Prepper Pantry - Chicken & Cheese

A few weeks ago I made a large bargain purchase of boneless skinless chicken breast at $1.49 a pound as well as some five pound bags of grated cheese at $12.50 a bag.  I also picked up a five pound bag of fresh grated parmesan for $14.95.

I trimmed off any fat and made cutlets out of some of the breasts

I divided all of the chicken into a variety of packages for the freezer.  The breasts were quite large so I butterflied most of them cutting some of them into smaller sizes.  I also sliced and diced some for other recipes.

All of the chicken was wrapped in plastic wrap before it went into Ziploc quart or sandwich sized bags, then labeled with a Sharpie marker.  I date them with the month and year I package them.  Then all of the bags get put into a larger Ziploc bag, either a one or two gallon size which I find helps to ward off freezer burn but also keeps them organized.  Then into the freezer they go.

I did pretty much the same thing with all of the cheese.  I measured it out and place 2 cups into a Ziploc sandwich bag squeezing out any extra air as I closed them.  Once labeled I placed the bags inside of a larger gallon Ziploc and out to the freezer with those as well.  Grated cheeses freeze well and when thawed in the refrigerator turn out quite nice.

With the chicken and cheeses stowed away in our chest freezer we were well on our way to stocking it back up and being better prepared for whatever may come our way.  At the very least we can rest easy knowing we have plenty of good food to eat.

Last Week'sThrifty Moves

Sunday was Mother's Day and my girls were kind enough to make sure I felt loved and appreciated, which I most certainly did.  They spoiled me with coffee, chocolate as well as raspberry and blueberry bushes to plant in our backyard.  They even helped me plant them.  We had a wonderful dinner of grilled steaks, salmon and corn.  My youngest made a salad and we also steamed some asparagus.  It was very nice.

My new blueberry bushes

I had made broth using up onion, celery and carrots in the crisper drawer along with a couple of turkey wings I had in the freezer leftover from Thanksgiving.  I also had a bag of turkey meat in the freezer so once the broth was done I allowed it to chill overnight and skimmed off the fat.  I combined it with the meat and some frozen veggies I had in the freezer for soup to can and keep on our shelf.  Now we have nine cans of delicious and healthy turkey vegetable soup to add to pasta or rice or just eat plain.

Veggies, herbs and turkey bones to make broth

We collectively decided to clear out our refrigerator and its freezer to use up the items inside to minimize any food waste.  We have squirreled away quite a few items in there.  The girls cooked up some pasta and finished up a bowl of leftover sauce I'd stuck into the freezer one evening.  We thawed a container of turkey chili for a couple meals too.  The girls enjoyed bagels and cream cheese as well as french toast to use up some bread items before they went stale.  I cooked up some frozen meatballs for supper one evening and the girls also enjoyed corn dogs for a couple meals last week too.  It was an odd menagerie to say the least, but also kind of fun.

 

We grilled a wonderful dinner on our free grill

My daughter folded our napkins into hearts

Our weather cooled down and we got quite a bit of rain so I didn't need to water anything.  I also didn't get much accomplished outside.  However, I did manage to get quite a bit done indoors so still a good and productive week.  Mostly I did some canning, dehydrating and vacuum sealing for our prepper pantry.

Turkey vegetable soup

Ham & bean soup

Prepper Pantry = canned pasta sauce, ham & bean soup, turkey soup, dehydrated onions & peppers.  Vacuum sealed oatmeal packets, pasta, flour & sugar.

More vacuum sealed item for our prepper pantry

Instant oatmeal packets
I cut part of the box off as my label with nutrition facts

Some of the 15 Minute Chores I accomplished to keep my home in order:

Laundry Room & Half Bathroom - vacuumed & mopped floors.  Daily swish & swipe.

Dining Room - vacuumed & mopped floor, cleaned the china cabinet shelves, dusted chair rail & baseboards.

Kitchen -  vacuumed & mopped floor, cleaned microwave, bleached the sink.

Bedrooms & Main Bathroom - vacuumed & dusted.  Scrubbed sink, mopped floor.  Daily swish & swipe.

Other - two large loads of laundry, vacuumed & dusted living room, hallway & entry.  Swept front porch & garage.

I made two loaves of banana bread

How was your thrifty week?

Financial Management - Planning For Big Expenses

Along with an emergency fund I like to have another fund for larger planned expenses.  These are expenses that pop up annually like our auto insurance bill or occasionally like new tires for the truck.  I try to plan ahead and set aside a certain amount each month to meet these expenses.

Planning ahead and setting aside money a little at a time works well so you I don't find myself running on a super thin budget one month or even worse reaching for that credit card.  It also helps me keep my emergency fund intact.  After all, failure to plan does not constitute an emergency.  It simply means I am not better prepared.

If I pay our auto insurance bill, due in November, in full I save a lot of money.  First they offer me a discount for paying it in full.  Otherwise I wouldn't get the discount and if I broke it up into payments throughout the year I would have to pay service fees for the privilege.  Two very good reasons for me to plan ahead and save money all year long so when it is due I can pay it in full.

Vacations are another thing I really enjoy saving up money for.  I found that by tucking aside a mere $35 a month it wasn't long before we had more than enough for our dream family vacation last year.

Whatever the case may be, planning ahead to fund those big expenses will save a lot in the long run.  A lot of money and even better, a lot of stress.

Another Small Home Improvement - Pantry Upgrade

This was a super fun project for me.  With all of the prepping and stocking up we've been doing lately I needed a bigger pantry, but forget that.  We don't have the space to build a larger pantry so the one we have had to make due.  My best bet was to make our current pantry better.

The new shallower shelf actually works better to get things on and off

To begin with I went through everything and put all like items together.  I washed shelves and realized I could adjust some of them to give me better spacing and allow me to add an additional shelf.

The old top shelf relocated at the bottom is spaced to hold quart and pint jars
while the shelf above it is spaced for holding pint jars making for more storage

I removed the top shelf to give me the "extra" shelf I needed to hold my home canning.  I spaced it to hold quarts and pints as well as the one above it to hold only pint jars.  Then I needed to replace the top shelf.

These items found new homes

I happened to have a shelf out in the garage and although it wasn't as wide as the ones I have in the pantry I knew I could still make it work.  I cut two pieces of wood and screwed them in at the top, cut the shelf to length and in it went.  Although it is not as deep it is a much better size for that space and makes it much easier to use.

The top shelf now holds just what I needed

On the top shelf I have my extra food storage containers, some baking pans, picnic ware and our extra egg cartons.  That is all that I have in here for non food items.  Everything else in here is food.

Pasta, rice & beans are all in glass jars

I needed to relocate quite a few items I usually keep in the pantry, but that was fine.  I did find new homes for these things as well as got rid of quite a bit too.

On the floor of the pantry I had the perfect amount of space to hold my boxes filled with vacuum sealed dry good.  Each box has a label too so I know what is inside.  The temperature in the pantry stays pretty steady year round so it will keep nicely and the boxes will keep out any light too.

Like items together

Canned goods neatly organized

Simply adding a shelf gave me a much larger pantry and the perfect amount of space I needed.  Total cost to complete this project = $0.  Even better!

A New Pressure Canner

As some of you may have guessed I got a new electric pressure canner.  And I love it!

This is a 13 quart NuWave multi function electric pressure cooker and for the money it is a very nice unit.  It was listed on Amazon for $149.99 + free shipping.  Not bad at all.  This thing is huge and holds up to nine pint jars at one time.  Perfect!  I couldn't be happier.

So far I've canned quite a bit in the past week since it arrived - pork verde, chili, pasta sauce, turkey soup and very soon I plan to do salsa.  I have plenty of other things on my list too.

On Sunday morning the youngest and I went to the thrift store and found a bunch of canning jars with price tags that just happened to be the color of the day and therefore 75% OFF.  Most of the jars I purchased were only 12¢ and 17¢ each.  I picked up a couple quart jars as well as a very vintage half gallon jar to add to my collection.  The quarts are to store our dehydrated foods and the half gallon will be perfect for rice, beans or pasta.  I was very happy with my finds.

I have to say thank you to the reader who encouraged me to bite the bullet and get the canner.  She said I wouldn't be sorry and she is absolutely right about that.  I'm super happy with it and excited to not only can some more, but to also try out some of the other features it has.  It even bakes and it came with a nice big cookbook too.  I'll keep you posted as I learn more about my cooker.

I just love it!

Have any of you got big plans for canning this year?  What are some of the things you are planning to put up and preserve?

Berry Bushes!

The girls spoiled me rotten on Mother's Day with some new additions to our garden.

We planted the raspberries next to our fence

Three raspberry starts!  They drove all the way to a private gardener in Nampa, Idaho to pick these up.  I was really touched that they were willing to go out of their way and get these.  And they are thorn less too!  Yay!

Blueberries planted along the deck

Three blueberry bushes!  I was very excited to get these too.  I love blueberries and I'm super excited to get some bushes of my very own.  I found a perfect place to plant them next to our deck.

Edith and the girls heartily approve

And an update on our bareroot strawberry plants.  They are taking very nicely to their new home.  We might actually have some success with these this year.  The netting is definitely doing the trick to keep the squirrels away.

Doesn't look like much yet

It will be very nice to have some more fruit bearing plants in our garden to go with our apple and pear trees.  I have the best daughters ever.

Last Week's Thrifty Moves

Sunday morning I was up with the sun, showered and dressed.  I got my electric blanket and flannel sheets off my bed and into the wash and the spring bedding onto my bed.  I opened my bedroom window to let in the cool fresh spring air and was able to look down and admire my handy work.  I am very pleased with the progress I have made in our backyard.

I did really well at Dollar Tree this time

I took the day off from yard work and after putting a ham into our slow cooker I headed off to Dollar Tree with a list to do some long awaited shopping.  I was happy to see the store was well stocked making it so I was able to get the things I was hoping to.  I picked up quite a few grocery items as well as some laundry supplies.

Prepper pantry items!

Later that evening the youngest and I headed off to Winco with an even larger list off stock up items mostly for our prepper pantry.  After putting these groceries away I cut up the ham to be packaged for multiple future meals as well as slice ham for sandwiches.

I picked up 3 large packages of stew meat on markdown

Monday I dashed to Fred Meyer on my lunch break to pick up pork roast on sale for 99¢ a pound.  I have plans for the roast and will share with you what I did with it in another post.  When I got home I packaged up sirloin steaks and sausages for the freezer.  I also cleared out the chest freezer in the garage and organized it.  Newest items are bagged and binned at the bottom and oldest on top to be used in the coming months.  Odds and ends are in the kitchen freezer.

I made homemade pizza with leftover ham

Tuesday I came home from work and loaded up the dehydrator with green beans and a little bit of corn.  I ran the onions I'd done over the weekend through my little food processor to make them more of a minced onion.  Seven onions nearly filled up a quart jar and they smell, oh my goodness.  Those onions smell divine.  I have a lot more onions to go too.

Dehydrated onions smell so good!

Wednesday evening I put the dehydrated green beans into a quart jar and filled it back up with sliced mushrooms and celery.  I also filled up the dishwasher with four dozen canning so I could get busy and do some serious canning that week and weekend.  Before bed I put a giant pork roast into my largest slow cooker with onions and green chile sauce on low and let it go all night.

Pork verde

Thursday morning I awoke to the heavenly smells of pork verde.  I shredded the roast and removed the bone and any fat.  Then I reloaded the slow cooker with another roast on low and let it go all day while I was at work.  When I got home I was able to get both batches of meat jarred and processed.

Saturday I was wide awake at 2:30 in the morning and couldn't go back to sleep.  So I got up and went downstairs to the kitchen and found myself cleaning and reorganizing our pantry.  Later, when everyone else got up, I went out to the garage and cut a new shelf so I could expand the storage to accommodate jars of home canning as well as our vacuum sealed and dehydrated items.  I removed and relocated quite a few non food items too.

I put the rice, pasta and beans away in Mason jars and organized everything by category.  By the time I was done it looked really good.

I added a new shelf up on top using stuff I had out in the garage

After overhauling the pantry I got busy and canned a batch of homemade chili to put on the new shelves.  Total cost to can the chili came in at 45¢ a pint jar and I ended up with 17 jars.  Healthy, delicious and thrifty.  You can't beat that!

All finished!

A week earlier I cashed in my credit card rewards points for a Home Depot gift card.  It arrived in the mail last week and I have great plans for that gift card.  I also completed a wellness challenge at work to earn another $50 gift card.  I'm excited to get that one too.

Homemade chili

Prepper Pantry = dehydrated onions, green beans, mushrooms & celery, sirloin steaks, sausages, pork verde & chili.

I got a gift in the mail!

Some of the 15 Minute Chores I accomplished to keep my home in order:

Laundry Room & Half Bathroom - vacuumed floors.  Daily swish & swipe.

Dining Room - vacuumed floor.

Kitchen -  vacuumed & spot mopped floor, cleaned microwave, scrubbed sink.

Bedrooms & Main Bathroom - vacuumed & dusted.  Scrubbed sink & tub.  Daily swish & swipe.

Other - two large loads of laundry, vacuumed & dusted living room, hallway & entry, polished wood furniture.  Swept front porch.

Dehydrated celery and mushrooms

How was your thrifty week?