Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Grocery Deas 1/30

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Smiths is continuing their Buy 10 promo this week.  Stock up on what your family will eat and what your budget will allow.  

 

WHAT A DEAL PROMO...BUY 10 ITEMS GET $5 OFF INSTANTLY AT REGISTER...PRICES SHOWN BEFORE/AFTER DISCOUNT

  • AMERICAN BEAUTY PASTA $1.29/.79
  • BUSHS BEST BEANS .99/.49
  • HUNTS CANNED TOMATOES .99/.49
  • KRAFT EASY MAC .99/.49
  • PEPPERIDGE FARMS GOLDFISH $1.49/.99
  • ROTEL TOMATOES .99/.49
There are many more deals if you want to use coupons....click HERE to view the entire Grocery Smarts list for Smiths/Kroger.  All prices good in Utah.      

Monday, January 28, 2013

Prepare Today Homemade- Potato Soup

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I love the convenience of dehydrated foods but sometimes the results have a lot to be desired.  Since moving to a new home last week I have not been to the store for our regular produce items. My challenge has been relying on my dehydrated foods to keep us going.  

Usually when I make a dinner from dehydrated foods we don't always agree on the results.  But I don't give up easily when it comes to food storage recipes, and I have been going through Leslie Probert's "Food Storage In A Nutshell" to try and find dinners that we all enjoy.

It was snowy outside today and I was craving warm, comforting soup.  The recipe for Potato Soup had simple ingredients and sounded really yummy, so I gave it a try.

When cooking with dehydrated foods I think that the outcome of your meal depends on the quality of the product you start with.  I really like Honeyville Grains dehydrated and freeze-dried foods for their top quality in taste and appearance.  

The dehydrated celery cooked up soft and added the right amount of flavor to this soup. I have dehydrated my own celery and I couldn't ever seem to get it to reconstitute, it always had a bite to it.  
I was equally impressed with the cubed potatoes.  They cooked up soft and looked just like a cubed potato.  I don't know why I am always so shocked when dehydrated food cooks up like it's fresh counterpart. 

    The other ingredients were shelf-stable and all in my pantry.  I used Shirley J's Whisk Bliss instead of the white sauce mix in the recipe.  

 This soup is as easy as boiling all of the dehydrated food together and adding in the warmed whisk bliss.

 
 Potato Soup 
(adapted from Food Storage In A Nutshell)
7 C water
3 C dehydrated potato cubes
6 T dehydrated onions
2 T dehydrated celery
2 t Shirley J chicken bullion (or 3 t regular bullion)
2 bay leaves
Combine all ingredients above in a large pot.  Bring to a boil.  Reduce heat, cover and boil 10-15 minutes.  

Meanwhile bring to a boil 6 C water and whisk in 1 1/2 C  Shirley J Whisk Bliss*. Stir for 5 minutes. 

Turn off heat to vegetable mixture, remove the bay leaves, mash potatoes slightly and add in the Shirley J Whisk Bliss.  
Add:
1 T dried parsley
salt and pepper to taste
Stir and heat until warm if necessary.

Makes 8-9 servings

*For a white sauce mix recipe click HERE

This soup had flavor and was thick enough to feel like a complete meal.  I made rolls out of the Honeyville Scone mix to round out our dinner.  Everyone in my family ate it up and even had seconds.  I was so excited that this didn't taste like food from a can.
    

Saturday, January 26, 2013

Every Needful Thing Newsletter

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 One of my favorite ways to cook without power is with the Global Sun Oven.  I have blogged about the Sun Oven many times (click HERE to see those posts)  I also receive the Global Sun Oven newsletter every month called "Every Needful Thing".  It is chock full of preparedness information and is very well written.  I was shocked when I opened the January 2013 newsletter to find one of my posts highlighted.  I was so excited!!  At Christmastime I wrote a post about cooking our ham in my sun oven and they picked it to add to their link list.  


Click HERE to view the list of all the Every Needful Thing newsletters and also take a minute to sign up for their email list. You only get one email a month with a link to the newsletter.  I highly recommend getting on that list.  They are also in the process of hiring a new editor for the newsletter. If you are interested there is more information through the link above.  

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Grocery Deals 1/23-1-29

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Smiths has some great deals this week!  I will link you to the full list so you can find what your family needs.  I will highlight only a few of the best deals.


3-Day Sale
  • KROGER BUTTER $1.67
  • SMITHS DOZEN EGGS .99 LIMIT 4
  • 5LB TEXAS STAR GRAPEFRUIT $2.69
WHAT A DEAL PROMO...BUY 10 ITEMS GET $5 OFF INSTANTLY AT REGISTER...PRICES SHOWN BEFORE/AFTER DISCOUNT
  • AMERICAN BEAUTY PASTA $1.29/.79
  • BUSHS BEST BEANS .99/.49
  • HUNTS CANNED TOMATOES .99/.49
  • KRAFT EASY MAC .99/.49
  • PEPPERIDGE FARMS GOLDFISH $1.49/.99
  • ROTEL TOMATOES .99/.49
There are many more deals if you want to use coupons....click HERE to view the entire Grocery Smarts list for Smiths/Kroger.  All prices good in Utah.      

Friday, January 18, 2013

I'm Still Alive....

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If you didn't know, I moved this past week, in the middle of winter.  And we didn't just move in the middle of winter.....we moved in the middle of the biggest storm of the winter...

 ...AND we had to up and down this canyon!!! It was crazy and exhausting.  But we made it and I am trying to put our life back together :)  We just got internet so I can post again and I actually had time today to make bread.  I haven't made bread since August because we were showing our old house, but I have my bosch back out and I am back to making bread!!

We are trying not to eat the whole loaf at once!! I used the recipe in this link.

There was one thing that I wish I had done before we moved that used my food storage.  I wish I had made more meals in a bag and had them ready to go at our new house.  (meals in a bag are complete meals with all ingredients stored together in one bag)  I do have meals in a bag made, but they were all packed in a box somewhere in my new storage room.  If I had thought ahead I could have had them out so we could have had warm dinners in the new house.   

Hopefully I will be back to regular posting next week. Moving is so time consuming and exhausting, but we love our new home and town so much that it is all worth it!!

Monday, January 7, 2013

Prepare Today Homemade- Quinoa "Mac" & Cheese

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I was bored one afternoon and I only had 3 people (versus the 7 I usually feed every night) to feed for dinner and I didn't want to cook one of our usual meals.  I found Quinoa Mac & Cheese on pinterest and it sounded way to good to pass up. I switched a few things up and with my 4 year old helper, we made it for dinner, and it was really good.  It smelled so good as we put it in the oven. 

I cooked the quinoa in my rice cooker while I assembled the rest of the ingredients and sauteed the veggies. Use a 2:1 ratio when cooking quinoa 2 C water to 1 C quinoa.  I cooked 2 cups of quinoa and 4 cups of chicken broth (for flavor).  Make sure to rinse your quinoa really well in a fine strainer berfore cooking, or you will have a very bitter taste to your meal.  We know from experience.  :)

I had quite a few veggies left over from a previous dinner.  I am sure all of your kids eat all the veggies that you cook, but we had leftovers ;)  I chopped them up super fine so no one would be picking them out of the dinner.   I sauteed them in a teeny, tiny little amount of olive oil before adding them to the other ingredients.  

  The spices for this dish were all in my cupboard and hopefully you have them on hand as well.

Here is my helper.  She begs every night to help with dinner.  It is hard sometimes to slow down and let her help, but she is so thrilled when I do let her cook.

  I used powdered eggs to bind everything together in this recipe.  I don't know what I used to do before I started using powdered eggs.  They are so handy to have on hand. 

After everything is combined, add a cheese topping and then...

We crushed some Ritz crackers for a topping, but you could use panko crumbs, bread crumbs, saltine crackers, or even corn flakes.  They make a yummy, crunchy topping on this casserole.

Quinoa "Mac" & Cheese
2 C quinoa, rinsed very well, and cooked (on the stove or rice cooker)
1 C finely chopped mixed veggies (leftover works great!!)
1 t olive oil
2 T powdered eggs + 4 T water
1 C milk
1 1/2 C cheese, plus more for the topping
1/2 t salt
sprinkle of pepper to taste
1/2 t garlic powder
1/2 t seasoning salt (I used McCormick's season all salt)
red pepper flakes to taste
1 1/2 C crushed crackers, bread crumbs, or corn flakes cereal

Preheat oven to 350°.  Cook quinoa on the stove top or rice cooker.  Meanwhile saute veggies in oil until warmed through but not brown.  Set aside.  In a bowl, combine the eggs, milk, salt, pepper, garlic powder, season salt, and red pepper flakes. Mix until combined.  Add in the veggies, quinoa, and cheese.  Stir and pour into a greased 13x9 pan. Sprinkle with cheese and then the crushed crackers.  Bake at 350° for 25-30 minutes.        

Make this a food storage meal:
  • use dehydrated or freeze dried veggies
  • use 1 C water + 3 T powdered milk for the 1 C of milk in the recipe
  • use freeze dried cheese in place of perishable cheese
  • cook in a Sun Oven or a Volcano stove with a Dutch oven

We loved this dinner and you actually couldn't even tell there were veggies in it.  Not one of my kids mentioned anything about veggies in their dinner, or picked anything out of it.      

Saturday, January 5, 2013

Buckets O Fun

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This is my life right now. Moving boxes and 50 some odd buckets carried to the garage to move next week.  I love my food storage but this was crazy.  The buckets are 3 rows deep in this picture.  My husband couldn't believe all this came out of our tiny little storage room.

We are slowly clearing out the storage room and it made me realize how bad my inventory system was..LOL!  I was finding #10 cans of food I forgot I had.  I am making a New Year's resolution to have a better tracking system for what I bring in and out of my food storage.  In my new home I will have a much bigger room and I will be able to visually see the food better.  This time next week the move will be all over and we will hopefully be back to a semi-normal schedule and I will have more enlightening posts :)

 

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Grocery Deals- Case Lot Time!!

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A few stores in Utah are having a case lot sale.  This is a great time to stock up on the items you use most for a great price.  Not all cases are a great deal, so I use the Grocery Smarts shopping list to make sure I get the best prices.  If you don't live in Utah, there is a link at the bottom of this post to view deals in your area.  Not all states have case lot sales, but there are great deals out there if you keep an eye on the sales. 

As my friend Lisa says: "A case is you can, and a can if you can't!"

 Click HERE to see the complete Grocery Smarts list for Smiths.

  • Hunt's Pasta sauce .88ea $10.56 a case
  • Diced green chilies .50ea $12.00 case


Click HERE to see the complete Grocery Smarts list for Harmons.

Click HERE to view lists for states other than Utah.
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