Today was our last day living on our food storage. I know we could continue on this path for longer than 33 days, January 26th- February 28th. We told the kiddos this was the challenge time frame and we did it! Not only does having food stored in my home provide me immense peace of mind but knowing how to use the food to create yummy balanced meals for my family is empowering! To be resourceful, like making brown sugar syrup, when I ran out of Mrs. Buttersworth is so satisfying. And the brown sugar syrup is so incredibly yummy. Who knows how long I would have gone without knowing how to make my own breakfast syrup had I not done this challenge? We as humans don’t look for solutions unless we have to. I am so happy to have created this experience to learn these bits of wisdom for myself.
Monthly Archives: February 2013
Our Last Day on the Challenge
Today was our last day on our food storage challenge. I was a busy day for me and not normal. I was setting up and working a Thrive booth at a boutique here in town. Meals today were just whatever was easy.
I had a big bowl of steel cut oats with almond butter. The kiddos have oats too or Chex. I brought with me the left over peanut butter noodles while I worked the booth today. In Pagey’s lunch we packed freeze dried pineapple and tri color rotini with cheese sauce. We ate lots of pasta with butter to get through the day. When you know you are going to have the smorgasbord of the grocery store available to you, you just want to get through the day.
Tamale Pie, Lunch and Homemade syrup
I am going to mix it up tonight and start with dinner. Mr. Incredible suggested I make tamale pie. I have never made one but found a recipe that I had all the ingredients to and thought I would give it a shot. Of course I substituted all the fresh ingredients like onions and green bell peppers for my freeze dried ones. I used tomato powder to make the tomato sauce and pureed a can of tomato dices in the blender so it would be free of tomato chunks. I used freeze dried corn instead of canned corn too. The ground beef? Freeze dried, one cup of ground beef is plenty of meat in our meals. I tripled the amount of chili powder at least. I mixed up the filling and was afraid it tasted too tomatoey. It also made a lot of filling. I added some Colby cheese to the filling. First because the recipe calls for cheese and second to lessen the tomato flavor.
Thrive Omelettes and More
Omelettes, this is the french spelling. For breakfast this morning I made customized omelettes. I rehydrated in different bowls: freeze dried onions, mushrooms, green chilis, asparagus, sausage crumbles, and spinach. I rehyrated the Colby cheese last night. I mixed up 1/2 cup of egg scramble mix. I was ready to go to town.
A couple photos of the omelettes for a visual.
Julz was first and wanted everything but spinach. The little specks are chili powder.
A New Day! Jam Oat Bars
Yay! I woke up today in a lot better mood than yesterday. I am ready to be done with this food storage challenge. Although I have thoroughly enjoyed not going to the grocery store. I miss the things the grocery store offers. Like spinach, red leaf lettuce and cucumbers. Heavy cream and fresh butter. Wild caught fish. Those things. I would totally be the target customer for delivered groceries but I like to pick out my own produce and fish.
Gnocchi for Breakfast, Fruit Leather! Chicken and Rice, Doughnuts Again
Sundays. Sometimes I love them and sometimes I don’t. This was a don’t love Sunday, Sunday. Pagey woke me up at 7:30 am asking me to make gnocchi for breakfast. Like I said yesterday, anything goes when you are living on your food storage. So gnocchi it was for breakfast. I also had a batch of naturally leavened brown rice waffles batter, for those who didn’t want gnocchi for breakfast, like me. I used the very last drops of the maple syrup. Every last drop.
Doughnuts for Breakfast
Doughnuts made out of food storage, of course! I didn’t want to wake up at 5 am on Saturday morning to make doughnuts so last night at 11:00 pm I mixed up a batch of dough and let it rise in the fridge. This morning I was so eager to get rolling and cutting that I didn’t take a photo of the perfectly risen dough. A few months ago I got a hankering for cake doughnuts. Those hankerings seem to always fall on Sunday. So I tried my hand at them. The cake doughnuts turned out terribly. They tasted like rings of white cake soaked in oil. I felt my gall bladder working over time and cursing me for ingesting them. Most of the cake doughnuts went in the trash. These doughnuts on the other hand are yeast doughnuts, way easier for me to make at home.
Friday! Gnocchi and Birdseed Treats for People
This morning I mixed up some pancake batter and cooked them on the outside grill for the kiddos. I felt like oatmeal. I have about a cup of almond butter. A friend of mine loves to eat peanut butter and oatmeal. I really like almond butter so I tried it with my steel cut oats this morning and it is really, really, good. I think I may eat it every morning for the next week.
Lunch: left over spaghetti, black bean and cheese burrito, and chicken curry with rice. I really enjoy the chicken curry recipe, its the coconut milk. I am storing a lot of canned coconut milk.
Blueberry Muffins, Spaghetti & Thrive Express, Chicken Curry
I have mention my friend Heather before. But this morning I made her Mix and Match Muffins for breakfast and they were a hit! I even had a little snag mixing them up this morning. I followed the recipe to a T. But I have this issue with my brown sugar, its rock hard.
Bagel Breakfast Sandwiches, Chocolate Cake, California Casserole
Yes we ate in that order today.
As you know I baked bagels last night. Julz wanted to bring one in her lunch with chicken salad. With Thrive food chicken salad is a cinch. Julz makes it herself. She just used the left over salad she made last week. The ratios I use are 1 cup chopped chicken (fd), 1/2 cup celery (fd), and 1/4 cup chopped onion (fd). Rehydrate in 1 1/4 cup hot water. Let the sit until all the water is absorbed. After 10 minutes drain off any excess liquid. Chill for and hour in the fridge then add a couple teaspoons of mayonaise. Those ratios are enough to make two large chicken salad sandwiches. And that is what Julz brought for lunch today, well one on a bagel.