January 27, 2012
Some have asked about the recipe program I use. I am currently using Master Cook v9. I truthfully do not know all the ins and outs of it. I would love to do all the planning and such in that program rather than in all the various programs I am currently using. I’m thinking of upgrading to v11 so I can get some support and learn how to do it all in one program. Until I have saved enough blow money to do that I’ll keep on the way I am doing it in Word, Excel and Master Cook, which is of course causing some redundancy.
So if you ask for an export of a recipe directly from MC I need to let you know this is one of the features that I can’t get to seem to work right, but I will work my way around that for you.
Anyway, on to the menus for week 2:
BREAKFAST OPPORTUNITIES: WEEK 2
Biscuits (leftover from week #1 Sunday’s dinner) with:
Leftover gravy (see dinner menu)
Sausage patties from the freezer or canned
Bacon, pre-cooked from fridge or canned
Eggs, fried or scrambled, from our chickens
Jelly/Jam/Honey/Molasses
Hot Cereals:
Rice, leftover from dinner’s week #1
Oatmeal packets, homemade
Farina, from food storage
Multigrain packets, homemade
Cold Cereal:
Raisin Bran, purchased with coupon
Rice Chex, store brand
Fruit:
Grapefruit, from bulk purchase
Mango, dried from food storage
Beverages:
Orange Juice, from frozen concentrate
Hot tea
Milk
Hot cocoa, from Master Mix
WEEK 2: LUNCH OPPORTUNITIES
Sandwiches:
Roast beef, from leftover smoked roast of week #1 dinners
PB&J
Toasted Cheese
BBQ Beef, from leftover bbq beef dinner in week #1
Salad ingredients:
Jarred spring mix
Tuna, from food storage
Roast Beef, from smoked beef from week #1
Pickled eggs, from food storage
Carrots
Onion
Salad dressings available:
Ranch, homemade
Italian, homemade
French, homemade
Soups:
Potato, after Tuesday
Chicken Noodle, after Thursday
Gumbo, after Saturday
Fruit:
Grapefruit
Banana
Fruit cups, bulk purchase
WEEK 2: DINNER MENU
Monday 1/16/2012
Chicken Pot Pie, homemade
Tea
Multi-grain dinner rolls, homemade
Gingerbread with whipped cream, made from Master Mix
Tuesday 1/17/2012
Potato soup, homemade
Crackers, bulk purchase
Milk
Gingerbread with whipped cream, leftover
Wednesday 1/18/2012
Sweet ‘n sour Pork, made from home canned pork loin or Master Mix
Egg Rolls, frozen, leftovers from previous week’s purchase
Chicken Fried Rice, use leftover rice and chicken from Monday’s meal
Steamed Rice, cook a jumbo batch
Tea
Peach Crumble, from food storage items
Thursday 1/19/2012
Chicken Noodle Soup-homemade
Peach Crumble, leftover
Tea
Crackers
Friday 1/20/2012
Roast beef Hash, from leftover roast that had been previously canned
Dinner Rolls, homemade
Tea
Brownies, from Master Mix
Corn, bulk purchased can
Saturday 1/21/2012
Gumbo, Zatarain’s Mix bought on sale, and frozen smoked sausage from food storage
Crackers, food storage, bulk purchase
Leftover desserts
Milk
Sunday 1/22/2012
Waffles, plain and fruited, from Master Mix
Milk
WEEK 2: SNACKS AVAILABLE
Salty:
Southern Trail Mix, leftover from the holidays
Chips leftover from week #1
Cheezits leftover from week #1
Sweet:
Gingerbread, after Monday
Peach Crumble, after Tuesday
Brownies, after Friday
Fruit:
Assorted dried fruits, home dried and bulk purchased
Grapefruit
Banana
Vegetables:
Carrot sticks
This week’s addition to food storage was the canning of the excess meat from the 10# of chicken leg quarters that I got for $.69 per pound. I canned the deboned meat as cooked, rather than raw pack. Again following the USDA guidelines. I then made chicken broth by boiling the bones with carrots, celery, onions, garlic, poultry seasoning and parsley. This in turn was canned for future meals.
I’m often asked for the Buttermilk Pancake and Waffle Mix recipe so I will include that one today.
BUTTERMILK PANCAKE AND WAFFLE MASTER MIX
Yield: 10 1/2 cups
2 cups buttermilk, dried
8 cups flour, all-purpose
1/2 cup sugar
8 teaspoons baking powder
4 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons salt.
1. Whisk all the ingredients together in a large bowl.
2. Store in an airtight container in a cool dry place.
BUTTERMILK WAFFLES
Servings: 4
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Start to finish: 30 minutes
Notes: Make a double or more batch and cool on a rack. Layer them in a refrigerator container with wax paper, or cereal bags in the container. Store in refrigerator or freezer. Heat as needed.
Serving Ideas: Serve with butter, a variety of syrups, bacon, ham or sausage.
Categories: Breakfast Foods
1. Preheat waffle baker.
2. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients except egg whites until just blended.
3. In medium bowl beat egg whites until stiff.
4. fold into mixture. Bake per baker instructions.
6. Variations:
Nut or Berry Waffles
7. Add 1/2 c chopped nuts, or dried chopped fruit to batter.
8. Meat add ins
9. add 1/2 c diced ham, bacon, sausage etc to batter.
BUTTERMILK PANCAKES
Servings: 10
1 whole egg, beaten
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 cup water
1 1/2 cups Buttermilk Pancake and Waffle Master Mix
1. In medium bowl whisk egg and oil together and then whisk in water.
2. Stir in mix. Add fruit, nuts, cooked meats if desired. Add extra water if thinner batter if desired.
3. Let set for 5 minutes.
4. Preheat a griddle , that is lightly oiled.
5. Pour 1/3 c batter on the griddle and cook each side until browned on each side, (the edges will be slightly dry and bubbles will form) Use a spatula to turn them over.
6. Repeat with remaining batter.
7. VARIATIONS:
8. Stir in 1/4-1/2 c chopped fruit, nuts, or browned breakfast meats.
So there is week 2 for your viewing pleasure.
Jan who knows doing the Master Mixes at first take a lot of ingredients, but the payoff in the long term is great in OK
Showing posts with label food storage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food storage. Show all posts
Friday, January 27, 2012
Sunday, April 17, 2011
THE THEORY OF ANYWAY
April 17, 2011
I’m currently reading a book called “Independence Days: A Guide to Sustainable Food Storage and Preservation” by Sharon Astyk. I’ve actually just started it, I saw a review of it online and decided it might be worth a read to gear me toward the food storage I hope to achieve.
Early in the book she speaks of the “Theory of Anyway.” From what I have read it is basically the reason we should be putting food by, become debt free, and be good stewards in life in and other aspects of our daily life in general. Simply because we should.
Not due to some coming crisis, a fear of the government controlling food, the end of the world or anything else, just simply because we should. I like this thought. It rings so much of the truth above and beyond anything else I have read.
So many books, articles, late night radio talk shows, disaster movies harp at the “impending doom” and how we must be “prepared” for it. The plain and simple truth is the things these media sources tell us to do we should do anyway.
The book got me to thinking, about all the times before I’ve needed food storage and was glad I had it. Over the years my husband has only been unemployed twice and both times we had ample food stored it was not a problem. We simply ate out of the food storage and we ate well.
A third time was when my father-in-law was in his last days. During that time we had up to 30 people staying at my home for one to three weeks. Due to food storage, my master mixes on hand and the co-operation of those involved we all ate 3 square meals a day and did so without having to spend a lot of time in the hospital cafeteria.
I had planned for none of those events to occur in my life, yet they did. Putting food by, just because I should anyway, showed to be a true blessing each time. This is why I need to build my depleted food storage back up now. I do not think the world will end in May as some say, or on 12/12/12 as others say. I do see food prices escalating in the stores and that may or may not be a meter of things to come. None of these are the reason for preparation. The reason is because I should “anyway.”
Not managing our finances as well as we should have put us in a bit of a bind during this most recent bout of unemployment. If we’d previously managed our finances as we should my husband would still be “retired”. I am striving to get him back to retirement. I miss him being home.
No matter what stage of your life you are in I suggest you cease using credit immediately and become debt free, not because it is the fad thing to do, or because major inflation is headed this way. But because it is something you should do “anyway.” As I have often said before we are following the Dave Ramsey “Total Money Makeover” book plan and it is working well for us. I know of hundreds of others it has done well for too. But you need to do it for yourself not because I said, but because you need to do so “anyway.”
Helping others is another thing we should do “anyway” not just because a disaster hit, but because it is who we should be as a nation. Oh it feels good to give to the Japanese Earthquake Fund or whatever the latest disaster is, but how about the elderly person down the road who has trouble just getting a ride to the grocery store? Or the newly widowed man who has never cooked a day in his life and now has no one to cook for him.
You don’t need to do something huge to brighten their day, sometimes just stopping by to say hello is all they need. Maybe the neighbor’s child is having a horrible time with math and you are good at it. Visit the parent around homework time and drop small “hints” about the easy way to do that math problem. Charity comes in all forms and it is something you should do anyway, not just when a disaster hits.
Back to the book Independence Days, the author touches on much deeper issues as she quotes her friend who developed the “Theory of Anyway,” Pat Meadows. Me I like to think that by simply bringing it up and adding it to my blog it will perhaps get a few more people thinking about the things they should do “anyway” without me pushing any political buttons. Because after all I do not agree with all of Ms. Astyk’s political statements, but I do believe in what we should be doing anyway.
Jan who is trying to read at least one non-fiction a week in OK
I’m currently reading a book called “Independence Days: A Guide to Sustainable Food Storage and Preservation” by Sharon Astyk. I’ve actually just started it, I saw a review of it online and decided it might be worth a read to gear me toward the food storage I hope to achieve.
Early in the book she speaks of the “Theory of Anyway.” From what I have read it is basically the reason we should be putting food by, become debt free, and be good stewards in life in and other aspects of our daily life in general. Simply because we should.
Not due to some coming crisis, a fear of the government controlling food, the end of the world or anything else, just simply because we should. I like this thought. It rings so much of the truth above and beyond anything else I have read.
So many books, articles, late night radio talk shows, disaster movies harp at the “impending doom” and how we must be “prepared” for it. The plain and simple truth is the things these media sources tell us to do we should do anyway.
The book got me to thinking, about all the times before I’ve needed food storage and was glad I had it. Over the years my husband has only been unemployed twice and both times we had ample food stored it was not a problem. We simply ate out of the food storage and we ate well.
A third time was when my father-in-law was in his last days. During that time we had up to 30 people staying at my home for one to three weeks. Due to food storage, my master mixes on hand and the co-operation of those involved we all ate 3 square meals a day and did so without having to spend a lot of time in the hospital cafeteria.
I had planned for none of those events to occur in my life, yet they did. Putting food by, just because I should anyway, showed to be a true blessing each time. This is why I need to build my depleted food storage back up now. I do not think the world will end in May as some say, or on 12/12/12 as others say. I do see food prices escalating in the stores and that may or may not be a meter of things to come. None of these are the reason for preparation. The reason is because I should “anyway.”
Not managing our finances as well as we should have put us in a bit of a bind during this most recent bout of unemployment. If we’d previously managed our finances as we should my husband would still be “retired”. I am striving to get him back to retirement. I miss him being home.
No matter what stage of your life you are in I suggest you cease using credit immediately and become debt free, not because it is the fad thing to do, or because major inflation is headed this way. But because it is something you should do “anyway.” As I have often said before we are following the Dave Ramsey “Total Money Makeover” book plan and it is working well for us. I know of hundreds of others it has done well for too. But you need to do it for yourself not because I said, but because you need to do so “anyway.”
Helping others is another thing we should do “anyway” not just because a disaster hit, but because it is who we should be as a nation. Oh it feels good to give to the Japanese Earthquake Fund or whatever the latest disaster is, but how about the elderly person down the road who has trouble just getting a ride to the grocery store? Or the newly widowed man who has never cooked a day in his life and now has no one to cook for him.
You don’t need to do something huge to brighten their day, sometimes just stopping by to say hello is all they need. Maybe the neighbor’s child is having a horrible time with math and you are good at it. Visit the parent around homework time and drop small “hints” about the easy way to do that math problem. Charity comes in all forms and it is something you should do anyway, not just when a disaster hits.
Back to the book Independence Days, the author touches on much deeper issues as she quotes her friend who developed the “Theory of Anyway,” Pat Meadows. Me I like to think that by simply bringing it up and adding it to my blog it will perhaps get a few more people thinking about the things they should do “anyway” without me pushing any political buttons. Because after all I do not agree with all of Ms. Astyk’s political statements, but I do believe in what we should be doing anyway.
Jan who is trying to read at least one non-fiction a week in OK
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
WORKING ON THE FOOD BUDGET
December 22, 2010
I’ve previously posted about how I am on the Dave_Ramsey_Debt_Beaters@yahoogroups.com email list. Recently a discussion was brought up by Ashley that she would like to try working her food budget and meals for the year, while laying in a year’s supply of non-perishables based entirely on loss leaders.
I asked if she would like a partner in this challenge. She thought it a great idea not only because things go better if you have a partner, but because we live on the opposite sides of the US and each has a family of 3 to feed. While living in two different areas with different stores to deal with and different economic basis to work with in our areas.
We have agreed to write about our journey through 2011 in building our one year’s worth of food storage by purchasing loss leaders as they become available, while maintaining a very, very strict budget.
Ashley posted her first blog entry this morning, with her challenges to herself at: http://dateam365.blogspot.com/
This, of course, is my first entry on this challenge. With the cost of groceries going up the $1 a day may be a mite stringent for us, but I am definitely going to do all I can to try and meet her challenge.
The first thing to do, as Ashley pointed out, is to educate yourself. I too am reading various blogs by people who have done this. I’m also checking online information for all types of good basic information to aid me in the challenge.
My first stop on the information train was: http://frugalliving.about.com/od/bargainshopping/tp/Best_Time_To_Buy_Everything.htm
This website lists month by month what items are normally on sale, not just food, but various things. Of course for the task at hand the food items are what I am most interested in. Knowing ahead of time what “loss leaders” will be coming can be a real help in planning the menu.
Meeting the challenge at $1 a day with two meat and potato men in my household is going to be a HUGE challenge. I can get them to eat meatless occasionally, but not all the time. My husband, is NOT a huge fan of vegetables.
Doing so healthily is another challenge, especially when you include my son’s allergies to deal with and our true love of food.
So the first menu planning basic step for me was figuring out the entrées and dealing with them while also maintaining my busy schedule as a merchandiser and mystery shopper. All too often it is too tempting to eat out.
This means not only do I need to plan my meals on the $1 a day budget, but I need to plan on refilling my freezer with homemade “convenience” meals. Knowing we have foods in the freezer we could quickly thaw and eat will eliminate the temptation to stop and grab a calorie laden fast food item or six.
So following Ashley’s theme here is what I want to accomplish this next year:
1. Bring our food budget down to as low as it can possibly go.
2. Lay in one year’s supply of non-perishable food
3. Make up ALL of my Master Mixes, this in itself is a HUGE challenge.
4. Fill the freezer with homemade “convenience” foods
5. Raise a large organic garden and go to year round gardening.
Going back to the entrées listings. I started out trying to figure out an exact order of what types of entrees I’d serve and in what order for a month alternating meatless meals and leftovers in as often as I thought I could get away with it. That became hugely complicated and failed miserably.
So then I tried to do it for every two weeks, same results, I wasn’t getting the rotation I wanted. Plus when you do a very set in stone menu plan it does not allow for spontaneity and this family doesn’t do well with that. We want the foods we want when we want them.
So I finally decided on the following seven categories:
1. Beef
2. Chicken
3. Pork
4. Variety meats (hot dogs, smoked sausage etc)
5. Meatless
6. Leftovers
7. Fish
Gee look at that seven days worth of entrées with one meatless and one leftovers day built in simple, simple.
So I now can plan a week’s worth of meals with those items as the main ingredients, prepare what I can ahead of time and we can eat them in the order we want each week. One week must be completed BEFORE we start the rotation for the next week. That way if we score a free meal out with the mystery shopping (read free meals—great for the budget) then I still have a meal in the roatation to eat before moving on to the next rotation.
So then I started making a list of the various family favorites for each of those seven. An example of this is below.
Meatless:
1. Biscuits and gravy
2. Vegetable soups (I have a bunch of recipes for these)
3. Pancake suppers
4. Salad suppers
5. Macaroni and cheese
6. Cheese and/or veggie pizzas
7. Bean meals
My list included a lot more than this, but you get the idea. I did this for each of the seven categories. Guess what I came up with a year’s worth of meals without duplication quite simply.
Using the same example of the meatless meals I can also prepare a lot of this ahead of time.
1. Biscuits and gravy
a. Make up biscuit Master Mix (recipe is listed in my search engine on the left) while flour is on sale this month. Then for a quick dinner I only need to add oil and water and bake.
b. Make up gravy butter balls ahead of time and freeze. I’ll post this recipe when I do this.
2. If we do well in the garden the fresh produce will be used for this as it grows and the dried produce will be used when it is out of season.
3. Pancake suppers
a. Pancake Master Mix (recipe is listed in the search engine at the left as well), add oil, our home grown eggs and water as needed.
4. Salad suppers can be the green leafy type, or made with homemade pasta, or a combination of the two.
a. Make up pastas ahead of time
b. Homemade salad dressing Master Mixes (which will be added to the blog as time goes on)
5. Macaroni and Cheese
a. Homemade pasta
b. Freezer cheese sauce mix, recipe will be added at a later date
6. Cheese and/or veggie pizzas
a. Pizza dough Master Mix (recipe to be added later)
b. In season veggies from the garden, frozen or dried veggies from the garden off season
c. Loss leader cheese (April purchase according to link listed above) purchased and frozen.
7. Bean Meals
a. I have a bean cookbook, and there are numerous recipes for beans of all sorts on the web. Beans freeze tremendously well. So this is an item that will be cooked in bulk and frozen for quick meals as time goes on.
Add to these entrées loss leader fruits and vegetables, and keeping portions at a reasonable size should enable us to eat cheaply and healthy. Homemade breads will also add to the meals.
I’m now in the process of listing those various meal ideas on color coded 3X5 cards. Ie: pink for beef, white for chicken, green for meatless etc. This will allow me to mix and match menus each week without having to figure it out each week.
The 3 x 5 cards will also list the ingredients for that entrée so I can watch closely for the loss leaders for it. As I lay in a supply of the loss leaders I will then mark each one as I have it in inventory.
Having the menus all figured out in this manner will also let me see how much of what I need to lay in a supply of.
Can I do it on $1 a day like Ashley, in truth it seems pretty hard, but I’m going to do it as closely as I possibly can. Even if I spend slightly over that, I am definitely going to come out the financial winner on the grocery budget.
So will you join us to eat our way to a better state of health both physically and financially?
Jan who thinks the plan will work in OK
I’ve previously posted about how I am on the Dave_Ramsey_Debt_Beaters@yahoogroups.com email list. Recently a discussion was brought up by Ashley that she would like to try working her food budget and meals for the year, while laying in a year’s supply of non-perishables based entirely on loss leaders.
I asked if she would like a partner in this challenge. She thought it a great idea not only because things go better if you have a partner, but because we live on the opposite sides of the US and each has a family of 3 to feed. While living in two different areas with different stores to deal with and different economic basis to work with in our areas.
We have agreed to write about our journey through 2011 in building our one year’s worth of food storage by purchasing loss leaders as they become available, while maintaining a very, very strict budget.
Ashley posted her first blog entry this morning, with her challenges to herself at: http://dateam365.blogspot.com/
This, of course, is my first entry on this challenge. With the cost of groceries going up the $1 a day may be a mite stringent for us, but I am definitely going to do all I can to try and meet her challenge.
The first thing to do, as Ashley pointed out, is to educate yourself. I too am reading various blogs by people who have done this. I’m also checking online information for all types of good basic information to aid me in the challenge.
My first stop on the information train was: http://frugalliving.about.com/od/bargainshopping/tp/Best_Time_To_Buy_Everything.htm
This website lists month by month what items are normally on sale, not just food, but various things. Of course for the task at hand the food items are what I am most interested in. Knowing ahead of time what “loss leaders” will be coming can be a real help in planning the menu.
Meeting the challenge at $1 a day with two meat and potato men in my household is going to be a HUGE challenge. I can get them to eat meatless occasionally, but not all the time. My husband, is NOT a huge fan of vegetables.
Doing so healthily is another challenge, especially when you include my son’s allergies to deal with and our true love of food.
So the first menu planning basic step for me was figuring out the entrées and dealing with them while also maintaining my busy schedule as a merchandiser and mystery shopper. All too often it is too tempting to eat out.
This means not only do I need to plan my meals on the $1 a day budget, but I need to plan on refilling my freezer with homemade “convenience” meals. Knowing we have foods in the freezer we could quickly thaw and eat will eliminate the temptation to stop and grab a calorie laden fast food item or six.
So following Ashley’s theme here is what I want to accomplish this next year:
1. Bring our food budget down to as low as it can possibly go.
2. Lay in one year’s supply of non-perishable food
3. Make up ALL of my Master Mixes, this in itself is a HUGE challenge.
4. Fill the freezer with homemade “convenience” foods
5. Raise a large organic garden and go to year round gardening.
Going back to the entrées listings. I started out trying to figure out an exact order of what types of entrees I’d serve and in what order for a month alternating meatless meals and leftovers in as often as I thought I could get away with it. That became hugely complicated and failed miserably.
So then I tried to do it for every two weeks, same results, I wasn’t getting the rotation I wanted. Plus when you do a very set in stone menu plan it does not allow for spontaneity and this family doesn’t do well with that. We want the foods we want when we want them.
So I finally decided on the following seven categories:
1. Beef
2. Chicken
3. Pork
4. Variety meats (hot dogs, smoked sausage etc)
5. Meatless
6. Leftovers
7. Fish
Gee look at that seven days worth of entrées with one meatless and one leftovers day built in simple, simple.
So I now can plan a week’s worth of meals with those items as the main ingredients, prepare what I can ahead of time and we can eat them in the order we want each week. One week must be completed BEFORE we start the rotation for the next week. That way if we score a free meal out with the mystery shopping (read free meals—great for the budget) then I still have a meal in the roatation to eat before moving on to the next rotation.
So then I started making a list of the various family favorites for each of those seven. An example of this is below.
Meatless:
1. Biscuits and gravy
2. Vegetable soups (I have a bunch of recipes for these)
3. Pancake suppers
4. Salad suppers
5. Macaroni and cheese
6. Cheese and/or veggie pizzas
7. Bean meals
My list included a lot more than this, but you get the idea. I did this for each of the seven categories. Guess what I came up with a year’s worth of meals without duplication quite simply.
Using the same example of the meatless meals I can also prepare a lot of this ahead of time.
1. Biscuits and gravy
a. Make up biscuit Master Mix (recipe is listed in my search engine on the left) while flour is on sale this month. Then for a quick dinner I only need to add oil and water and bake.
b. Make up gravy butter balls ahead of time and freeze. I’ll post this recipe when I do this.
2. If we do well in the garden the fresh produce will be used for this as it grows and the dried produce will be used when it is out of season.
3. Pancake suppers
a. Pancake Master Mix (recipe is listed in the search engine at the left as well), add oil, our home grown eggs and water as needed.
4. Salad suppers can be the green leafy type, or made with homemade pasta, or a combination of the two.
a. Make up pastas ahead of time
b. Homemade salad dressing Master Mixes (which will be added to the blog as time goes on)
5. Macaroni and Cheese
a. Homemade pasta
b. Freezer cheese sauce mix, recipe will be added at a later date
6. Cheese and/or veggie pizzas
a. Pizza dough Master Mix (recipe to be added later)
b. In season veggies from the garden, frozen or dried veggies from the garden off season
c. Loss leader cheese (April purchase according to link listed above) purchased and frozen.
7. Bean Meals
a. I have a bean cookbook, and there are numerous recipes for beans of all sorts on the web. Beans freeze tremendously well. So this is an item that will be cooked in bulk and frozen for quick meals as time goes on.
Add to these entrées loss leader fruits and vegetables, and keeping portions at a reasonable size should enable us to eat cheaply and healthy. Homemade breads will also add to the meals.
I’m now in the process of listing those various meal ideas on color coded 3X5 cards. Ie: pink for beef, white for chicken, green for meatless etc. This will allow me to mix and match menus each week without having to figure it out each week.
The 3 x 5 cards will also list the ingredients for that entrée so I can watch closely for the loss leaders for it. As I lay in a supply of the loss leaders I will then mark each one as I have it in inventory.
Having the menus all figured out in this manner will also let me see how much of what I need to lay in a supply of.
Can I do it on $1 a day like Ashley, in truth it seems pretty hard, but I’m going to do it as closely as I possibly can. Even if I spend slightly over that, I am definitely going to come out the financial winner on the grocery budget.
So will you join us to eat our way to a better state of health both physically and financially?
Jan who thinks the plan will work in OK
Saturday, August 7, 2010
A SINGLE QUART OF BUTTERMILK
As I waited for the update to my McAfee to download I suddenly realized I was smiling, not a little half smile but a big full blown smile. It was one that reached from one side of my chubby face to another.
“What in the world am I smiling about?” I thought. I looked around the nearly empty library to see if my husband, who sat across from me, or anyone else had noticed me smiling like the proverbial ape. Nope, I was safe.
“Surely I’m not that happy to be sitting in the public library and using free wi-fi” I thought to myself. “Maybe it’s because Gary got a job yesterday” I continued, “No that’s not it, I’ll miss all the time we spend together and I’ll miss traveling. That’s not it. Although I am delighted to have a steady income again”
Yes you read right my husband was offered a job after nearly 18 months of unemployment/retirement. It’s not going to mean instant wealth for us, things are still going to be tight. But if we stick to our budget we will be able to pay the bills and finally truly snowball as described in Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover. Not just once in a while, but each month. Only a few dollars at first, but it will be steady.
Our plan, as some of you already know, is for us to keep mystery shopping around home, and selling stuff to add flakes to that snowball until we are totally debt free. It will take us more than a year or two that is for certain, but we didn’t get so deeply in debt super fast either, so slow and steady will win the race in being debt free. Of course there will be several gazelle intense spurts of paying off debt.
So why was I smiling. The download wasn’t finished so I decided to mull over this weird grin on my face and the happiness I was feeling as I tried to discover its source. Then it hit me what it was “No, it couldn’t be that! “ I admonished myself, “surely not”. But then I realized that was exactly it and I grinned even bigger.
I was smiling about a single purchase I had just made for $1.92. I had purchased a quart of buttermilk. Yes I said buttermilk. No I’m not a buttermilk junky, well maybe I do cook with it a lot. The smile was because I suddenly realized our life had done a 180. No not the job, well yes the job, but not so much about it as what it meant.
It meant I had control of my life back. As you already know I’m all about frugal food cooking and storage. Since that day in 2009 when we had our first talk about how we would survive being unemployed our life has not been totally in our control.
Oh we have had the final say on all we did, but our life was ruled by when and where the mystery shops could be found. This was not a bad thing, we have had a blast traveling and seeing all sorts of things. But when it comes to frugal food storage it is a hard thing to do when you aren’t certain where you will be when. Certain food items that will help to feed your family frugally require a bit of attention now and again. So starting such food items when you may be leaving town on a moment’s notice is not a good idea. You could lose your original ingredients. There are all sorts of foods like that. Some you can refrigerate or freeze to save, such as sourdough starter, but others like Perpetual Buttermilk needs “renewed” periodically.
I cook a lot with buttermilk in my scratch cooking. I use powdered buttermilk in my dry mix recipes a lot, but I also marinade with it. You can use reconstituted powdered buttermilk to do that as well, but I prefer using regular buttermilk because you pour out just what you need to do the marinade, no mess, no mixing up too much, no waste, and fast.
That’s where Perpetual Buttermilk comes in. The premise is simple you purchase “a single quart of buttermilk”. Cultured buttermilk is what you need, you could even go as small as pint because here’s how you make a quart of buttermilk from just ½ cup of that original purchase of cultured buttermilk.
PERPETUAL BUTTERMILK
3 ¾ C water
1 1/3 C powdered milk
½ C cultured buttermilk
Mix well 3 ¾ cup water with 1 1/3 cup powdered milk (NOT powdered buttermilk) . Once this is mixed well add ½ cup cultured buttermilk. Then leave the container sitting on the counter overnight. That’s all there is to it. New fresh buttermilk will be waiting on you in the morning. Refrigerate and use as normal. Start to get low, use another ½ cup and repeat the process.
You can do similar things with live culture yogurt, sour dough starter and much more, but you need to be home to tend to them. Refrigerator bread dough either needs used within a certain amount of time or mixed up into a loaf and frozen. So for the last 18 months I’ve not been able to make these staples to our family diet.
Now I can, I am back in control. I smiled big. We were going back to good frugal eating. Homemade Artisan breads in less than 5 minutes a day, sour dough biscuits, onion strings, chicken nuggets, yes these would all soon be back on the menu. In fact I decided at that moment there would be onion strings on the dinner menu with charcoaled hamburgers and butterfly potatoes to celebrate the new job. That will bring a smile to my husband’s face too.
The next time my darling husband retires it will be permanently and I will still be in control because then I’ll know when we might leave town and can prepare my food storage accordingly. So for the next long while be prepared to see a lot more recipes and be told many a story about the adventures on and off the Rock ‘n Tree Ranch.
Jan who is not about to give up traveling for fun in OK
“What in the world am I smiling about?” I thought. I looked around the nearly empty library to see if my husband, who sat across from me, or anyone else had noticed me smiling like the proverbial ape. Nope, I was safe.
“Surely I’m not that happy to be sitting in the public library and using free wi-fi” I thought to myself. “Maybe it’s because Gary got a job yesterday” I continued, “No that’s not it, I’ll miss all the time we spend together and I’ll miss traveling. That’s not it. Although I am delighted to have a steady income again”
Yes you read right my husband was offered a job after nearly 18 months of unemployment/retirement. It’s not going to mean instant wealth for us, things are still going to be tight. But if we stick to our budget we will be able to pay the bills and finally truly snowball as described in Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover. Not just once in a while, but each month. Only a few dollars at first, but it will be steady.
Our plan, as some of you already know, is for us to keep mystery shopping around home, and selling stuff to add flakes to that snowball until we are totally debt free. It will take us more than a year or two that is for certain, but we didn’t get so deeply in debt super fast either, so slow and steady will win the race in being debt free. Of course there will be several gazelle intense spurts of paying off debt.
So why was I smiling. The download wasn’t finished so I decided to mull over this weird grin on my face and the happiness I was feeling as I tried to discover its source. Then it hit me what it was “No, it couldn’t be that! “ I admonished myself, “surely not”. But then I realized that was exactly it and I grinned even bigger.
I was smiling about a single purchase I had just made for $1.92. I had purchased a quart of buttermilk. Yes I said buttermilk. No I’m not a buttermilk junky, well maybe I do cook with it a lot. The smile was because I suddenly realized our life had done a 180. No not the job, well yes the job, but not so much about it as what it meant.
It meant I had control of my life back. As you already know I’m all about frugal food cooking and storage. Since that day in 2009 when we had our first talk about how we would survive being unemployed our life has not been totally in our control.
Oh we have had the final say on all we did, but our life was ruled by when and where the mystery shops could be found. This was not a bad thing, we have had a blast traveling and seeing all sorts of things. But when it comes to frugal food storage it is a hard thing to do when you aren’t certain where you will be when. Certain food items that will help to feed your family frugally require a bit of attention now and again. So starting such food items when you may be leaving town on a moment’s notice is not a good idea. You could lose your original ingredients. There are all sorts of foods like that. Some you can refrigerate or freeze to save, such as sourdough starter, but others like Perpetual Buttermilk needs “renewed” periodically.
I cook a lot with buttermilk in my scratch cooking. I use powdered buttermilk in my dry mix recipes a lot, but I also marinade with it. You can use reconstituted powdered buttermilk to do that as well, but I prefer using regular buttermilk because you pour out just what you need to do the marinade, no mess, no mixing up too much, no waste, and fast.
That’s where Perpetual Buttermilk comes in. The premise is simple you purchase “a single quart of buttermilk”. Cultured buttermilk is what you need, you could even go as small as pint because here’s how you make a quart of buttermilk from just ½ cup of that original purchase of cultured buttermilk.
PERPETUAL BUTTERMILK
3 ¾ C water
1 1/3 C powdered milk
½ C cultured buttermilk
Mix well 3 ¾ cup water with 1 1/3 cup powdered milk (NOT powdered buttermilk) . Once this is mixed well add ½ cup cultured buttermilk. Then leave the container sitting on the counter overnight. That’s all there is to it. New fresh buttermilk will be waiting on you in the morning. Refrigerate and use as normal. Start to get low, use another ½ cup and repeat the process.
You can do similar things with live culture yogurt, sour dough starter and much more, but you need to be home to tend to them. Refrigerator bread dough either needs used within a certain amount of time or mixed up into a loaf and frozen. So for the last 18 months I’ve not been able to make these staples to our family diet.
Now I can, I am back in control. I smiled big. We were going back to good frugal eating. Homemade Artisan breads in less than 5 minutes a day, sour dough biscuits, onion strings, chicken nuggets, yes these would all soon be back on the menu. In fact I decided at that moment there would be onion strings on the dinner menu with charcoaled hamburgers and butterfly potatoes to celebrate the new job. That will bring a smile to my husband’s face too.
The next time my darling husband retires it will be permanently and I will still be in control because then I’ll know when we might leave town and can prepare my food storage accordingly. So for the next long while be prepared to see a lot more recipes and be told many a story about the adventures on and off the Rock ‘n Tree Ranch.
Jan who is not about to give up traveling for fun in OK
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