Canning Dates for the Rest of the Year

Below are the Canning Dates at the Church Regional Cannery for our stake and a reminder about the cannery guidelines.

For more information about Canning at the Cannery, see the How do you get your food storage? post and Policy Change at the Cannery Post.

Canning Dates:

Sep 11, 9 am - 2 pm
Oct 9, 9 am - 2 pm
Nov 6, 9 am - 2 pm
Dec 4, 9 am - 2 pm

Basic Rules:

1. All orders must be received one month before the canning date. Orders should be on the form provided on providentliving.org and e-mailed to the Peacocks at rpeacock8123@yahoo.com
2. Bulk supplies may not be brought in from outside sources for canning in the cannery.
3. Those operating machinery must be at least 16 yrs old.
4. Those receiving canned food must attend the canning session or be babysitting for someone who is canning. You can't can the food for others who are not participating.
5. Children can not be accommodated. There is no place for them to play.
6. Everyone participates on canning everyone else's orders and helps cleanup. Therefore, a person is there for the full canning session.
7. Payment is preferred by check or it must be exact change. Prices may change slightly from what is on providentliving.org and the prices at the cannery due to price changes.
8. Bulk supply orders may be picked up at any time during the session. Note: As soon as the orders are filled and cleanup is done we leave and the cannery is closed. This has been as early as 10:30am.

Egg Substitution in Baking

When I saw a recipe for an egg substitute in then the Church's 1978 Essentials of Home Production and Storage, I've been wanting to try it, and I finally got the stuff and tried it.

The recipe calls for...

1 teaspoon unflavored gelatin
3 tablespoons cold water
2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon boiling water

The recipe didn't give much more instruction than saying to make the egg substitute before you start making cookies, cake, etc.

I used the egg substitution for making cookies. While making the egg substitute, I thought that maybe eggs over thirty years ago must have been a lot bigger because the recipe asks for a lot of water. By the time I needed the egg substitute, the mixture had a slight egg white texture, but it was still watery. I needed to add more flour.

When all was said and done, the cookies were still soft and chewy (how we like'em), but the taste was definitely off. Not bad. The cookie still tasted good, but it was definitely different.

I quickly looked up reasons why, and I bet you can already guess why the taste would be off.

The yoke.

The yoke adds a definite flavor to what your baking, and most egg substitutes, including the unflavored gelatin one above, are imitating the effect egg whites have in baking, not egg yokes.

In researching more online, websites people have recommended using I/2 mashed banana or 1/4 cup apple sauce as a substitute for 1 egg in baking sweet goods. Obviously, these substitutions affect the flavor of what you're baking, but being able to store apple sauce, bananas (when dehydrated or freeze dried), and unflavored gelatin in one's pantry is a plus in the case of emergency or whatever.

Another random, but applicable comment I read online is that "you do not need eggs for most cakes." Think about it. Not using eggs at all in making cakes. The problem with that is I don't think I have enough guts to try making a cake without eggs. What if the cake I'm making doesn't fall under the "most cakes" category? I can't afford at the moment to be unpleasantly surprised when the cake comes out.

Here's the websites I looked at if you're interested.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_can_be_used_as_a_substitute_for_eggs_when_making_a_cake

http://vegetarian.about.com/od/vegetarianvegan101/f/eggsubstitute.htm

http://www.thecookinginn.com/eggsub.html

http://www.wikihow.com/Replace-Eggs-in-Your-Cooking

If you learn just one thing from reading these websites, it's that there are a lot of egg substitutes out there.

So...Which ones have you done, tried and/or swear by?

Rice-A-Roni

I posted about this recipe awhile ago, but hadn't tried it yet. I have now tried it. Although it's not the most delicious recipe that ever was, I do like it and have learned a lot from it.

Here's the recipe

Rice-A-Roni

1 c long grain rice
1 c broken pieces of vermicelli pasta
2 Tbs. butter or oil
1 Tbs. chicken bouillon granules
1 t. dried parsley, crumbled
1/8 t. white pepper
4 1/2 c. hot water

Brown the vermicelli and rice in a saucepan with the butter or oil. Add all other ingredients and cook for 20 minutes. The rice will be light and fluffy. Serves 4.

I've a confession to make. I haven't yet followed the recipe to this day, and I've made it about half a dozen times. In fact, I made it today.

First off, I half the recipe for my family of two adults, a preschooler and a toddler.

Now, this is how I've been making it...

Having lately discovered the greatness of freezers in storing food, I pulled out some frozen red bell pepper and onions (all pre-chopped of course). I sauteed them with a clove of garlic for about 5 minutes. Then I added the inch-long broken up spaghetti (what I substitute for vermicelli) and rice to the saucepan to brown. After that, I added about 2 1/4 cups of water (remember I'm halving the recipe), a small can of chicken, frozen parsley, a cut up chicken bouillon cube (they're surprisingly easy to cut), and a couple shakes of pepper.

It tasted good. We ate it with mixed veggies. If I was a little more proactive, we would have eaten it with grapes as well.

Food storage items used
rice
pasta
canned chicken
onions (if dried or frozen)
peppers (if dried or frozen)
various herbs or spices you have in your pantry, freezer or garden

Anyway...I hope this recipe can give you ideas on how you can use your food storage items.

Last Sunday's Joint RS and Priesthood Meeting

I thought Bro. Gardner did an awesome job on Sunday talking about being prepared for hurricane season. I liked how he impressed on us through pictures, words, and discussion that hurricanes are a reality that we need to prepare for.

There one thing he mentioned that I want to reiterate.

Days before a projected hurricane hit, whole isles at the grocery stores will clear out.

I remember going to Kroger a couple days before Ike and...

Bread isle...empty
Canned goods (soups, beans, fruit, etc.)...gone
Cereal Isle...empty
Water...gone
Chip and snack isle...empty

I'd never seen a grocery store so depleted of products.

This was no coincidence. When a huge storm is pending in the gulf, the shelves of grocery stores will clear.

This is why having at least a two week supply of food requiring little to no prep time is important for you and your family.

One way to gradually build your food storage is to grab a few extra cans, bags, or boxes of what you're already buying. If your buying canned pineapple or corn or beans, buy one or two extra (how ever many your budget permits).

If you don't usually buy canned, bagged, or boxed products, you might need to make an exception when building a food storage, especially if you can't think of alternatives.

Also, distributors like Emergency Essentials (BePrepared.com) specialize in selling all sorts of food storage items. In addition to longer-term food storage items, they sell items ideal for 72 hour kits and crisis situation food storages (power outage/water outage), i.e. MREs (Meals-Ready-To-Eat) and Freeze-Dried Pouch Foods. Both items store well up to 7 years. Just looking at what's available at Emergency Essentials and other companies like it could also give you ideas on what foods you'd like to have stored for hurricane season.

Just some food for thought.

What do you do (or will you do) to be prepared for hurricanes?