03Mar 2017 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

From Storage to Stovetop: GREEN CHILI PEPPERS

In this installment of From Food Storage to Stovetop Julie shares about her love of Freeze-Dried Green Chili Peppers and how easy they are to use in your everyday cooking. With a long shelf life and the ease of not having to chop fresh or the flexibility of not having to use a whole can for a few pieces ... these have become a staple in our kitchens. Freeze-Dried to Fresh Conversion 1/4 cup freeze-dried green chili peppers = 1- 4 oz can of green chili peppers 1/3 cup freeze-dried green chili peppers = 2 fresh green chili peppers Favorite Recipes Using Green Chili Peppers Vegetarian White Bean Soup Bacon and Green Chili Cornbread Cilantro-Lime Rice White Bean Chicken Chili Chicken Tortilla Soup Spicy Green Chili and Pinto Bean Soup…

01Mar 2017 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

Upcoming Sun Oven Webinar

Powerless Cooking

Discover 13 ways to harness the power of the sun to be prepared and save money. The All-American Sun Oven is one of our very favorite powerless cooking tools. Learning to cook with the sun has helped us to be better prepared and baking outdoors has reduced our utility bills. We invited Paul Munsen of Sun Ovens International to teach an interactive online seminar for our readers to show us all how we can use our Sun Ovens every day. Paul has devoted his life to sharing fundamental Sun Oven Cooking techniques with people all over the world. Register now to join us for this FREE educational webinar where you will discover: 13 ways the sun can be used year around to give you the peace of mind of knowing…

24Feb 2017 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

From Storage to Stovetop: BLACK BEANS

From Storage to Stovetop, Uncategorized

Today Jodi goes over a few different options you may have for black beans in your food storage. If you store canned beans you probably don't have a hard time with rotating them or knowing how to use them in your everyday cooking. However, for long term storage canned beans are not an ideal solution. They have a short shelf life so are more appropriate for keeping in your 3 month supply as opposed to being your entire supply of beans for a year. Even though we are specifically covering black beans here most of this would apply to pinto beans and navy beans as well. Bean Conversions 1 can of beans = 1 1/2 cups of cooked beans 1/2 cup of dried beans = 1 1/2 cups of cooked…

16Feb 2017 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

From Storage to Stovetop

We're excited to introduce our new From Storage to Stovetop series where we will be highlighting one item from our storage and showing you exactly how we use it in our kitchens. We will be updating this post with an index of each item as we highlight it. So bookmark this page and check back often to see the features as they are posted. From Storage to Stovetop Introduction Facebook Group We'd love to have you join our Storage to Stovetop facebook group to share your own experiences as you use the products we are highlighting each week. It will be a fun place for us all to learn and practice using our food storage together! Click here to join the Facebook Group From Storage to Stovetop Index Instant Pot…

23Jan 2017 by Jodi and Julie 1 Comment

Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

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Cold winter? Feels like it's never ending? Homemade broth made in minutes? Creamy chicken noodle soup? YES PLEASE! The other day we posted a meme on facebook about how sometimes after a big grocery shopping trip you end up ordering pizza because you are too tired to cook. Sound familiar? Well I discovered a way to avoid that when I do my Costco trips. I pick up a rotisserie chicken on the way out and a yummy pre-made salad. It ends up being a whole lot healthier and I get 2-3 meals out of that chicken. We usually eat half the chicken the first night it comes home and then I make a soup out of the rest of the chicken with the yummiest broth thanks to the INSTANT POT!…

15Jan 2017 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

Complete Self Reliance eLibrary for Just $29.97

Self Reliance

Over the last 8 years of running this blog we have learned that there is so much more to the world of being prepared than just having a food storage. That is a GREAT place to start but it feels even better to develop skills and acquire tools to become more self-reliant and less dependent on outside sources to meet your family's needs. We have taken really gone "back to the basics" to learn things that used to be common knowledge but are completely lost skills these days. It's been a grand adventure but one thing is for certain, there is always more to learn! Introducing this year's Back to Basics Bundle We are thrilled to be a part of the Back to Basics Bundle this year which is a…

10Jan 2017 by Jodi and Julie 2 Comments

Vegetarian White Bean Soup

Bean Recipes

Are you looking to eat a little healthier this year? I've recently switched to a vegetarian diet for a number of reasons so I've been on the hunt for new and delicious recipes. Lots of white bean soup recipes call for ham or ham bone and most are cream-based so not very good for the waist-line either. I subscribed to about a million vegetarian/vegan blogs and have spent the last few weeks salivating over new recipes and adding them into my weekly meal planning to try them out a few at a time. This soup from vegetarianventures.com definitely did not disappoint and with a few substitutions is a perfectly acceptable shelf-stable food storage recipe to add to my arsenal! Ingredients: 1 T. olive oil 1/3 c. freeze-dried onions 1 c.…

07Jan 2017 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

How to make bread

Wheat Recipes

Making bread is a skill that you may choose to incorporate into your daily life, or you may just save it for a rainy day. In last month's newsletter we sent an article all about wheat, wheat grinders, and included a whole bunch of recipes. Wheat is the most popular item in food storage plans because of it's long shelf-life and nutrient dense properties. One of the recipes we included in the handout was our FAVORITE bread recipe. Today we wanted to give you three things: A recipe card of our bread recipe you can print A handout that includes an FAQ about making this bread A video where we invite you into our kitchen and show you hands on how to make it We know making bread can be intimidating for…

29Nov 2016 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

Light The World!

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We hope you all had a fantastic Thanksgiving and got to enjoy some time with family and friends. We spent the day together and enjoyed great food and felt grateful for so many things. With Thanksgiving over we're in full swing of the Christmas spirit over here. We usually don't blog a lot in December because we spend extra time with our family at this time of year but we do have a few things we will be sharing this month. We're participating with the #LIGHTtheWORLD Christmas challenge on Mormon.org. Whether you share our faith or are of another faith we invite you to join in the Christmas spirit and spread love this season. Think about these two scriptures as you watch this video: "I am the light of the…

04Nov 2016 by Jodi and Julie No Comments

Spaghetti Squash – 2 ways to cook it and a recipe

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I think it's safe to say gardening season is over here but I am still enjoying the spaghetti squash I grew this year. I consider myself a beginner gardener but I'm proud of what I've grown so far. My kids join in and I love teaching them some good self-reliance skills. So I completely over planted the spaghetti squash this year (LIKE REALLY).So today's post features a couple ways to cook it and a recipe! Back to my dozens of spaghetti squash...They grew well so that was cool but it had left me with so much squash. I don't mind because I love it but I'll admit I don't love how long it takes to cook in the oven. I know you can cook it in the microwave but I…