DEAR SUN SPOTS: Barker Mill Arms, located at 143 Mill St. in Auburn, is having a Holiday Craft and Rummage Sale on Saturday, Nov. 5 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. There will be a cookie buffet, white elephant table and a door prize. Parking will be “assistant directed” to available reserved parking spaces. — No name, Auburn

ANSWER: I’m going…is anyone else in Sun Spots Land going to join me? There are several craft fairs coming up nearly every Saturday in November and I’m really looking forward to making a big dent in my Christmas shopping. I’m sure there will be a treasure for me, too. And of course, I must sample the cookies!

DEAR SUN SPOTS: We recently endured a power outage of over nine hours — and we don’t have a generator. Although I didn’t open the refrigerator during this time without electricity, I was concerned about the integrity of its contents.

I threw out a day-old rotisserie chicken, eggs, mayonnaise and deli-sliced meats and cheeses. I kept vinegar-based items, such as pickles, relishes and salad dressings, as I felt vinegar is a preservative and those items would be safe to eat. None of the frozen items in the freezer seemed defrosted to any degree, so I kept all of them.

Please contact your food experts and print some guidelines regarding food safety following power outages, as I am sure there will be future power outage episodes like this, and we would like to be well-informed. Thank you for the great service you provide. — No name, Lewiston

ANSWER: To prepare yourself for the next outage, have an appliance thermometer on hand. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines (https://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety) state that foods should be thrown out if they have been in your refrigerator for 4 hours during a power outage. To avoid that, moved items to ice-filled coolers (frozen gel-packs) and keep them below 40 degrees.

The food that must be moved to the coolers or tossed include most dairy products (butter and hard cheeses, as well as processed cheeses are okay to keep), all meat and fish, produce that has been cut, all pre-packaged greens, eggs, and leftovers of any kind.

Mayonnaise can be kept at over 50 degrees for 10 hours, as can horseradish and tartar sauce. Opened canned fruit can be kept as well as opened fruit juice, but open vegetable juice needs to go.

You are right about condiments containing vinegar, but it’s no for oyster and fish sauce, creamy salad dressings, chopped garlic in oil and jarred pasta sauce.

Jam/jelly is fine to keep as is bread and the like.

Absolutely do not keep cooked or fresh pasta or cooked rice. Eating these could make you severely ill.

If you want these dos and don’ts in list form, go to https://www.foodsafety.gov/.

I have packed the refrigerator itself, as well as coolers as needed, with ice, snow and dry ice. If a big storm is predicted and you have room in your freezer, make some blocks of ice that will be at the ready, and have your coolers stored where they’re easy to get to.

You can safely refreeze (or cook) thawed frozen food that still contains ice crystals or is at 40 degrees or below.

May the (power) force stay with you this fall/winter.

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