Last week the Relief Society had a great class on gardening. I unfortunately was not able to attend myself because of our whole house being sick.
But they had some great handouts on clay soil, lasagna gardening and flower gardens. So if you missed the class and would like the handouts go check them out.
One of the Relief Society’s monthly groups is called: Make it From Scratch in which some simple meals or foods are shown how they can be made at home from scratch instead of buying them.
The March class showed us how to make hot fudge sauce, chocolate syrup (like Hershey’s), ice cream and homemade rice-a-roni.
Hot Fudge Sauce
1 cup butter
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
3 cups sugar
1 (12 oz) can evaporated milk
Dash salt
1 tsp. vanilla
Combine butter, cocoa powder, sugar, milk and salt in a large saucepan. Place over medium heat and bring to a boil. Boil for 7 minutes. Remove from heat. Stir in vanilla. Carefully poor hot mixture into a blender and blend for 2-4 minutes. Serve immediately or store in refrigerator and reheat as needed. Best if used quickly as it can tend to go grainy with time.
Chocolate Syrup (like Hershey’s)
1 cup water
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 cups sugar
Dash salt
1/4 tsp. vanilla
Whisk water and cocoa powder in large saucepan until smooth. Add sugar and cook over medium heat until it boils. Boil for 3 minutes. Remove from heat and add salt and vanilla. This will thicken as it cools. Store in refrigerator
*Make sure you use a large enough pot as this tends to boil over in a smaller pot.
Rich Vanilla Ice Cream
**Also known as French Vanilla**
3 cups half and half
1 cup sugar
4 egg yolks, beaten
1 cup whipping cream
1 tbl vanilla extract
In a heavy medium saucepan, combine half and half, sugar and beaten egg yolks. Cook and stir over low heat until mixture coats a spoon and is slightly thickened. Cool to room temperature. Stir in whipping cream and vanilla. Pour into ice cream canister. Freeze in ice cream maker. Makes 2 quarts.
Homemade Rice-a-roni
1 1/2 cup long grain rice (prefer jasmine)
1/2 cup vermicelli or spaghetti noodles broken into approximately 1/2" pieces
3/4 cube of butter, margarine, or 5 tbls olive oil
2-3 cloves of garlic, minced
2 tsp. Dehydrated minced onion
4 cups boiling water with 4 chicken or beef
bouillon cubes
4 tbs. Fresh parsley, or fresh cilantro, or 2 tsp dry Italian seasoning, or other seasonings compatible with Mexican, or oriental cuisine
OPTIONAL: red, green, or yellow bell pepper, chopped
olives, sliced or whole
Water chestnuts for oriental cuisine
chili beans for Mexican cuisine
chopped ham, chicken, turkey, or beef
In heavy skillet (that has a lid to cover tightly), melt butter or heat oil on medium high heat. When hot, add the rice, the pasta, and the garlic, stirring to prevent burning, but allowing it to brown nicely. Have hot water with melted bouillon ready to pour into the pan. Stir it into the rice and pasta. Add the dehydrated onion, the fresh herbs or veggies, or any dry seasonings, and any chopped meat, mixing well. Bring the mixture to a boil, then put on the tight lid, and turn off the burner. Let it set on the burner for 35-40 minutes before removing lid. You may stir in olives or water chestnuts before serving and garnish with any additional fresh herbs. Stir with a fork to break it up as you put it in a bowl. If you want it moister, just add a little more water the next time you prepare it. If less moist, use a little less water.
I can’t wait to try out the Homemade rice-a-roni. This will be a real treat.
I wonder what awesome goodies our Relief Society sister’s have to share with us next time.
As a quick recap, last month we talked about making our list for our 3 Month Supply. If you haven’t done it yet you need to pull together that list and start now. (When I have a chance I’ll put more information about this on the blog.)
This month’s article and homework is going to be in addition to last month’s and more.
Here is a small sampling of out list:
Chicken Pesto Pasta Spaghetti Meatloaf Fiesta Chicken Bake Sloppy Joes Tacos Fajita Skillet Bake Pancakes Waffles Chili & Cornbread Pizza Enchiladas Pork chops, potatoes & carrots Rice & Chicken Many More…….
To make my list I downloaded a great spreadsheet from the girls at Food Storage Made Easy. With this spreadsheet all you have to do is put your 
Homework for April: Look at your list and look at your store sale fliers then buy what’s on sale that goes with what you need.
Our family bought 100 soft taco tortillas for $10. When I got them home I piled them into the freezer where they will stay until we need them. I also got us granola bars, pasta sauce, cereal and much more. And yes as usual I used my coupons to do this. You don’t have to use coupons but it sure makes buying your stock pile or 3 month supply more affordable by using your coupons. If you want help, advice and pointers on using coupons let me know (kinscrapin@gmail.com). I am not an expert but I am constantly getting better at. And as with anything else if you have questions about your food storage let me know; if I don’t know the answer I’ll research it for you or point in the right direction for your self.
I would love to start a food storage cookbook so we can share our ideas together. Please send your ideas on this.
The prophets have said:
(Taken from the Church website under Provident Living and then Quotes and Talks from church leaders)
From President Thomas S. Monson, First Counselor, we hear: "Many more people could ride out the storm-tossed waves in their economic lives if they had their year's supply of food . . . and were debt-free. Today we find that many have followed this counsel in reverse: they have at least a year's supply of debt and are food-free."15
From President Gordon B. Hinckley, the Lord's prophet, we hear: "The best place to have some food set aside is within our homes. . . . "We can begin ever so modestly. We can begin with a one week's food supply and gradually build it to a month, and then to three months. . . . I fear that so many feel that a long-term food supply is so far beyond their reach that they make no effort at all.”
President Spencer W. Kimball said, “The Lord will not translate one’s good hopes and desires and intentions into works. Each of us must do that for himself. Acquire and store a reserve of food and supplies that will sustain life. Obtain clothing and build a savings account on a sensible, well-planned basis that can serve well in times of emergency. As long as I can remember, we have been taught to prepare for the future and to obtain a year’s supply of necessities. I would guess that the years of plenty have almost universally caused us to set aside this counsel. I believe the time to disregard this counsel is over. With events in the world today, it must be considered with all seriousness
Remember these words from Paul: "If any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel." –President Hinckley
The revelation to produce and store food may be as essential to our temporal welfare today as boarding the ark was to the people in the days of Noah.
How do we begin to get a year supply of food?
"Begin in a small way, . . . and gradually build toward a reasonable objective."16 Inspired preparation rests on the foundation of faith in Jesus Christ, obedience, and a provident lifestyle. Members should not go to extremes, but they should begin.” -President Hinckley
Obtain at least a two week supply of water for each member of your family. Have water in all sorts of containers. An inexpensive idea is to put water in emptied, clear, plastic 2 liter pop bottles. Small water bottles are convenient incase you need to take them and go. Fifty gallon drums are good for drinking water and/or cleaning water. It is essential to have enough water—a person can only survive a few days without water. Look on the church’s website for information and safety tips for storing water. You need at least one gallon of water per person per day.
Put together a 72 hour kit of water, food, clothing and essentials for each person in your family. Make it portable in case you need to leave your home in a disaster. Tips: Buy 72 hr. backpacks at the D.I. for really inexpensive, get backpacks with handles and wheels for the children to carry themselves, put children’s 72 hr. backpacks under their beds for quick access, and put together a small car emergency kit. Put water and some basic essentials in a backpack in your car incase an emergency happens, and you (and your children) need to walk to somewhere safe. Items that might be important include water, snack food (granola bars, suck on candy, dried fruit or jerky etc.), a flashlight, poncho/umbrella, and a sweater or jacket in case of cold weather.
Make a list of the food items your family eats most often. (i.e.- macaroni & cheese, chili, tuna (mayo), peanut butter & jam, pasta & spaghetti sauce, etc.) Start building your food storage around those items. Start by getting a three month supply of these commonly eaten foods. One thing to remember is to buy all the components of each meal you eat on a regular basis. For example, oatmeal for breakfast wouldn’t be good without brown sugar, raisins, cinnamon & milk (powdered milk). Keep in mind that in a disaster, you won’t be able to run to the store to buy the “extras” for meals. You will need all items on hand to put together meals for your family. Once you have created a supply of these items, you can begin accumulating more long term food items. These items include grains, legumes, sugar, vegetables, fruit, salt, oil and powdered milk (among many others).
How to store your food? The main concern is keeping insects and rodents out of your food. There are a few ways to store paper packaged food items. The first is to dry pack items at the cannery. Another is to put food items in plastic containers (Rubbermaid totes, empty plastic buckets, large plastic garbage cans etc. ) Anything will work as long as it can be shut out from surrounding bugs and damp air. Keep food in a cool place—like a cold storage room under the porch.
Keep track and rotate your food items. Use the worksheet provided, or your own system, to keep track of how much of each item you have, and to properly rotate your food. Tip: When you buy the food, put the month and date you purchased it on the container with a permanent marker. This way, you will know which items to use first. Put the newer food on the back of the shelf and move the older items forward. Keep a running total of each item so that at any moment you can look at your food storage sheet and see what you are running low on. (Creating a shelving system makes storing food easier to organize and rotate. This can be done inexpensively with cheap metal shelves, store bought food storage racks, or homemade wood shelves. You will feel so good when you begin to see your own “store” growing in the basement.)
When items are on sale—STOCK UP! It may seem like you are spending a lot of money at once, but you will actually save money in the long run. If you buy a year supply of items, you will not need to run to the store and buy it when it’s not on sale. Think BIG—for example, a year supply of sugar for one adult is 100 lbs., times that by 3-4 people in your family & that’s 300/400 lbs. of sugar. Even if you don’t use it all in one year, don’t worry---sugar will last 30 + years. That’s why it is so important to buy items when they are at their cheapest price. Watch the ads and compare prices. Doing this will save time and money!
With a little faith, effort, and time, you will feel the peace that comes by knowing you are prepared for whatever comes your family’s way. Starting is the hardest part. Once you begin and gain a testimony of the importance of food storage, you will begin to find it a rewarding hobby and understand what President Hinckley meant when he said:
"The feeling of peace and the desire to be faithful to the commandment given by the Lord through the modern prophet helps us feel the Holy Spirit, . . . to not be afraid, and to see that the signs of the time for the Second Coming of the Lord is a blessing and not something to fear. We rejoice in it. . . . It gives us the motivation to be faithful and endure to the end and to be saved and obtain eternal life."20
Last night’s food Storage class ended up being a really nice cozy affair with a few in attendance but ate an amazing treat made for us by the Blazzard family in their Dutch oven.
Thank you Blazard family for the wonderful peach cobbler.
First I’ll give you a little Dutch oven history. In my research I have found several different histories of the Dutch oven so you can decide which one you want to go by but I will give you a little 
According to the to book you get when you first buy your Dutch oven from Lodge the “cast iron camp ovens cooked the food that kept America going.” “The first iron kettles and pots date back to the 7th and 8th centuries, but by 16th century Europe, the art of casting iron was widespread and cast iron cookware had become a valued commodity.”
Paul Revere, a blacksmith and silversmith by profession, is credited with the flanged lid of the camp Dutch oven. The flanged lid and bottom legs allow for a fire source to be under the pot and on the lid, making it an actual baking oven at the hearth of campfire.
In and article found in the New Era in 1974 “Dutch Oven Cooking” Sister Thomas says, “Dutch ovens are heavy, cast iron pots that pioneer families used for all types of cooking. Today they are still used by ranchers, prospectors, hunters, fishermen, smart New Era readers, and others who need simple but versatile outdoor cooking equipment.
The outdoor or open-fire Dutch oven has three legs to hold the oven above hot coals for cooking, and a flat lid with turned up edges that will hold coals on the lid for baking. The lid has a handle in the center that allows it to be lifted with a hook, claw hammer, pliers, or forked stick when it is hot or loaded with coals.
There is another type of Dutch oven known as the indoor Dutch oven. It is flat-bottomed with no legs and has a dome-shaped lid adapted for cooking on a stove or in the oven of a stove.”
Now that you have read a little history about the Dutch ovens lets talk about their importance with your food storage and how to use them.
I have said many times before that your food storage is only as good as what you put into it and that you know how to use it. Remember if you can’t cook your food storage why bother storing it.
Now with that said you can use your Dutch oven in four different ways: roasting, frying & boiling, baking, simmering & stewing. All you need to do is check out the oodles of recipes out there or use some of your favorites from your own kitchen.
If you click here you will see a great Chart for Baking with your Dutch Oven by Lodge.
Now a quick little personal story for you all. My family and I went to Yosemite last weekend in our new trailer but our trailer doesn’t have an oven so we decided instead to just buy Dutch ovens and get by that way. So while we were in Yosemite we decided it was a great time to try out our new Dutch oven. We pulled it out and dropped some food in and off the cooking started. I’d say within half an hour give or take we had a great pork chop dinner with all of the fixin’s.
So here’s the food we put into the Dutch oven: pork chops, cut up potatoes, carrots, chopped celery, chopped onions, 2 cans of cream of mushroom soup and Worcestershire sauce. This is a great example of how you can put together your own meal.
At our Food Storage class on last night two different handouts were given out to the class. If you would like your own click here and here.
And if you haven’t already you should really go and check out the great article by Sister Thomas in the New Era about “Dutch Oven Cooking.”
I put together a book of several different pdfs that I found on the internet (with the help of Brother Bowman) and I had this with me in class as well. If you too would like to see them here is a list that you can look at yourself:
Dutch Oven Cooking by Larry Hoffman
Dutch Ovens for Backpacking by John W. Russo & Dennis Schmitt
The Dutch Oven Cookbook by Mike Audleman
Ol’ Buffalo Camp Cook by Blaine S Nay
Dutch Oven Dinners by Troop 288
Dutch Oven Desserts by Troop 288
A Scout’s Guide to Dutch Oven Cooking by Roger Tipley
Dutch Oven Cooking by Ray Stern
Dutch Oven Cooking by Utah State University Extension Office
Now then here’s the great recipe Sister Blazzard used to make us the great Peach Cobbler for our treat at the end of class:
Blazzard Family Sundown Cobbler
1 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 egg (if desired)
½ cup melted butter
1 quart fruit (2 cans)
Put butter into pan and let it melt in oven. Pour batter into pan after first mixing it in order given above. Use fruit or berries, canned, or fresh and sweetened. Pour this fruit over batter. Bake in a moderate oven (about 375°) until it is nicely browned and batter is done, about 30-45 minutes.
Serve plain or with cream or ice cream. This cobbler works real well in a Dutch oven over the campfire too.
From the Kitchen of Silvia Farr Blazzard
In the month of April we talked about building your Long Term Food Storage and to only store the items that your family will eat.
In class Thursday night we started introducing the lesson with a small game. I don’t want all of you that weren’t able to attend class to miss out on our game so I set it up for you here at my house, took pictures and have it all set for you to try and figure out as well. The only unfortunate part is that you won’t be able to touch and taste like the class did last night.
Here is the picture below. Can you guess what each item is? There is a total of 28 in all.
Happy Hunting and I hope you have fun!!!!
I started talking to the class and going over only storing what your family will eat. Right now I am not really good at cooking dried beans so for now we are storing canned beans and only a few dried. My goal is to continue to experiment with dried beans and then to store them instead.
The other food item that our family has decided to store instead of it’s counterpart is dried corn instead of cornmeal. Our wheat grinder can grind many foods including corn and so my thoughts were why not store something that will last longer. We are talking about a difference of months to years here.
Otherwise the basic Long Term Food Storage recommended foods are as follows:
Grains
Wheat
Flour
Corn (Cornmeal)
Oats
Rice
Pasta
Fats and Oils
Shortening
Canola Oil/Olive Oil
Mayonnaise
Salad Dressing
Peanut Butter
Legumes
Pinto
Black
Kidney
Split Peas
Lentils
Dry Soup Mix
Sugars
Honey
Sugar
Brown Sugar
Molasses
Corn Syrup?
Jams
Fruit drink powdered
Flavored Gelatin
Milk
Dry Milk
Evaporated Milk
Powdered Eggs
Cooking Essentials
Baking Powder
Baking Soda
Yeast
Salt
Vinegar
As a quick overview here it is all together:
Understanding Long Term Food Storage
• Understand the basic recommended long‐term foods and how they are used to help you determine what to store.
Determining What to Purchase
• Determine the quantities you will need by using our Long Term Food Storage Calculator (see tools section below)
• Start small. Work on a full 3 month supply, then move onto 6 months, then a full year
· Follow the BabySteps Checklists to help spread out your purchases over time
Learning to Use Long Term Food Storage
• Use food storage recipe books and websites on how to use your long term food storage
• Help your family become accustomed to eating your Long Term Food Storage. This will ease the transition in case of an emergency
· Talk to your friends and family members about how they use their food storage.
For homework read Checklist #4, Create a space for your food storage, and purchase a shelf for your food storage. Read Food Storage Lies…….Debunked (Step #4)
And once again the great girls over at Food Storage Made Easy made a spreadsheet to help you figure out what your family needs to put in their Long Term Food Storage.
Answers to the game:
1. wheat 2. flour 3. corn 4. oats 5. rice 6. shortening 7A. olive oil 7B. canola oil 8. mayonnaise 9. salad dressing (rand) 10. peanut butter 11. pinto beans 12. kidney beans 13. split peas 14. honey 15. sugar 16 brown sugar 17. jell-0 18. pudding 19. dry milk 20. fruit drink powdered 21. baking powder 22. baking soda 23. yeast 24. salt 25. vinegar 26. gluten 27. bisquick 28. buttermilk
Class handouts:
so we decided that this was a deal. We were able to buy several boxes for $1.99 a box instead of the regular price of $4.99 a box. That was just smart shopping and watch the sales ads but you can do the same or better with coupons. I found a January grocery receipt a little while back that said we saved $72.00 of that almost $10.00 was just with coupons. That may not seem like a lot but after a while it all adds up.
site called The Obsessive Shopper. A few tricks when it comes to using coupons: (according to Shauntell on Obsessive Shopper.net is 1. buy in bulk, 2. maximize your coupons, and 3. have multiple coupons.) She tells you to have enough coupons for each person living in your home. Think about it when you buy something for a recipe in your house how many items do you buy at a time?
2-3 chicken breasts
2-3 chicken breasts
