot of searing happens you will likely see dozens of these in use, and there is a reason, they work really damn good. While I used them mostly for searing at first they have now become my go to for 90% or more of my stove top cooking.
There are quite a few options from 8 inches up to a huge 15 inch one with double handles. I currently own an 8 and a few 12 inch skillets and they serve my needs very well.
I am a huge fan of old cast iron but it is heavy and it is not efficient when it comes to getting it hot, what it is good at is staying hot once you get it there. Thinner carbon steel is efficient at getting hot quickly. These come pre seasoned and if you use proper care they will stay stick free and last forever.
When I first got these pans I really used them the most for searing off meat in two ways.
One – I will sear steaks and such BEFORE finishing on the grill or in the oven. They provide the best sear I have ever gotten and if you are finishing in the oven they can go strait in.
Two – For searing after a sous vide cook. Again they are just the best thing I have found.
But over two years that has changed. First I found the factory seasoning on them to be very good, way better than I expected. They are very low stick, note I didn’t say non stick. I have pretty much given up on other cookware at this point and use Lodge carbon steel pans exclusively.
The primary advantage of the carbon skillets over the cast iron is they heat up a lot faster and are easier to get searing hot. They also weigh less so they are easier to toss food around with when you don’t want to use a spatula and damage food by doing so.
After trying both expensive and low cost cookware over the years today I do almost 90% of my cooking with the following
Lastly as a prepper, when it comes to carbon steel pans, I love the efficiency here. If you are ever in a situation where fuel needs to be rationed you want a pan that heats up fast, cooks fast and finishes fast. So check out Lodge’s Carbon Steel Skillets today.
Remember you can always find all of our reviews at TspAz.com
Joshua Sloan is a longtime listener and friend of TSP and is known by many in the community. He has been involved with Zello since 2012 and Citizens Assisting Citizens since their formation in 2013. He runs his own consultancy and has a long background marketing and technology.
Joshua is the lead moderator of TSPN Zello channel, where he is known as PA Prepper, and was recently picked as the Tech and Communications Team Lead for Citizens Assisting Citizens. He is here today as an authorized spokesperson to tell us about the 6th anniversary of CAC, lessons, learned, new initiatives and the future of Citizens Assisting Citizens.
Resources for today’s show…
Josh’s Top Ten Ways to Support CAC
Sponsors of the Day
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK (866-658-4465) and you might hear yourself on the air.
Join the MSB Today
Want Every Episode of TSP Ever Produced?
Remember in addition to discounts to over 40 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
Special Notice – I am bringing this item back today because it is on sale for 56.99, which is 23 dollars off the list price. So if you have been thinking about upgrading your router now is a great time. I LOVE this router, read the review to see why. I went though a lot of routers until i found this one. I really do believe it is the best router for the most people.
Also the WiFi extender mentioned in the review is also on sale for 10 bucks off standard price. I have no idea how long the sale will last so I wanted to bring it to your attention today. This is the router I have used now for almost three years, it still works flawlessly. – End Special Notice
Every day I bring you an item on Amazon that I personally use or has been purchased by many members of the audience and I have researched enough to recommend.
Today’s TSP Amazon Item of the day is the TP-LINK Archer C7 Wireless Router. I did a TON of work when I last upgraded our router, this is the one I settled on, I have never regretted it. It has now been running for three years and I have no desire to replace it.
We have a large house, not a mansion or something like that just a long house because the garage was converted to indoor space and lot of brick walls. We always had trouble with the signal in certain areas, and especially out in the detached metal garage.
This thing bangs signal out hard and with one extender (which you can find here) I can hit almost any part of my 3 acre property. It also has two bands one at 2.4 and one at 5 ghz. We have found some of our devices like say our printer, just does better on the 2.4 ghz band. Since they merge to a common network you just sign the equipment in on what works best and all is well.
It also comes with a guest network, so your visitors can be on the web but not on your network, which is very nice. You can configure everything in your browser, the set up is step by step and anyone with a very basic computer knowledge can do it.
Best part? Well it also has a smart phone app called Tether, this lets you pull up your network, see everything on it, change passwords, get your password if you forgot it, etc. But the very best part of this is you can, reboot from you phone. Yes you can reboot your router from your phone.
Imagine this, you and your spouse decide to hit the bed early and watch some Netflix, network issues ensue, you need a reboot. Don’t get up like a fool and walk to the other side of the house, grab your phone and give the reboot command and all is well. Another great thing, you can block devices from your phone. When my son refused to do a chore back when he was a kid I found the best medicine was changing the password on the network. Now to use that discipline (I call it motivation) you can just shut their devices off and on at will. God Matt is lucky I didn’t wield this power 15 years ago!
I dealt with a lot of buggy crap with three previous routers, unfairly yelled at Comcast customer service about their wonky internet due to one of those, found this and finally I am happy. I can use my laptop or phone on network from my pool or in my garage, my guests have their own network, everything works and I have good signal in the entire house.
I am not a network administrator, or a MCSE or anything like that. I just know this works, it always works, it is easy to set up and manage and does what I need. If anyone wants a free router by the way I have three in my closet you are welcome to the next time you stop by.
So if you need a new router or are just ready to upgrade give the TP-LINK Archer C7 Wireless Router a shot. I finally agree with the NY Times for a change, it is in their words “the best router for most people”. It is far from an enterprise product but for home networks it is the best thing I have found.
Remember you can always find all of our reviews at TspAz.com
Anyone that has followed me on TSP for any length of time, knows that I love herbs. I love them as the medicinal gifts of creation they are. I love them for the pollinators and predators they attract. I love them for how the enhance our foods. I love them for the teas they make. And I love them simply for how they look and smell on a warm afternoon.
Many people seem to think of growing herbs sort of as an after thought. Or they think of them only in a dedicated space, an “herb garden”. To me they are best planted right with our crops, right in our flower beds and everywhere and anywhere in margins and edges. Why? For a few reasons…
This doesn’t mean I am anti herb garden, I think that is a great idea as well, I just think doing that and more makes a ton of sense. Today we are going to look at 20 herbs, why I love them, what they do and how to grow them.
Join Me Today to Discuss…
Resources for today’s show…
Sponsors of the Day
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK (866-658-4465) and you might hear yourself on the air.
Join the MSB Today
Want Every Episode of TSP Ever Produced?
Remember in addition to discounts to over 40 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
When we rolled this out in Nov. last year it quickly sold out. The beans Nicole makes it with are hard to get and she only gets a few hundred pounds a year to work with. Nicole just got in 100 pounds last week and she is already down to only 73 pounds remaining. So if you missed out last time, or if your stash is gone get some more while you can.
This coffee is expensive, and Nicole won’t apologize for it. This coffee is going to be the coffee you spoil yourself and very lucky friends with. The process is complicated, it has to be done just right to make it work and give you all it promises. So it is expensive but it is also worth it. And right now Nicole only has 73 pounds available, so it is sure to sell out fast once again.
I really love Holler Roast Coffee, well, come on guys I really love coffee period. I started talking to Nicole last year about developing something truly special. First I wanted a blonde to a medium roast. Yea everyone wants a deep black roast, but with the right beans a subtle blonde roast lets you actually taste the character of the beans. To find the coffee’s sense of place, known as the terroir.
That led us to the next challenge, what place to capture the sense of? Using her knowledge Nicole tracked down 6 candidates for this signature blend. Some of the worthy candidates came from Tanzania, Bali and Rawanda, they were all good but in the end Sumatra won the day. It didn’t surprise me that Sumatran beans won the day.
Coffees in Sumatra are traditionally processed using a method called Giling Basah, or wet-hulling, which results in a coffee that leaves the farm with a much higher moisture content than other methods used more popularly worldwide. This allows the coffee to develop unique herbaceous characteristics you just don’t get in other coffees. Typically Sumatran beans are roasted to a very dark level, in an attempt to enhance these flavors. But going with a blonde roast brings out spicy notes, essences of cinnamon. Additionally the unique natural sweetness remains along with subtle earthy tones.
Okay I admit it, I know way more about coffee than I should!
Sumatran coffees also tend to have naturally low acidity compared to other beans, this allows those earthy and herbaceous tones to really shine. You also get some sweet cedar tones and with a light roast a light coco and black cherry back finish.
So now we had the perfect bean, the perfect roast, something truly unique but we were not yet done. We wanted to take my signature roast over the top, to make it something you just could not get anywhere else other than Holler Roast. So we went to bourbon, yea good old bourbon. Now hold the phone folks, this isn’t bourbon flavored coffee, though some of that character does come though. It is bourbon cooled.
You see some time ago Nicole sent me a bag of her classic Holler Roast with one thing different, the beans were “vodka cooled”. It was a pretty amazing difference. The speed at which coffee beans cool impacts the sweet notes in the drinking experience, with a faster cooling cycle resulting in more natural notes of caramel and vanilla. Some street roasters in Vietnam use vodka as part of their roasting cycle.
So when I realized how awesome this process was I sent an email to Nicole with subject line, “6 Words” and the body of the email simply said, “Blonde Roast Bourbon Cooled – Jack’s Blend”. That is where this whole thing started! Yea we reverse engineered it. What was the perfect bean to roast medium and cool with bourbon, try this stuff and I think you will find we nailed it.
To get yours before it is gone, check out Jack’s Blonde Bourbon Cooled Sumatran at Holler Roast right away.
Every day I bring you an item on Amazon that I personally use or has been purchased by many members of the audience and I have researched enough to recommend.
Today’s TSP Amazon Item of the day is the Otium Bluetooth FM Transmitter. I was turned onto this product by a listener and knew at once I needed one for my old F350. About 2.5 years ago we got our Toyota 4Runner. It was the first tech heavy vehicle I have ever owned.
I really love being able to play my iphone music and podcasts in it, to make phone calls hands free and hear them over the speakers, etc. I have been trying to talk myself into getting a new stereo for my truck with features like that.
I just can’t justify it! My old beast is a long ago paid for 2005 F350. Not only is it an 05 but it was even when new a bare bones work truck. I paid cash for it in 2011 and it has been a good partner. I just don’t drive it that much any more, so I wanted the cool features and access to my music but couldn’t justify the expense.
I did have a FM Modulator in it for a while that allowed me to play music but it wasn’t really that good of a sound quality. What I had been doing is taking my Bose Speaker with me, but I don’t really like having a 300 dollar speaker sitting in my truck when I am in the store or what have you.
Coming in at only 20 bucks, when I first reviewed it, I almost wrote this thing off but the guy that wrote in about it was raving about it so I gave it a shot. Man this thing is slick. First you pick an open unused frequency on the FM dial and set it to that. You pair your phone to it and that is that. And today it is an even better deal as the price has dropped to only 16 bucks!
Better yet they just upgraded this unit and didn’t even raise the price. After two years the old one in Big Red was getting hard to read the screen so I got one of these as an upgrade. It is everything the older model was an more. Poor Big Red is never getting that shinny new stereo she wants.
With this adapter you can make calls, listen to music or podcasts, etc. One really great thing is it also has a USB port so you can charge your phone and you don’t loose the outlet for that purpose. It also takes an SD card if you want to put music or audio files on it that way.
Another great feature is that it has an aux port, so you can directly connect a non bluetooth device or not use bluetooth on your phone to conserve battery life, or simply because you don’t want to use it for any reason. And the new model even has a USB input so you can use a thumb drive with audio files on it if you want to. On top of it the number of USB charging ports has been increased from one to two. Otium, took upgrading this device seriously.
Most newer vehicles now come with these features built in but if you have an older vehicle this little gadget will give it a hell of an upgrade for only 16 bucks. So check out the Otium Bluetooth FM Transmitter if you have an outdated sound system.
Remember you can always find all of our reviews at TspAz.com
P.S. – My only word of caution is make sure you have some “empty space” on your FM dial based on where you live. Here in Dallas I have 107.7 and 105.1 that are actually empty with minimal bleed over. I have put presets for these two stations on my radio so I can swap if one starts picking up too much static or bleed. I live in a huge market and the dial is really crowded, in many areas the dial is full of empty channels.
Today on The Survival Podcast I take your questions on business, the census, guns, monetizing skills, grapes, health, gardening, mulching, plant propagation, CBD oils, generators and more.
Make sure if you submit content for a feedback show that you put something like “comment for jack”, “question for jack” or “article for jack” in the subject line to assure proper identification for my screening process.
Please understand I receive several hundred emails a day and can’t get them all on the air.
I also do put out a lot of information on Facebook from emails that I can’t fit on the program though so keep em coming.
Join Me Today As I Respond to Your Calls and Discuss…
Resources for today’s show…
Sponsors of the Day
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK (866-658-4465) and you might hear yourself on the air.
Join the MSB Today
Want Every Episode of TSP Ever Produced?
Remember in addition to discounts to over 40 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
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