Cheese Glorious Cheese!

I am sure I could live without cheese, but I love cheese! The powdered stuff is not a good enough substitute for the creamy, gooey, yummy real thing. Cheese is in almost all of my everyday recipes. I knew there had to be a way to store cheese safely. I found a few methods in my research. None seemed to be the solution to me until I found Cheese Wax. I was soooo excited.

Cheese wax provided me with a safe way to include cheese into my food storage. Cheese can be stored as long as mold is prevented from growing on it. It does not need to be refrigerated once it is coated in Cheese Wax.

Cheese wax is reusable. After you peel it off your cheese, wash it, dry it and save it for next time. I bought mine from www.cheesemaking.com. I bought three different colors: red, yellow and black. I plan to color code the cheese. I also bought a cheese wax brush, so that I can paint it on if necessary. (Cheese supposedly gets slippery when you try to wax it.) You will also need a double boiler. I recommend an old one or a garage sale find, as you will not be able to use it for any other purpose after using it to melt the wax. Follow the instructions and be careful. Cheese wax is EXPLOSIVE! It will be worth it. Just think about the yummy things you can eat that are made with cheese, glorious cheese.

Beef, It What's for Dinner

I finally used my Mother's Day gift, a pressure cooker/canner. To tell you the truth, I was scared. I have heard horror stories about them blowing up and burning people. I did not have any such disastrous things happen.

I was quite impressed with myself. I read the instruction manual and The Ball Blue Book.

I purchased two of the biggest packages of ground beef (97/3) that I could find. I was hoping to make 7 jars of meat, I only got six. They were a little too full, but I did it anyway. (It is not recommended to overfill your jars.) It took a long time. I used the hot pack method. I started late and did not have all the things I needed. I sent my hubby out to get the things I needed. It took him what seemed like forever. I needed something to warm my jars, so they wouldn't crack when I put the hot meat in them & a ladle to spoon hot water over the meat in the jars.
I chose the hot pack method because I have seen jars of red meat in other peoples storage. It just looks gross to me. I would rather see it browned. Anyway, here is my advice: make sure you have all the things you will need before you start, make sure you know how long it will take, and follow the proven directions.

I have not tried my meat yet, but I am excited. My food storage dinners will have much more variety. We will have sloppy joes, enchiladas, and many more.

Did I mention the house smelled great all night and the next morning?

Laughing Brownies

I found another recipe for beans. I really like beans. I like brownies too. Put them together and you get a lower fat brownie with added fiber and protein. I had to try it.

You need three things to make Laughing Brownies.
1. A brownie mix
2. A can of black beans
3. Water

Open the brownie mix and dump it in a bowl. I know you know that but I am trying to be thorough.Rinse, Rinse, Rinse the beans. The better they are rinsed the less likely you and your family are to experience the joys of the musical fruit. Put the rinsed, drained beans in a blender. Add one cup of water. (The recipe I found said to put the beans back in the can, then add water to the beans to fill the can. I did that, then I dumped the water off and measured it. It was just about one cup. It was annoying to me to put them back in the can. If you do decide to put them back in the can, rinse your can or you will have musical brownies.)

Puree the beans and water. It smells beany, but your brownies will not when they are done.

Add the bean puree to the dry brownie mix. Mix. The beans will almost disappear if you pureed them well enough. The brownie batter will look about the same as if you follow the recipe on the back of the box. It tastes yummy too. Go ahead and lick the spoon.
I baked my brownies according to the recommendations on the back of the box. I separated mine into two different pans because my big pan was dirty. I used it the night before and it was full of leftovers.I decided that I like real brownies better. I could get used to these though. Maybe I'll get on a health kick and love them. I was disappointed with the texture of the Black Bean Brownie. It tasted like a microwave cake. My husband agreed the real thing is better, although he did eat several. My daughter did not seem to notice. She would have eaten the whole pan. I rinsed my beans well, so we did not notice any extra gas. I would eat the batter over the actual brownies.

Why do I call them Laughing Brownies? My daughter tried to say Black Bean Brownies and out came Laughing Brownies. I thought the name was funny. Make some, you might be surprised.

White Wheat Bread

I have been wondering about the difference between Hard Red Wheat and Hard White Wheat. I read a little about it online. In my reading I found that white wheat has a milder flavor, but all the same nutrients of red wheat. The length of storage is the same. The difference is in the coloring of the bran. White wheat has a lighter color. I decided that I wanted to try it out. So, I bought some.

I used the same bread recipe. It is hard to tell the difference between red wheat flour and white wheat flour. The loaves of bread made from the white wheat are a lighter color after baking. Not as light as white bread made from white flour.

My conclusion: I will still use a little white wheat. I will use it for tortillas and pizza dough and cinnamon rolls. We learned that our family actually prefers the "wheat" taste in our bread.

My suggestion is if you want to have white bread with higher nutritional content use a mixture of white wheat flour and white flour (bleached flour from the store). I think it would be hard to tell if you sneaked in a cup or two into your loaves. Gradually you could build up the amount of white wheat flour and then mix in the red wheat flour.

If you are considering purchasing wheat and want to get a great price, check out http://www.ldscatalog.com/. They have Hard Red Wheat. There prices are great and shipping is free in the US. Another great thing is there is no minimum weight required for shipment. I think you have to purchase one case of six #10 cans. The current price is just over $22.

Free on Fridays

Most Fridays the Shelf Reliance blog has a give away contest. The winners get great prizes from food storage rotation shelves to food storage foods. Who wouldn't want to win something like that. Check it out for yourself. It is easy to enter. Just go to the Shelf Reliance Blog and follow the instructions. You might be the winner. Then again maybe it will be me. Good luck! Go to www.shelfreliance.com/blog/ to enter.

Radio

I added an emergency radio to our 72 hour kits. I chose this one because it is small and lightweight. It also is self-powered and has AM/FM and weatherband radio. It is a flashlight too. I hope I never need to use it, but just in case it will be there.

Recipes

I was convinced that food storage was not the most tasty food in the world. I thought "Why store all that stuff? I will have to be starving before I eat it." I found a website with great tips and recipes: www.everydayfoodstorage.net. Crystal Godfrey really knows how to use her food storage and she made me believe that I could do it too. I tried out a couple of her recipes and did not tell my family that is was food storage before they ate it. (That's what she suggests.) They would have never guessed. After I tried a couple of her free recipes that are on her website, I bought her book. I was really sad that I didn't live in Utah. She is having book signings all over Utah. I wanted mine signed too. I think is it so cool to have books signed by the author. I ordered mine from www.amazon.com. When my book arrived, it was signed! How cool! I was so excited. I can't wait to try out more of her recipes.