Garden Delight
July 9th, 2008 by KimA friend shared this delightfully simple casserole recipe to help me use the armloads of zucchini we are getting from the garden. Enjoy!
Zucchini Casserole
Layer the following in a greased 9 x 13 pan in given order:
Zucchini (and yellow squash, if desired), cubed to fill bottom of pan
1 lb. raw hamburger, crumbled over zucchini
Grated cheddar cheese
1 can cream of mushroom soup combined with
1 sm. can tomato sauce and spread over top
Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 1 1/2 hours.
We like to spoon this over rice.
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Food Storage Life Spans
July 9th, 2008 by KimHow long will it last on my shelf? This is probably the most popular question in food storage, and the answer is essential to ensure a nutritious, tasty product when it’s time to use it. Temperature and oxygen have the greatest effect on food storage shelf-life. If your foods are stored in airtight containers (e.g., #10 cans, food storage buckets with oxygen packets, etc.) in a cool area of your home (70 degrees is the standard), their shelf-life will be extended considerably. So, yes, you should probably throw out that wheat that’s been in the garage for years. :) This storage life information, summarized from the Walton Feed website, has been extremely helpful to me so I wanted to pass it on. All of the storage times are based on the items being stored in #10 cans that are nitrogen-treated or with oxygen packs in other containers, in a temperature controlled area.
Hard Grains (red or white wheat, corn, buckwheat, etc.): 15-20 years in the environment mentioned above, considerably longer if you are able to keep them cooler.
Dry Beans: 8-10 years
Dehydrated Vegetables: 8-10 years
Dehydrated Dairy Products: 5-10 years (rotate Morning Moo milk by 5 years, as it is whey-based)
Flours: 5 years if stored without oxygen in a cool location, but don’t try to store longer than 1 year if it is unprotected. This includes baking mixes. However, if these items are stored in your freezer they will last much longer.
Pasta: 10-15 years if oxygen is removed and it is kept cool and dry.
Honey: Honey, Salt and Sugar should keep indefinitely if stored free of moisture.
Brown & White Rice: Brown rice will keep about 6 months in average conditions. If it is sealed in food storage containers without oxygen it will last 1-2 years and up to 4 years if kept really cold (like vacuum-sealed and stored in your refrigerator or freezer). White rice is much less nutritious but will store 8-10 years if properly packaged and stored.
Yeast: Store in its original foil packaging in your freezer for the longest storage life–5+ years.
I hope this information helps your family to rotate your dry food storage in a timely way. For more details, you can click here and scroll down.
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June 28th, 2008 by KimPosted in Home Storage & Preparedness Tips || No Comments
Follow-up on Cooperative Wheat Purchase
June 15th, 2008 by KimI recently received prices back on our white wheat in 45 lb. buckets. With the increased cost of the wheat and the insane freight charges, I have decided not to make this purchase. At present the savings would not warrant the hassle for all of us because 45 lb. buckets of hard white wheat from Lehi Mill are available at Costco in St. George, Utah for $26.99 each. At last report, Costco had 700 of these buckets available. With prices ranging up to $43 per bucket, this is by far the least expensive price locally at present.
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Spice of Life
June 8th, 2008 by KimIf we’re going to actually eat our food storage items, it’s a good idea to store some seasonings to make them more palatable. Alison’s Pantry offers a large selection of spices and seasoning blends that can spruce up your pantry items. Here are a few that our family has tried and enjoyed:
Tuna Salad Seasoning–This is a blend of spices that transforms a tuna sandwich into tuna salad even if you don’t have celery or onion on hand.
Chili Seasoning Mix–a not-too-spicy blend that will perk up all those dried beans you are storing, and turn them into a meal.
Mom’s Meatloaf Seasoning–this is a seasoning blend that takes the guesswork out of flavoring your meatloaf. If you are storing canned ground beef or dehydrated beef crumbles, this seasoning would be a good one to store. Click on the link and check out the great recipes on the AP site for this one.
Tasty Tomato Herb Dip–don’t wait until an emergency to enjoy this one! This seasoning blend can be combined with sour cream and mayonnaise to make an easy dip for vegetables or crackers. Add in fresh chopped roma tomatoes and crumbled bacon for a real treat.
And my favorites, Alison’s Pantry Fruity Flavored Powdered Flavorings–these come in Sweet Vanilla, Strawberry and Lemon and can be added to anything from whipped cream to cake mixes and frostings. I use the Sweet Vanilla Powder in my baking because it doesn’t include alcohol so all of that great vanilla flavor stays in the recipe rather than baking out. I also like to sprinkle the Vanilla Powder into our all-natural fruit smoothies (just frozen fruit, about 2 c. orange juice, and sometimes a tablespoon of dried milk, ground flax, or oatbran like the smoothie stores add) to create an “orange julius” flavor. It’s great in oatmeal as well. Keeping these powdered flavorings on hand gives you options. I love that I can whip up frosting and it doesn’t have to just be vanilla!
Alison’s Pantry offers the seasoning blends in plastic containers that are large enough to divide and share with a friend. In fact you can split them up into several small shakers and package them for a unique gift for bridal showers or Christmas. The vanilla and fruit-flavored powders are in sizes you’ll want to keep for yourself, but buy them in the multi-packs because it’s not only a little bit cheaper, but you’ll likely start talking about them and your friends and family will want to sample yours. 
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Food storage for those who hate to cook
June 8th, 2008 by KimOne turn-off to food storage for some is the assumed need to possess extensive cooking skills. Although there is some truth to needing to know how to prepare beans and other dry goods from scratch and learning simple recipes to incorporate food storage items into your menus, there are other super simple options for those who feel like fish out of water in the kitchen. I was recently introduced to Daily Bread ready-made meals. These are individually packaged meals that only require water. The representatives who showed me the product, Benson and Shane, left me a sample of Daily Bread’s Chicken Teriyakki with Rice. It was of course very easy to prepare, and was surprisingly good. All of my kids gobbled up their samples and wanted to know when I would be ordering more. The company touts these packaged meals as “efficient, compact and easy to store, ready in 10 minutes, and great tasting.” The representatives also told me that their products have a 25 year shelf life. So, for a person who doesn’t want to store a bunch of #10 cans of products they don’t know how to use, this may be an ideal option for long-term food storage.
We enjoy cooking and we cycle all of our food storage items, so stocking a large amount of these ready-made meals as our main source of food storage isn’t the best option for my family. (Plus, I know my kids will want to eat them for lunch all summer.) However, they are so handy and tasty that I think they will be a great addition to our 72-hour kits. They are very light weight and would be perfect for backpackers as well. And, we thought they would be handy for camping. Daily Bread also sells dry white and chocolate milk packets, as well as 72 hour kits and portable burners for cooking. If you are interested in learning more about products and pricing, you can call Benson at 801-941-1645 or Shane at 801-791-0211. You can click on one of the Daily Bread links above to connect to their site and request a free sample as well.
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Whole Wheat Brownies…YUM!
June 8th, 2008 by KimA friend gave me this recipe and I just made a few alterations to make it lower fat (so I could justify making it more chocolatey with the mini-chips. :)) As a brownie-lover, I was so surprised how delicious these are with no white flour. All of my testers thought the same. Enjoy!
WHOLE WHEAT BROWNIES
2 C. whole wheat flour (best if from white wheat)
2 C. sugar
3/4 C. cocoa powder
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1 C. water
1 C. oil (I use 1/2 c. applesauce and 1/2 c. oil)
1 tsp. vanilla
Optional: Add about 1 C. each of chopped walnuts and mini chocolate chips
Mix all ingredients together and pour into greased 9 x 13 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes. Let set for 10 minutes before cutting.
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Rice Leftover Ideas
May 17th, 2008 by KimIt used to be that white rice was so cheap, if you had a cup left over after a meal, it probably went in the garbage. With prices skyrocketing and some supplies limited, it makes sense now to stretch this pantry staple as far as it will go. Here are a few simple ideas to avoid waste.
1. Cover leftover rice with milk and heat through. Serve with sugar, nutmeg and cinnamon for breakfast or a treat. I have tried this with brown rice…but some healthier choices just can’t be converted. I didn’t like it.
2. Make an easy Chicken and Rice Soup with broth, veggies, chicken (canned if you don’t have any other) and stir in the rice at the end to heat through.
3. If I have brown rice left over, I make fried rice the next night. Or, we like Hawaiian Haystacks–rice with homemade chicken sauce over the top and then layered with your choice of toppings (cheese, celery, slivered almonds, pineapple tidbits, chow mein noodles, etc.)
It’s fun and frugal to share ideas on how to stretch our food dollars. I would love to hear your ideas too. Please post!
In response to a request, I am including directions for my easy Chicken Sauce for Hawaiian Haystacks. I’m sorry for the delay on responding. This is one of those recipes that varies a little each time. I start with a roux–melt about a cube of butter, and then whisk in flour to make a paste. Then slowly add chicken broth and one can evaporated milk to make a creamy sauce. I add the milk first and then add the broth until the sauce is the desired thickness. Then I just season the sauce to taste with cracked pepper, a little rosemary, maybe a little garlic powder, and salt. Finally, I stir in 1-2 cups cooked, shredded chicken. You can cheat and make this recipe with a can of cream of chicken soup thinned with milk, but we like the above version much better.
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A Way to Rotate Your Powdered Milk
May 17th, 2008 by KimIf you’ve followed the amounts on most food storage calculators, you are likely dutifully storing a lot of powdered milk. And, possibly wondering what to do with it (because, we really don’t want to drink it unless we absolutely have to, do we?) I try to use my powdered milk in bread recipes to rotate it in my storage. Below is a recipe for Indian Fry Bread that uses a cup of powdered milk per batch (and you don’t have to reconstitute it). For drinking, I prefer the taste of Morning Moo milk over the standard powdered milk, and this brand is available in chocolate and strawberry flavors as well. Through perusing the internet, though, I have read that Country Cream brand dry milk is the best tasting…the closest to the real thing. I am trying to order a sample so I can try it. Since we don’t want to store what we won’t use (or don’t know how to use), it makes sense to divide our storage between dry milk for drinking and for baking.
Indian Fry Bread
4 C. flour
3 heaping tsp. baking powder
1 1/2 C. warm water
1/2 tsp. salt
1 C. powdered milk
Mix all ingredients. Roll or form into flat rounds with your hands and fry in small amount of oil. Serve with chili and cheese, or with butter and honey.
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You can’t eat it, but…
April 24th, 2008 by KimYou can’t count laundry soap as food storage but I think you can call it a storage essential. My sister-in-law, Kim, has been experimenting with homemade laundry detergent recipes from the web and has posted her success on her blog. I love hearing someone else’s trial and error story before I endeavor to try something new, so I think her post is great. It provides the recipe for the detergent that she has liked best, and the step-by-step process she took to create and use it. Homemade detergent is certainly cheaper than buying store brands, and it can be helpful if you have family members with sensitive skin. I can’t wait to try it myself!
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