LDS Freedom Forum

Might I make a suggestion? I was out of work for two months a few months ago and we resorted to using our food storage to live off of. This was a great opportunity to learn how to cook from scratch with what we had. It was actually fun! I got out the cookbook and off we went.

The experience has taught us some important lessons.
1. We feel 100% healthier eating our own foods cooked from scratch.
2. Where's the toilet paper?
3. Spices are the spice of life.
4. Learning to make wheat into meat takes some practice
5. Do not use too much liquid soap in the dishwasher or washing machine (the floor was very clean after that experience)
6. You can eat for 1/10 the price of store bought foods.
7. Cooking from scratch is both satisfying and relaxing if you have the time.
8. The food tastes a lot better!
9. Wheat cake leaves something to be desired.
10. We will not go back to prepared foods.

This experience was great! We now know what is missing from our years supply and have been able to quickly remedy it. Because we buy scratch items, we are able to spend the same amount of money at the store each week, but buy ahead by three months at a time!

Any other experiences out there?

My hubs and I are now trying to live healthier and get rid of the processed foods. I already do alot of cooking from scratch but having time to develop the recipes is REALLY worth it. I've been working on a pizza sauce recipe for awhile and I've almost got it. I'm also working on making a homemade version of Panda Express orange chicken for the hubs (and really it will help when eating that dehydrated fake chicken, frying it in a batter and smothering it in a sauce. ) Yes I have to agree on the toilet paper and spices. I've also learned one can never have too many socks. But really learn recipes and then make sure you have everything to make them. I dont have tons of the #10 cans of dehydrated foods, but what I have are onions, carrots, celery and green peppers. All of those are the best starts for soups and stews and seperatly add to sauces and such. Oh eyah and I still stock up on organic mixes for cakes and brownies (the kind with basic, not overly processed ingredients) Makes things a little easier. I also keep flavorings to add to cakes to help the flavor (i.e. lemon, orange and so forth).

If you try to live on the SMFS (standard mormon food storage), you'll be in for some tough times. You need the wheat, the milk, the oil and such, but you need so much more to make the food palatable and digestible. Do not forget the spices and flavorings. If you keep them in a cool, dry and dark place, they last so much longer. You want a variety of foods, also. To keep up morale you need a goodie once in a while. So plan for that. And get yourself some good recipes before it's too late.

NoGreaterLove wrote:Might I make a suggestion? I was out of work for two months a few months ago and we resorted to using our food storage to live off of. This was a great opportunity to learn how to cook from scratch with what we had. It was actually fun! I got out the cookbook and off we went.

The experience has taught us some important lessons.
1. We feel 100% healthier eating our own foods cooked from scratch.
2. Where's the toilet paper?
3. Spices are the spice of life.
4. Learning to make wheat into meat takes some practice
5. Do not use too much liquid soap in the dishwasher or washing machine (the floor was very clean after that experience)
6. You can eat for 1/10 the price of store bought foods.
7. Cooking from scratch is both satisfying and relaxing if you have the time.
8. The food tastes a lot better!
9. Wheat cake leaves something to be desired.
10. We will not go back to prepared foods.

This experience was great! We now know what is missing from our years supply and have been able to quickly remedy it. Because we buy scratch items, we are able to spend the same amount of money at the store each week, but buy ahead by three months at a time!

Any other experiences out there?

Excellent! I put this on my preparedness blog http://kunaprepare.blogspot.com if it's OK with you?

Thanks,
Shawn

Oh yeah flour store for a couple years and needs to be rotated but boy it's nice to use. no grinding and it's fine enough to bake with.

ShawnC wrote: Excellent! I put this on my preparedness blog http://kunaprepare.blogspot.com if it's OK with you?

Thanks,
Shawn

Nice blog ShawnC !

Sure, its ok with me. I have already emailed your top 20 responses to my family and friends. It should be back around to us in about 48 hours or less!

Good post, I think the key to food storage is to use it for your everyday food. I cant even eat a store bought loaf of wheat bread ever since I got a wheat grinder in December. You also feel a lot healthier. If more people were able to save money, eat healthy and slowly deplete their food storage by using it everyday, more people would have it because they would see it as less of a waste then someone who just lets it sit for 20 years.

I am a frequent visitor of http://allrecipes.com/ for new bread, cookies, and other meals from scratch.

And here is the best Bread Recipe I have come across in my nearly year long journey. So delicious.

http://www.thenewhomemaker.com/wholewheatbread2

My husband and I are looking to buy a grain mill. We havent made up our mind on which one to get because I want one that grinds a finer flour than the Armegeddon hand crank one I have. Which one did you get? I'm just curious how you like it. I'm dying to try the bread recipe. Mt hubs still hasnt found one I make that makes him go WOW!!. Though he approves of the tortillas.

ndjili wrote:My husband and I are looking to buy a grain mill. We havent made up our mind on which one to get because I want one that grinds a finer flour than the Armegeddon hand crank one I have. Which one did you get? I'm just curious how you like it. I'm dying to try the bread recipe. Mt hubs still hasnt found one I make that makes him go WOW!!. Though he approves of the tortillas.

Get a Wondermill electric grinder, or if going for a hand grinder, get this one...

http://kodiakhealth.com/catalog/product ... ts_id/3941

best on the market in my opinion, and I've looked at pretty much all of them.

ndjili wrote:Which one did you get? I'm just curious how you like it. I'm dying to try the bread recipe. Mt hubs still hasnt found one I make that makes him go WOW!!.

Same with my family, been trying to find that right recipe that they all can agree on. This one makes two loaves, one of the loaves is gone within hours, and the other I can use for sandwiches and stuff. It keeps well for a few days. It is also 100% Whole Wheat which is nice.

I add about 1 tbsp soy lecithin and a little less than 1 tbsp white sugar and use 2 tbsp yeast. The key is the Vital Wheat Glutin and kneading it for 20 minutes or so. It is laborsome, but when worth it. I try to eat store bough bread, but it tastes so awful thanks to the vinegar and other preservatives.

As for the wheat grinder. I generally would stay away from the hand ones, they aren't that great and take a lot of time. I have the new Nutrimill from the company in SLC, it works well. I do fancy those older models though, they just seem easier to repair. But apparently these Nutrimills last for many many years.

Good post, I think the key to food storage is to use it for your everyday food. I cant even eat a store bought loaf of wheat bread ever since I got a wheat grinder in December. You also feel a lot healthier. If more people were able to save money, eat healthy and slowly deplete their food storage by using it everyday, more people would have it because they would see it as less of a waste then someone who just lets it sit for 20 years.

I am a frequent visitor of http://allrecipes.com/ for new bread, cookies, and other meals from scratch.

And here is the best Bread Recipe I have come across in my nearly year long journey. So delicious.

http://www.thenewhomemaker.com/wholewheatbread2

Thanks so much for these links. I'm making the wheat bread as we speak. I'll let you all know how it goes. It seems a liitle daunting when reading the instruction but was actually pretty easy (it's still rising now though. I hope I get it right. Bread is not my forte.) I found a ciabatta bread recipe that I'm also going to make as well. One thing I did forget to add to the food storage list, you can never have too much plastic wrap, sandwhich bags or foil. Also practice cooking without electricity this summer when you go camping. I've never used a dutch oven before but I'm going to learn this summer. Might come in handy.

I apologize for my disruption of topic.

I want to alert you to the lively debate that is occurring on the thread: "Is it OK to mandate no facial hair."

It has grown MUCH more than what the title implies.

Please see this thread and participate with your comments.

Again, I apologize for the inconvenience.



Now back to your regularly scheduled program.


JustPullinYourChain

JustPullinYourChain wrote:I apologize for my disruption of topic.

I want to alert you to the lively debate that is occurring on the thread: "Is it OK to mandate no facial hair."

It has grown MUCH more than what the title implies.

Please see this thread and participate with your comments.

Again, I apologize for the inconvenience.



Now back to your regularly scheduled program.


JustPullinYourChain

Now that was funny!!! I will try to make my way to the thread

But first I need to comment on my grain mill.I have the Country Living grain mill with the motor. So I can grain by hand or use the motor. I really enjoy it. The motor is very slow but there is a reason.

I will try those bread recipes posted...I just love bread!!! so dang good but real bad on women's hips

I'd be really interested in what people discovered during an emergency or whatever that they didn't have that they needed, or didn't have enough of - the little things people don't think of until something happens. When our power went out last summer we found we were too dependent on battery-powered light. So I acquired more crank lanterns, flashlights, plus more batteries just in case.

One thought I had was when you're sick of rice and beans, one thing that can really spice it up is salsa. I got a salsa mix from http://www.suttonsbaytrading.com that you can mix with a can of diced tomatoes to make it. I haven't dipped into it yet to save it, but looking at the ingredients I'm sure an enterprising person could reproduce it. Anyway, I thought I'd put that out there for those like me who love their salsa.

I'm also stocking up on cocoa powder. Gotta have your chocolate goodies...

The bread turned out great. I'll definately keep that recipe. I even added some of my hand ground not as fine as I like flour to it, just to see and it turned out great. I think this needs more discussion on what things others might be able to think of that might help. Too many frivilous topics get far too much talk and useful ones like this should get equal time.

Oh yeah, I dont have a ton of wheat in my food storage (I dont like whaet cereal, and I know I will have to do some milling but it's not easy to work with) I keep equal amounts of flour stored. It only lasts about 2 years or so But it's all about rotation. I do enough baking that I can keep it rotated and it's nice to have the finer flour for cakes and such. I also have alot of oatmeal but I'm not a huge fan of eating hot oatmeal cereal (it's a texture thing for me, makes me gag.) My husband and I do like granola though, so instead of making a hot cereal I make lots of granola. You can eat it as a cold cereal, add it to yogurt, use for making trail mixes or IF I have to have some hot oatmeal, I add some granola for taste and texture purposes and it's just fun to munch on as a snack. Also it's really easy to make. I mix 6 cups of quick oats with 1/2 cup of oil and 1/2 cup of either maple syrup or honey. spread on a baking sheet (with a rim) and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Let cool and put into a container. That's the basic but you can add dries fruits or nuts really the possiblities are endless. I like real syrup but it's expensive so I make my own putting twice as much sugar to water ratio, bringing to a boil and then adding a little maple flavoring. All things that can be kept in food storage.

ShawnC wrote:

ndjili wrote:My husband and I are looking to buy a grain mill. We havent made up our mind on which one to get because I want one that grinds a finer flour than the Armegeddon hand crank one I have. Which one did you get? I'm just curious how you like it. I'm dying to try the bread recipe. Mt hubs still hasnt found one I make that makes him go WOW!!. Though he approves of the tortillas.

Get a Wondermill electric grinder, or if going for a hand grinder, get this one...

http://kodiakhealth.com/catalog/product ... ts_id/3941

best on the market in my opinion, and I've looked at pretty much all of them.

I have the Magic Mill. It explodes the wheat berry instead of grinding it - and it works pretty fast - however it is loud like a vacuum cleaner. We enjoy it.

However, we are looking for a good hand mill (no electricity). Most of what we have seen doesn't grind very well or its not fine enough for bread (great for cereal!). Any suggestions?

That's been my trouble. I think that's why I have flour stored too. I can in some things add the flour I've milled from the hand one I have, but to use on it's own I'm limited to biscuits, pitas and tortillas and they're not a light and fluffy (I've even tried sifting out some of the larger bits but it still doesnt help).

pjbrownie wrote:

ShawnC wrote:

ndjili wrote:My husband and I are looking to buy a grain mill. We havent made up our mind on which one to get because I want one that grinds a finer flour than the Armegeddon hand crank one I have. Which one did you get? I'm just curious how you like it. I'm dying to try the bread recipe. Mt hubs still hasnt found one I make that makes him go WOW!!. Though he approves of the tortillas.

Get a Wondermill electric grinder, or if going for a hand grinder, get this one...

http://kodiakhealth.com/catalog/product ... ts_id/3941

best on the market in my opinion, and I've looked at pretty much all of them.

I have the Magic Mill. It explodes the wheat berry instead of grinding it - and it works pretty fast - however it is loud like a vacuum cleaner. We enjoy it.

However, we are looking for a good hand mill (no electricity). Most of what we have seen doesn't grind very well or its not fine enough for bread (great for cereal!). Any suggestions?

See link, that is the best on the market right now. Has steel and stone grinders that work very well. You can never really seem to get mill style grounds, but this one comes close.

That looks like a pretty good grinder, ShawnC. Thanks for the info. I have a hand grinder now but it is tedious to use and doesn't grind really fine. (It was only $69.) I guess I'll have to be prepared to spend a few $$$ to get a decent one.

kathyn wrote:That looks like a pretty good grinder, ShawnC. Thanks for the info. I have a hand grinder now but it is tedious to use and doesn't grind really fine. (It was only $69.) I guess I'll have to be prepared to spend a few $$$ to get a decent one.

Yeah, the back to basics ggrinder is a last resort. Keep that around if everything else breaks, but don't depend on it. You get what you pay for.