Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Buying this year to save in the future

I am writing late this Saturday.  I hadn't been feeling well and when I got a flu shot on Tuesday, it has brought mild flu symptoms.  Just enough to keep me feeling blah.  This is my normal reaction, which is why I don't get a flu shot every year but my doctor has said this year's flu is nothing to take a chance with.

We are now very cold and there is both colder weather and snow in the forecast so I made certain to have everything I need for our Christmas Eve meal already purchased.  This meal is pretty much the same I make for Easter, easy to make and with ham on sale... not very expensive.

Ham is definitely the cheapest protein to buy right now.  They freeze very well.  I bought a couple extra last year, the ham that has a large bone in it.  I made a ham bone broth out of it to use in bean soups last winter.  I saw that technique on a homestead blog and wondered why I had never thought of doing that before!

This year for my kid's Christmas (and their spouses), I bought a cookbook I thought each would appreciate and a various food items I didn't think they would buy for themselves.  Did you know they now have a Sasquatch brand of maple sugar?  I had to get a small bag for my New England family.

I think food will be appreciated by many people this year.  My kid's families enjoy cooking and trying different recipes (Christopher got a Japanese cookbook for his birthday) so I can try unique food items but if I was buying for some friends, I would keep the gifts to more common items... coffee, chocolate, good olive oil, etc.

I had an appointment in town early last week and my husband asked if I would stop by Hobby Lobby for Christmas cards while I was nearby.  They already have 60% off most Christmas items, 70% off of Christmas decorations.  I bought a box of cards for him and a package of treat bags for candy gifts but if I go back to town before Christmas, I want to purchase various sizes of gift bags for next year's gifts.

Usually I shop for half-price gift bags after Christmas but there have been very few left in the last two years.  It is also the time I buy Christmas cupcake liners, etc. to use next year.  I am even using Christmas Ziploc bags from last year!  All at a much reduced price than they were originally.

I think a lot has changed with COVID and the supply chain uncertainty.  Hobby Lobby had lots of stuff still available but Meijer's Christmas offerings were much less than usual at the store closest to where I live.

Oh, speaking of Ziploc bags earlier... the Ziploc bags I use in my deep freeze are the Ziploc XL bags that my store sells on the bottom shelf of the other Ziploc items.  They are often used to carry sports supplies or clothing.  They are heavy enough to hold the frozen food and the handles make it easy to bring up from the deep freeze.

I am currently making changes in my menu plans (which are very informal) to incorporate more winter vegetables and less salad ingredients.  Not only do they cost less at this time of year but some salad ingredients have not been up to their usual quality in produce sections.  

I grew up eating lots of cabbage in cold weather but my husband was never fond of it.  I have since found out that he loves it sauteed in butter instead of steamed or boiled.  Then again, I think he would eat just about anything if there was enough butter.

I did take advantage of the butter sale at Aldi, only a few boxes since I had some already.  Butter freezes so well.  I put a label with the month and year purchased on each package of butter when I put it in the freezer.  Recently, I pulled out a package of Kerrygold butter frozen last February and it was fine.  

I make certain that I stock up on Kerrygold salted butter when it goes on sale.  I keep a stick in a Pyrex butter holder on my kitchen counter.  Since it is salted, it lasts quite awhile at room temperature.  Irish butter is one of my few frugal luxuries.  I don't bake with it except for something like shortbread cookies, where the taste of the butter comes through.  But it makes even a cabbage hater a cabbage plus butter lover.  ;)

It is getting quite late and I do not have time to proofread much so please forgive any typos and strange putting together of words. 

Image:  Christmas Glow

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Eating from the pantry and a favorite recipe

We have been experiencing a cold rain in our part of the Midwest most of this week.  Except for one day when the rain was more steady, it has been mostly sprinkles or a misty rain.  With temperatures only in the upper 30s or around 40, the cold goes right through one's bones!  I feel colder with this weather than when it is well below freezing and snowing.

Except for a quick trip to the grocery store for produce, dairy, and a couple items I needed for Holiday cooking, I haven't done much shopping this week.  When I did, everything was well stocked except there were less packages of flour and sugar one usually finds in December.  It is definitely a good thing to stock up before the Holidays the way the world is right now.

What continues to surprise me, even though I read about it all the time, is the continuing spike in the cost of food.  I came home from Meijer with just a few bags... those small plastic bags... and the cost was over $90.00.  Even then, I gave the young woman at the self check out line a box of Tylenol to put back on the shelf.  I could wait...

My son and his family came over for dinner this week, I gave both Mr. & Mrs. Christopher their birthday gifts after dinner.  When we had pulled food from the deep freeze to use soon, I found two packages of beef bones and one package of a small chuck roast that I could use for soup.

I always make soup stock, whether beef or chicken, a couple days ahead of time so I can easily strain the fat off the top.  This time, since I had so many bones, I simmered the "bone broth" all day before cooling it and putting it in the refrigerator.  The next day I skimmed the fat and simmered the rest of the stock with carrots and an onion.  I also added the chuck roast with the bones to simmer for a few hours.  Then, I removed the cooked beef and strained the rest into a smaller stock pot before it went back to the refrigerator.

The afternoon I was going to serve it, I added two cans of tomatoes and the vegetables along with the cook beef I had shredded and simmered until the vegetables were soft.  It seems like a lot of work but it was over three days and until I had to chop the vegetables the final afternoon, I didn't have to do much but watch to see when I needed to add water.  It was delicious!

Because the weather has been so raw and I thought perhaps the kids wanted something other than soup, I also made my favorite macaroni and cheese casserole.  It is so good!  

I only make it when I have extra people here to eat it or I would eat too much of the pasta. It is also a good pantry meal because everything is usually what I have on hand, anyway.  I will add the recipe below.

One thing I have done for decades to stretch our budget is to shop Goodwill and thrift stores.  Most of my clothes come from Goodwill and I am always getting compliments on them.  That is how I can wear the highest quality for next to nothing.  Not to mention, I can find brand names there that I  no longer can find at the Mall, like Alfred Dunner tops.

Because I know God cares for even the smallest details, He knows our every need, I was not all that surprised (well, just a little) when I went to Goodwill to drop off some items last week and when I looked around, found a very good quality high chair just when I had been thinking that we needed to buy one since the baby is sitting but not able to eat at the table, yet.

I washed it off, even though it already was very clean and he looked so cute eating in it.  We were all thankful for that much needed and inexpensive find.  I love it when God does that!

So, here is the macaroni and cheese recipe I use.  It is very similar to the Beverly Nye recipe that she said her mother gave her, which means it was probably from the 40s, 50s, or perhaps the 60s. Somewhere along the line, I had found this recipe and it is almost the same amounts. Although, her crumb topping is not sauteed in butter.

It does require making an easy roux and for new cooks, there are how-to videos all over the Internet on how to make a roux as a base for multiple sauces.  This is an easy recipe, it just requires close attention at times.

Macaroni and Cheese with a Buttered Cracker Topping

• 2 Cups elbow macaroni (Pasta shapes like shells would work, too.)
  
• 2 to 3 Tablespoons butter
• 2 to 3 Tablespoons flour
• 2 Cups milk (I have a little extra available if the sauce needs more)
• 2 Cups shredded cheese, I use mild cheddar
  

• Topping: 1 sleeve Ritz style crackers crushed, 3 to 4 Tablespoons butter

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cook macaroni in salted water per instructions for Al dente, drain and set aside.  Melt butter in saucepan and add flour.  Cook stirring constantly about a minute until flour is cooked.  Watch carefully because it can easily burn at this point.  It has happened to me!

Slowly add the milk, stirring until it thickens into a sauce.  Add the shredded cheese and stir until cheese melts.  If the sauce is too thick, add a little milk at a time until it loosens up a bit.

Melt butter in small skillet and add crumbled crackers.  Stir to make sure they get evenly coated with butter.  Like the roux, this can burn easily so don't walk away.  Keep stirring until slightly golden brown.  Set aside.

Butter or grease a casserole dish.  I use a 9 x 13 but a square dish works fine, too.

Pour macaroni and cheese into the dish and bake about ten minutes.  Then pull out of oven carefully and spread buttered cracker crumbs over all the top.  Bake another 15 to 20 minutes until bubbly and the crumbs are golden brown.  

You probably can put the crumb mixture on in the beginning but you will need to watch it carefully that it doesn't get too brown before the macaroni and cheese is cooked.

It can be served immediately but it is very hot.  I have found letting it sit about ten or fifteen minutes helps.

This is quintessential comfort food and better than anything from a box.  Although... I did make plenty of the boxed mac and cheese for lunches when I had young children.  At one time, Christopher liked it even better!

Image:  A blog friend created this a number of years ago.  I have always loved it.

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Inflation has changed our buying and meal planning habits

My friends, I hope if you are an American then you had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  I wish our Thanksgiving holiday was around the same time as our neighbors in Canada so the colorful leaves would still be on the trees. 

As much as I love the season of Christmas, the Thanksgiving meal is my favorite each year.  Of course, made more special because of the people who were with us this year.  We do not change up the menu, certain foods are expected each year.  These were added to when my daughter-in-law's family joined us and we had to have "orange stuff" each year.  I have no idea regarding the recipe.

I seem to have taken some people by surprise by my absence since I tucked the announcement that I wouldn't be here last weekend where it wasn't obvious.   Sorry about that!

Before our family arrived, my husband helped me take everything out of the deep freeze to check what was in the large, blue Ziploc bags I keep most meat in to protect them even further.  The large bags also make it easier to pull everything out of the deep freeze. Frozen veggies and prepared foods are on top of the bags and in the two baskets.  

We did this partly to unearth the turkey I needed to begin defrosting the week before I was going to roast it ahead of time to get drippings for gravy and stock for the dressing.  I used part of the white meat that week for sandwiches, I froze the rest of the white meat, and made soup from everything else.

The cost of meat has gone up so much that I needed to transfer some of what I already have frozen to the small freezer that is part of the refrigerator.  Because I had most of what I needed for the Thanksgiving meal, I only had to purchase a few items like dairy to prepare the recipes.

I mentioned before that we have multiple birthdays as well as Christmas gifts for the family to purchase and we do not keep a balance on our credit card.  If we can't pay it off when the bill arrives, it doesn't get spent.  I was very tempted with all the Amazon sales but I only purchased a few Christmas gifts that I was going to buy, anyway.

Last week was stock up time (where did that last month go?) and both my Aldi and Meijer purchases were much less than usual so I could add more to the gift budget.  Having food in the freezer and pantry made that possible.

It was especially amazing to me because it seems the prices jumped a great deal since my last stock up week.  The bottle of olive oil we purchase had already gone from around $13.00 to around $17.00.  Now it is $21.99!  

Yikes.  Hubby and I had a ummm... talk?... about how much olive oil he puts on his salads and being an engineer, he decided to measure how much he usually used.  Indeed, the amount surprised even him.  He has cut back to half that amount of olive oil now.  He still takes a couple tablespoons medicinally with his Vitamin D and medications on days he does not have a salad. 

I am doing everything possible not to waste any food and even then, I had a bag of salad go bad before the Use By date and had to throw away some Campari tomatoes that had turned overnight (or so it seemed).  I have heard that happening from others, too. I have found when I just purchase romaine or iceberg lettuce, they last much longer than the bags of chopped salad.

I'm also continuing my "Everlasting Meals" whenever possible.  We were tired of the turkey noodle soup after two meals (neither of us love turkey soup) so I thickened the last of the soup and added some milk and butter to make it more like a gravy base and served that over mashed potatoes.  My husband liked it much better than the soup.

Every year I tell him that I could just imagine what his mother would say if I threw away the turkey carcass, especially since it still had some dark meat on it.  So, making the soup is an annual tradition that is especially helpful in these days of inflation.

Usually I would stock up the pantry more during the Holiday season but this year I mainly purchased what we would need for November and December.  I did purchase some extra cans of pumpkin for making pumpkin bread during the year.  I also purchased a new can of Kroger Apple Pie Spice since the older can was almost empty.

I don't use pumpkin pie spice for Holiday baking because it has ginger in it and I have a picky eater in the house who does not like ginger.  I haven't seen apple pie spice sold everywhere and I even had to search for it at Kroger since it was not out with the Holiday display since it was pumpkin season.

I will include a link to my sister's chicken tetrazzini recipe below.  It is very time consuming when made this way and I had to find a different brand of the cheese crackers but I wanted to make it exactly like she did as my son requested.  It was worth it!  Not exactly healthy but quite yummy.

Isn't it amazing how some tastes can take us back to other times and help us remember people who are no longer with us?  Perhaps that is why some people become depressed during the Holidays.  We tend to do a lot of remembering and it becomes apparent that those we loved are not at the table.

As for the pulled pork, I was mainly looking for technique with the pulled pork recipe.  Especially how to turn out a good pulled pork without it roasting twelve hours.  So, there wasn't just one exact link I can include but I will add one that comes close as far as the technique.

I have the rest of the pulled pork in the freezer.  It will make a good meal on a cold day in January or February.  It would make a good sandwich on a cold day like today but we are still recovering from feasting at Thanksgiving and the wonderful meal we shared at a restaurant the next evening.

Speaking of which, one of the appetizers my daughter ordered was something we have had before called something like Autumn Nachos.  I think there is more to the name than that.  But the large corn chips are covered with things like pulled pork instead of ground beef and it has sliced brussel sprouts, cubed butternut squash, dried cranberries, and other autumnal foods instead of the usual ingredients.

My daughter, daughter-in-law, and I love it.  There were some who have the opposite reaction.  ;)  But it is fun to try new ways to serve dishes we are used to eating with other ingredients.

Mentioned in this Blog Post

Everlasting Meals... here.

My sister's recipe... here.

Kind of like I made the pulled pork... here.  Every recipe I looked up had different seasonings.

I didn't use all of these seasonings and I used a bottled barbecue sauce after it baked.  I baked a whole pork shoulder roast in a heavy dutch oven, covered for three to three and a half hours.  I then took the lid off and baked it at least another fifteen or twenty minutes to get the "brown ends" we love on the pork.  Martha's recipe calls for cutting the pork shoulder into smaller pieces.

This is as close as I could find to the technique I came up with that worked.  Next time, I will not put the barbecue sauce on all of the pulled pork.  Instead, I will put it on only what we will use for sandwiches immediately and keep the rest without any extra sauce.  I think the texture will be better in the long run that way and it will provide more options for leftovers.

Disclosure:  Most links to Amazon.com are Associate links.

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Cooking to battle inflation

What a difference a couple of weeks makes in the world around us!  Two weeks ago we still had some colorful leaves on the trees.  Today most of the leaves have fallen and there are snowflakes descending from the sky.

It almost puts me in the Christmas mood.  While I will wait to do much Christmas decorating, I will be more likely to listen to the music of the season now that we have had our first (however light) snowfall.  My friend who lives in the Dakotas has been experiencing blizzard conditions.  I will take a few snowflakes here and there without complaining.

The stores that I go to have been well stocked and if one store was a little low on a product, another store had plenty.  I didn't go back to Aldi last week but I am hearing online that they have a lot of Thanksgiving sales going on right now, including the price of turkeys and butter.  I will definitely check it out this next week.

Meijer has turkeys on sale.  One of turkeys is down to (I think) 59 cents a pound with purchase.  What I did notice was all of those turkeys were huge.  Meijer also had whole chickens on sale for 99 cents a pound.  I haven't seen that price for awhile so I bought one to start chicken stock this afternoon.

I mentioned last week that I had purchased a pork shoulder for the first time in ages to make pulled pork sandwiches.  Most of the recipes I had seen for pulled pork had the pork shoulder (aka: Boston Butt) cooking for around twelve hours.

I had purchased the pork shoulder at Sam's when I saw it at a very good price and figured I would look up various recipes online.  I found a recipe that had a three hour cooking time and one could lower the oven temperature to keep it cooking a couple hours longer.

That is the recipe I used and it turned out to be fabulous.  I slowly cooked it in my large Lodge dutch oven (in the oven) and the pork shredded easily.  I put together a simple rub that I rubbed into the top fatty side of the roast, along with plenty of salt and pepper.  We enjoyed pulled pork sandwiches for a couple of dinners and most of it went to the freezer.  I only put Sweet Baby Ray's original barbecue sauce on the part that we had immediately.

That one pork shoulder could have fed a crowd for a very reasonable amount, especially with sides of cole slaw (which is cheap to make), and perhaps baked beans and potato salad.  Makes me almost miss July and picnics!  Believe me, I will start missing very warm days again by January.

Christopher and his family came over for dinner early last week.  I asked if he had any requests and one thing that came up was his Aunt Joan's Chicken Tetrazzini.  I hadn't made it in a long time but I found the recipe and started it the day before they were coming.

Her chicken tetrazzini was a legend and while she passed away when my son was very young, he still remembers that casserole.  So, I printed out the recipe as she had given me and made it exactly the same as her instructions, Which I found, had to be tweaked off and on as she used to always double or triple the recipe and some of the amounts were off for one casserole.

The way she made it was to start with a whole chicken and "boil it" (I would say simmer on medium to medium-high heat) until the cooked meat fell off the bone.  She then used the chicken stock to boil the spaghetti in for a good flavor.  

After I had removed the chicken, I thought that was a waste of delicious rich chicken bone broth so I ladled that broth to a freezer container (for later use in soup stock) and covered the bones once again with water to make a less rich stock but one that would still provide flavor to the spaghetti. 

It provided plenty of flavor to the spaghetti and although that recipe takes a lot of time and a day to wash all the dishes (I would NOT let my daughter-in-law help, she had a night off of cooking), it was worth it.  Isn't it amazing how food can bring back good memories?

I thought it remarkable that one of the women (Jess the Pilgrim) I follow on IG was talking about stretching her food dollar a few days later and she talked about what those who came before us called "second stock".  That is exactly what they called using the bones a second time and they often used that "second stock" for cooking food like rice to add flavor.

I'm making chicken soup today because I do not have room for the chicken in my freezer and the morning snowflakes made me think soup would make a good dinner.  I haven't made lemon chicken orzo soup for awhile, it sounds very good for a cold day.  When we lived in the Detroit area, there was a Greek restaurant that served delicious lemon chicken rice soup.  This is very similar.

I have put back quite a few packages of 15-bean soup, which is what I planned to make this weekend but it can wait a week.  Many articles and books I have read about saving money in the kitchen suggest a soup meal at least once a week, especially in colder weather.

I will be away from blogging next weekend and the following Saturday as I will have company coming and going so there will be no time for putting together anything other than making memories.  

Because of that, just a reminder that if you need to defrost a turkey before Thanksgiving, place it in a container that can hold condensation as it defrosts (there can be a lot with a turkey), give it plenty of days to defrost, and let it sit outside the refrigerator awhile before roasting it.  

Some websites say to let it sit out at least an hour before going into the oven.  This will help the inside of the turkey roast quicker so the white meat does not dry out.  I didn't know that until about a decade ago.  It is the same for any large roast.

There is always more to learn about cooking.  I have been spending more time looking for recipes that are budget friendly.  My sister's casserole was not budget friendly or quickly made but it was special. 

Mentioned in this Blog Post

Lodge Dutch Oven 6 quart... here. I keep this on a shelf in the garage along with other cookware I don't use a lot.  It is heavy but it is also perfect for some kinds of cooking, like the pulled pork roast!  It is also available in a smaller 4 quart size... here. (The 4 quart size is on sale at the moment.)

Lodge tends to be heavier than Le Creuset but it is a fraction of the cost and it is American made.  I had a Le Cruset dutch oven that lasted for decades until it had chipped too much to safely use.  They are remarkable but I couldn't see spending that much money these days.

Jess the Pilgrim on Instagram... here.

Lemon Chicken Orzo Soup... here. 

Disclaimer:  Most links to Amazon.com are Associate links.

Image:  Apple Pie Harvest

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Stock up week before the election

Our Internet finally came back on after being off for awhile.  I'm thinking the high winds may have something to do with it. (The new and improved Internet service has not made it to our gravel lane, yet.) So, just in case we lose Internet again... I am not going to put any links in today's blog post.  I will just type as fast as possible! 

There have been a couple red flags to indicate the need to be prepared more than usual on the prepper vlogs recently.  The first has to do with the shortage of diesel fuel needed to transport food and supplies.  

Is there really a shortage and if there is, what caused it? I'm past speculating about such things these days.  Instead, I decided to finish my stock up shopping this week instead of doing the Sam's and Walmart shopping next week.  I don't purchase very much at either place, which made it easy.

I also do not plan on being out and about after we vote on Tuesday.  We don't live in an area where there has been much political outrage taken to the streets.  There were some marches prior to and after the presidential election but mostly the battles were on social media and I avoided them as much as possible.

Having said that, it is still a good idea to listen to warnings from some people that we should be at least a little stocked up before the election.  Sometimes the speculation from those who study what is going on in the world around us is justified.  It wouldn't hurt to be prepared, especially if you live in a major city where there could be unrest.

I have been making an effort recently to plan our meals more than I have since the kids left home.  Especially to try inexpensive but tasty meals.  Last week I slow cooked deboned chicken thighs until they were almost falling apart.  I drained the liquid into a bowl and added a jar of Aldi's butter chicken sauce, then baked it another fifteen minutes.  I served it along with naan bread that I had toasted.

It was inexpensive and delicious but what shocked me was that my husband, who dislikes dark meat poultry and any Indian sauce on anything... really liked it.  I usually have the butter chicken sauce in the pantry but this was the first time I bought deboned chicken thighs.  They were a winner!  This made enough for two meals.

My second attempt at something new was a purchase of a pork shoulder roast (Boston Butt) at Sam's Club.  I am slow roasting it today to make pulled pork.  We will see how it turns out but it certainly smells good.  I made a simple rub of garlic powder, onion powder, oregano, smoked paprika, and salt.  For liquid, I added two tablespoons of tomato paste to a cup of warm water.  It has been slow roasting in the oven since this morning.

As far as shortages while shopping, I noticed a shortage of herbs and spices at some of the stores.  I wanted to purchase a small container of dill but the only dill I could find in three stores was one of the pricier brands.  Since I needed it for a recipe, I went ahead and bought the brand that was available.

It looks like the common spices used during the Holidays were available but I wouldn't wait until the last minute.  

We always purchase the Kroger brand of club soda and there was none to be found this past week.  There was also no room for it on the shelves, which had been moved to a new location.  That was odd.

Meijer had a lot of empty shelves when I shopped on Tuesday. It had the most shortages of all the stores.  The only sugar they had was powdered sugar when I was there.  They were out of a few nonfood items I needed so I will probably return on Monday to see if they are now in stock. 

Kroger was well stocked although a little low on some items such as flour and sugar.  They didn't have frozen organic fruit and were once again very limited on their brand of frozen organic vegetables.  They have been out of most of the organic vegetables for awhile but at least this week they had frozen organic spinach.  Their organic corn is only available in a large bag recently.  Instead, I have been buying the Birdseye brand.

Aldi has been out of half-and-half for a long time but they were finally in stock this week.  They now have most of their Holiday foods in stock, including their vintage looking foil wrapped chocolates.  I bought them on this shopping trip to make certain I had them for Oliver and Piper this Christmas.

Aldi is well known for their charcuterie board offerings at a good price.  Even with higher prices all around, I thought they were reasonable.  Although, I didn't buy any so I hope they haven't gone up in price by December.  

I have noticed that even the Aldi prices have gone up a lot.  Whoever says the rate of inflation is 8% has not shopped for food.  Some of the food items we purchase have gone up 50% to 100% in the various stores.

I only needed a few items at Sam's Club.  So, I stopped by when running errands near there last week.  They had the pecans and the cashews I needed but they didn't have my favorite Kerrygold Irish butter in stock. 

I had to purchase insulin pen needles at Walmart on Friday.  While there, I looked around to see how their stock looked.  They are putting out the Pioneer Woman Christmas plates and such and they are always cute.  Their food section seemed to be well stocked but the one thing I noticed that was odd is the very long rack of clearance clothing.

I had heard that Walmart had a lot of clothing come in that had been delayed in shipping.  The long rack, probably multiple racks put together, had so many clothes that I doubt there was room for any more.

So, most of my grocery shopping is complete for November.  I only have to go back for produce and dairy, as well as what they were out of last week.  Also, any last minute purchases for Thanksgiving recipes.

The wind is picking up again so I had better publish this before we lose Internet connection again.  Every time we have this kind of winds going through, I am very thankful to God that we could have those old (and very big) trees next to our house cut down.  We already had near misses with some huge branches.  

He does take care of His people and He will provide for you.

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Simplifying meals and stretching the food budget

Today's Pantry post is later than usual.  We had a very important birthday party to attend and while I started the post yesterday, I couldn't finish it until after dinner this evening.

The days are certainly cooler with only the occasional and temporary revisiting of the 70s temperatures now and then. After above normal temperatures for so long, the cooler weather has felt good. 

It seems that October has flown by, it doesn't seem possible next week is the beginning of November .  It is already time for Holiday season preparations.  Although, I look for gifts all year round, this year even more than in the past I have been keeping an eye out for unique food gifts.

I have mentioned in lots of Holiday Pantry posts that I have found people enjoy food gifts that they usually would not purchase themselves.  That is for another blog post but in the meantime, I have looked for items like delicious prepared foods (such as jellies, chutney, oils, vinegar, pickled foods for those who like them, chocolates, etc.).

We have a lot of birthdays around the times of the Holidays, so I'm always thinking ahead for stretching the gift budget.  Our first birthday of the season is this weekend when Oliver turns four years old.  I purchased his main gift in the summer when I knew it was still available.

I have been tweaking changes to our meal plans and purposely making purchases for the least amount of food waste.  I didn't think we wasted much but after trying not to waste any food, I'm surprised how much was being thrown away. Just a little produce here and there but it adds up over time.

In order to change how I am putting meals together and in order to waste less from the grocery store, I have been changing my routines to wash most vegetables as soon as I arrive home from the store or at least the next morning.  Having them washed and ready to go makes them easier to use in recipes and throw together meals.

Of course, there are some foods we should never wash ahead of time like strawberries or mushrooms.  I don't purchase fresh strawberries this time of the year but I do purchase mushrooms off and on.  

I learned from Jacques Pepin's cooking shows that one should always purchase the mushrooms that are a little older and on sale whenever possible.  He says that is when they are at their prime flavor and you save money. He just washes them off with a damp paper towel before cooking them.

There is always something new to learn about cooking.  I was half way listening to a cooking show while in my kitchen and I caught the guy talking about preparing shredded cabbage to make cole slaw.  

He shreds it and then places it in a colander on a bowl and then sprinkles a good amount of kosher salt over the shredded cabbage and leaves it at least six hours (or overnight) in the refrigerator.  He said the texture of the cabbage is always perfect for the slaw by doing that.  I have heard of similar treatments of cabbage, only they strained it in the colander for less time.

We had chicken soup for dinner last night.  I simmered the chicken with an onion and celery earlier in the week and then let it sit covered in the stock pot until yesterday morning when I warmed it and drained it through a colander into a smaller dutch oven in the morning.  

While the stock set in the refrigerator until time to finish it before dinner, the stock pot and colander were soaked and washed with the breakfast/lunch dishes.  Making for far less dishes when I was tired later in the evening.  

I knew we would be away from home part of the day so for tonight's dinner, I warmed up the soup but I added a box of Pomi chopped tomatoes with a little more water, sea salt, and herbs to freshen the soup.  It was delicious and didn't taste like leftovers at all.

My daughter sent me a new soup recipe I want to try this week that our friend, Sarah, served when Stephanie visited her in England recently. I want to make soup from one of the Hurst 15 Bean Soup packages, too.  There are so many good soup recipes, not to mention our favorite chili.  Can you tell I am glad cooler weather is here?

Yesterday while I was warming up lunch in the air fryer, I used the time to cut the celery leaves off the end of the stalks and run water over them before draining on a kitchen towel.  I placed them when almost dry on a couple paper towels and let them sit on the kitchen counter overnight.  

I purposely bought a stalk with a lot of leaves in them since the leaves have a lot of flavor for soup stocks.  I placed the leaves in several snack size Ziploc bags to make soup stock with them when I don't have celery in the crisper drawer.  Five or six of the snack size Ziploc bags fit into a quart size Ziploc bag to protect them from freezer burn in the freezer.

A good friend, after reading last week's blog post, reminded me that this kind of cooking is what An Everlasting Meal is all about.  It is my favorite book about cooking where we use basic foods and stretch them as much as possible.  I am certain it is how the women (and men) before the past generation thought about food.  They had to!

I have shared the link many times but I will share it again below.  I'm sure the library should have this book since it was so popular.  It is also now available in Audible form narrated by the author, too.

I didn't purchase anything for the pantry last week, except for a few items to use in the soup recipe that my daughter sent me.  I made one preparedness purchase though.  Although I have an emergency radio, it is too big to carry around with me and it uses D batteries.

I had a small transistor radio on my Amazon Wish List for awhile and it went half price recently.  (It is inexpensive, anyway.)  I purchased it and after putting two AA batteries in it (it doesn't come with batteries), I turned it on and was very happy with how the stations came through.

This is the perfect size to slip in a purse and while it doesn't have an emergency station on it like the actual emergency radio does, in a real emergency any local channel will be announcing watches and warnings... or, God forbid... something worse.  

This size of transistor radio always reminds me of my dad listening to Chicago baseball games on the small radio that he often had to put up to his ear when the house was full of people.

I will be doing some more pantry pondering and research this week.  Hopefully.  God willing and the creek don't rise.  Although, we could use the rain.

Mentioned in this Blog Post

An Everlasting Meal... here.

PowerBear portable radio... here.

Disclaimer:  Most links to Amazon.com are Associate Links

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - It looks like changes are here to stay

I have thought a lot over the years about the "suddenlies" of preparedness.  We still see it today when a natural disaster hits like the hurricane in Florida.  My heart goes out to all of you who live in that area.  

As you know, I believe even a small amount of preparedness for the "suddenlies" will keep people from having to go out for food, water, medicine, and other essentials in the midst of an emergency.  But nothing can prepare anyone for the devastation like that, except for having an emergency evacuation plan in place.

Sometimes those who do not live near the natural disaster experience sudden shortages. An unexpected, although entirely understandable, shortage of gallon size containers of water is being felt in other parts of the country as large amounts of bottled water are being shipped to Florida where it is needed.  

I remember after Katrina, a good friend who lived in the desert of New Mexico found the grocery shelves low on food there for awhile because trucks were being rerouted to the Gulf states.  This was before shortages were even thought possible.

So, it is with good reason that most people who ponder preparedness subjects think a lot about those events that happen suddenly and how families could be prepared.  Our two long term job losses were both unexpected and sudden, it doesn't have to be a natural disaster. 

But in past emergency situations I have known, they were always over within a relatively short period of time.

I was "chatting" with a friend this week over emails about how the inflation and shortages are here to stay.  It has become obvious there will be no quick fix and return to normal soon. I guess I'm quite slow but it has taken a little over 1- 1/2 years to realize I need to change from "short-term shortages" thinking to a more long-term different-way-of-life plan.

This takes more thought than researching shortages and stocking up a bit on those items that may be hard to buy later this winter.  With out of control inflation, which it is even though the evening news would not admit it (does anyone in Washington do their own grocery shopping?), we are no longer just purchasing for the pantry... our way of life most of us have known has changed.

I was a bride during the last period of inflation like this but even then, I don't remember this kind of food inflation.  We lived in Married Student Housing since my husband was working on a Master's Degree so we were used to living on a tight budget.

For many years, there were some sections of the grocery store I didn't bother going near.  For instance, the only time steaks were purchased were special occasions like birthdays or our anniversary.  Even then, it was often less expensive in the long run to go out to a steak house rather than cooking steak dinners at home. 

Many households saw steak dinners as a special treat.  But these days, even the cost of ground beef is getting out of reach for a growing segment of society.  Chicken has become expensive unless one is fortunate to find a good sale.  I bought a whole chicken at Aldi last week and had to think awhile if the cost was worth it but I figured I could get three meals out of it if I made soup.

I must admit that I don't have many suggestions this week.  The realization that this is going to be a long term challenge is still sinking in.  Besides the shortages of food and the much higher prices, there is a lot of talk about how much it is going to cost to heat our homes this winter.  

What I have been doing is paying more attention to menu planning for dinners.  I am looking through recipes I already make that are reasonably priced and/or that can be stretched.  For instance, on Monday I finished making the vegetable beef soup from stock I made on Saturday and I immediately put part of the soup in two quart size freezer containers that went to the deep freeze as soon as they cooled.

A friend shared kale from their garden before we had a couple of freezes and it is in the refrigerator as I plan to use it as a "side green" this week.  On Thursday, I roasted four sweet potatoes and one butternut squash I had cut into thirds on a sheet pan.  The leftover squash was sauteed and served with sausage patties today with leftover frozen peas from Thursday.

The leftover baked sweet potatoes will be served with Sunday's dinner or perhaps mixed with pancake batter Monday morning.  There was a time when I would not have put so much thought into using every bit of leftover food as part of another meal. 

I think most of the time we save money the best by cooking from scratch.  It just makes sense that we are not paying anyone else to do the prep work for us. However, there are times I need to use some pre-made or healthy processed foods because I am too tired to make dinner.  

I purchase packages of chopped salad for instance, on sale when possible.  But since one package provides a large salad for two people, it is more reasonable than buying individual ingredients.  The chopped salads provide an easy and healthy dinner.  I add a chopped tomato, sliced cucumber, and a couple sliced green onions to the basic chopped salad for added nutrition.

Sometimes I purchase pre-made items because they are well made and at times, not more expensive because they use out of season fruit.  For instance, my husband loves strawberry rhubarb pie but making it out of season is very expensive.  Instead, for a treat, I purchase a Mrs. Callenders frozen strawberry rhubarb pie at Kroger and keep it in the deep freeze to serve as a special treat.

Since eating out has become so expensive, I have begun keeping some frozen items to prepare in the air fryer on evenings when I am very tired.  They are semi-homemade but far less expensive than their counterparts at a restaurant.  

By planning ahead of time, I can prepare some of the dinner prep in the mornings when I have more energy.  I also make certain to keep dishes washed and the kitchen tidied so there is not as much work to do in the evening.  My husband is really good about some housework, I haven't washed the tub or made our bed in decades!  However, he absolutely despises washing dishes.

Our favorite Chinese take-out is now a once a month treat and sometimes we will meet "the kids" at a diner for breakfast before they begin their busy schedule of work and homeschooling.   We must put some fun and family time together in the budget!  I have to decline fun activities so often due to health that when I can say yes... we go!

I plan to re-read The Feast Nearby this week.  Since I originally bought it on Kindle, I can increase the font and read it again now.  I will include a link below but there are very few reasonably priced hardback copies.  They were expensive even before it went out-of-print.  I bought the Kindle version many years ago because it was much more reasonably priced.  

It is one of those food related books that is easy to read in the Kindle format, too.  I have probably read it through three times over the years but it is time again for inspiration in putting good food on the table on a budget.  I have recommended it many times before. It is the kind of book I believe all of us are needing now. Few of us can do everything she did to put food on the table but there are still good ideas.

I have probably rambled too long already today.  It has been a week of ponderings!  Have a good week and remember that God will never forsake you.  I have seen him work miracles in the lean years that still amaze me when I think of them today.

Mentioned in this Blog Post

The Feast Nearby: How I lost my job, buried a marriage, and found my way by keeping chickens, foraging, preserving, bartering, and eating locally (all on $40 a week) by food journalist Robin Mather.

Info... here.

Disclaimer:  Most links to Amazon.com are Associate Links.

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - This and that from the pantry

The aroma that is filling the house right now reminds me that we are once again in soup weather.  As part of checking some food I have had for awhile, I found a few packages of beef bones that I had planned to use for making three different bone stock recipes.  I decided to make one larger stock pot batch with all three packages of beef bones, carrots, celery, a couple small onions, and a couple bay leaves.

I will use a third of this batch for soup on Monday and freeze the remainder.  I've never done it this way before with beef bones but I have with chicken.  I have one quart of chicken stock left in the deep freeze that I plan to defrost next week and use to make a chicken pot pie. Our weather is to turn even colder next week, time in the kitchen will be welcome after such a hot summer.

Sometimes we have to let go of food items we have been holding onto for too long.  Did you know there is something called the summer fruit syndrome?  When I read about it a few years ago, I knew I was guilty of doing the same thing with my frozen cranberries.  

It seems some people hold on to the fruit they have frozen instead of using it because they did not want to use it up too soon.  We should remember that we freeze food to be used and not to throw it away with freezer burn months later.  ;)

I also do that with food I buy in bulk, like rice or beans. I should have learned by previous mistakes.  Recently I watched a YouTube video about cooking with rice.  I think it was from America's Test Kitchen but I cannot remember for certain.  In that video, she says the common teaching that white rice has an indefinite shelf life is not correct.  It actually begins to lose flavor and nutrients after a year of storage.

I had a large bag of rice that I was storing in a medium size Rubbermaid container that I took out and put on a shelf while I decided what to do with it.  I broke my own self-made rule about stocking my pantry and that was not to buy a food product in bulk that I don't use very often.  

It has worked out much better to purchase the smaller bags of rice because I will open them up when I didn't want to open a 20 or 25 lb. bag.  I keep the different kinds of rice I use now in half gallon Ball jars.  In the Rubbermaid container that was now empty, I was able to put a couple of the small bags of rice that I had not put into jars, my bag of potato flour, a bag of potato flakes, and what is left of a bag of potato starch.

That container now sits on a garage shelf since it is cooler weather and by moving those small bags, I was able to reorganize my yellow pantry so everything in it is where it belongs. It is so much easier to find everything. All of that by removing one large bag of rice from a container.  I probably won't purchase any really large bags of rice, anymore.  Lesson learned this time...

 

Did you know that matches have a shelf life?  I learned that long ago but I was still surprised when the matches from my large box I keep in the kitchen didn't flame up last week.  Time goes so fast that while I thought they were only a couple years old, they could have been there for many years.  

I now date matchboxes when I buy them so they were purchased before that time. The matches usually will still burn but they will no longer flame up by striking them against the matchbox.  That is good to know if you plan to use matches to start a fire, even if like me... it is only to light a scented candle in the kitchen.

I didn't shop much for groceries last week but I did a trip to Meijer for a few items.  While walking through an aisle toward the back, I stopped and checked their non-food clearance section.  They must have just put a lot of garden items on clearance for I found four long horizontal vinyl flowerpots for a dollar each.

I found very nice stoneware pots for $3.00 each.  I bought two of them to use on the porch next year.  The long horizontal flowerpots can be used for growing greens like lettuce or kale on the deck... or pretty flowers.  All of the flower pots were 90% off their original price.

It pays to check the clearance section of stores, especially during seasonal changes.  I heard online of someone getting bags of indoor potting soil on clearance at Walmart for I think (it was a few days ago) $1.00 each.

That is part of living a pantry lifestyle, buying on sale or clearance whenever possible.  I found two throws and a queen size set of flannel sheets really cheap this spring at Meijer.  I still have the sheets put back for when new sheets are needed but the throws were washed along with the others last week and all were ready for cooler weather.

I bought two large warm blankets on clearance last spring, too.  I remember how hot it was that day I bought them!  While we didn't need another blanket for our bed, they will be good to have should we need to keep the house colder or for the sofa bed.

 

Regarding the Amazon links, I loved when I could keep Amazon widgets on the sidebar all the time.  First they took away the widget that let bloggers keep a running list of favorite books, etc.  Then recently, they took away the simple Amazon widget that was on the sidebar.

At least the new method for creating a link within the body of a post is quite easy and quick once you get used to it.  However, to do anything else requires more time and energy into creating advertisements than I am willing to put into it these days.  It also takes away from the simplicity of the look of CTB&Me that I prefer.

So, I will try to remember to link to a book or something else each Saturday.  You can enter to do any Amazon shopping by clicking on a link.  You don't have to purchase what you are linking to, it is just an entrance into Amazon using my Associate's coding.

I think I will share my most recent Amazon purchase for the kitchen.  I haven't ordered much lately, even with the lure of Amazon Prime sales.  However, I have been seeing these kinds of bowl covers on various cooking shows and thought I would try them.  

There has been a serious (to me) shortage of plastic bags in my area.  I only recently was able to purchase two boxes of my favorite Meijer plastic bags with twist ties after they have not been on the shelf for a couple months.  Ziploc bags were available but in short supply.

Using these instead of plastic bags or plastic wrap should be helpful and good for the environment.  There is too much plastic making its way to our rivers and oceans. Besides, if you like the look of vintage fabric like I do, they are cute.  Cute can be very important.  ;)

Mentioned in this Blog Post

Pretty 10 Piece Reusable Bowl Covers... here.

Disclaimer:  Most links to Amazon.com are Associate links.

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Stock up days ponderings

The first full week of the month is always my stock up grocery time.  Now I spread it over two days instead of one exhausting day of grocery shopping at Aldi, Meijer, and sometimes Kroger if there is time.

For newer readers who are unfamiliar with my grocery buying habits, since my husband had to go on Social Security Disability a little over seventeen years ago (and was phased into regular Social Security at age 65), we have been "paid" once a month.

So, I started doing most of my grocery shopping at the beginning of the month when we also paid all of our bills.  That way I would be certain to purchase our most important groceries.  The grocery shopping the remainder of the month was to fill in with dairy and fresh ingredients as needed.

I still follow that way of grocery shopping since it has been successful now for so many years.  Once debts from before going on Disability were paid, it gave us a little more cash to spend on groceries as the month went by and we were able to save for big purchases.  Only God could have stretched the little into more than enough!  Generous friends helped out on Holidays (they are angels in disguise).

I have an ongoing list that I add to over the month, reorganizing it before I go shopping.  It not only contains items I need purchase that I have run out of but I add items to the list that I will "put back".  Sometimes a video or an article remind me of an item I hadn't thought of before but often they are food items I already have as a priority like coffee, or something practical like extra cooking oil.

With inflation being out of control, I mostly purchase extra food and nonfood essentials these days to deepen the pantry.  As it is possible, I add a little extra each month to my "emergency" shelves.  They do get rotated if necessary.  I date all the cans these days, even if they are an item I plan to use right away.

The shortages are such that it takes going to three or more stores to purchase what is on my list.  Usually I can find what I need but some items, like Sheba cat food, I have had to purchase from Amazon off and on. It is almost impossible to find the Sheba Florentine likes at the grocery stores in the past year or two.

Some food items are available but scarce such as sugar.  There was only one box on the shelf of the Sugar in the Raw packets I use for my coffee each morning.  I like it because I know exactly how much sugar I am putting in my coffee before I take my breakfast insulin.  There was cane sugar available but gosh have the packages been downsized as the price has increased!

Meijer was almost out of rice, something I don't remember ever seeing before.  I have been reading about worldwide crop failures of rice.  Which may be annoying for some western countries but could bring famine to the countries that depend on rice for the majority of their diet. 

I have read that rice crop failures in Italy will mean less arborio rice they use for risotto.  If you make risotto, you may want to stock up.  I will link to the article below, their olive oil and tomato crops are threatened, too.  

In the article, it also mentioned Spanish olive crops being in danger. It tells me I should try to budget more to put back some extra bottles of the California extra virgin olive oil we use, even if it is one extra a month. That is why I like to read what is going on around the world as far as crop failures, in today's environment we are all linked globally.

Back to the empty shelves of rice here... there was one large bag of Meijer white rice and two large bags of Uncle Ben's converted rice left, otherwise that shelf was completely empty.  All that was left were the bags of specialty rice, like the smaller bag of organic rice which is what I purchase.  

Rice is heavily sprayed as it grows, which I didn't know until recently. So, once a month I am purchasing a small bag of the organic rice.  Usually I buy the Lundberg brand of basmati or jasmine rice. The price is reasonable since rice overall is still inexpensive.

I have to be careful with white rice but when mixed with other food in a casserole or a soup (or as beans and rice), the carbs are cut enough that it doesn't hike my blood sugar.  Like cooking with pasta, it helps to add a lot of vegetables to the recipes, too. Which has the side benefit of lowering calories and increasing nutrition.

Beans are still inexpensive so when I stock up at Aldi, I like to purchase three or four cans of their organic black beans.  We love the new black bean burger recipe. I first made black bean burgers from a mix and I was surprised how much we liked them.  This recipe is less expensive and it has no preservatives.  I will link it again below. I had been searching for an easy black bean burger recipe and this one is very easy.

I purchase one can of Keystone beef at Meijer each month.  This time I purchased beef since it will make a good base for vegetable beef soup and the Use By date is five years out, although it would be good past that date.  Keystone canned meats have gone up in price like everything else but purchasing one can is still do-able in my budget.  

It never ceases to amaze me how one can build up their pantry a little at a time.  While I do purchase extra when I get a good sale (like the Kroger green beans last month), most of what is in my pantry was purchased a little here and there. Often when I go over recipe cards and write down what I will need to make certain recipes in the near future.

I finally remembered to put a bag of Keebler Sandies on my grocery list this month.  When Stephanie and I attended a fabulous cooking lesson/dinner at Colonial Williamsburg (ten years ago, maybe?), the chef talked about using these cookies crushed instead of graham crackers.  If crushed completely, they will form into a crust without added butter and add a good flavor.

I may purchase another bag of them next month and each will be slipped into a gallon size Ziploc bag and placed in the deep freeze.  If they are not used to make a crumb pie crust, they will be handy to take out of the freezer when little people arrive wanting a snack.

Speaking of the deep freeze, I have been taking the quart size containers of chicken broth I had frozen out of the freezer and defrosted each to use in soup now that it is cooler weather.  Two containers have now been washed and put back with the other empty containers.  There is one left and when all have been used, I will make a big batch of chicken soup stock to both use at that time and to fill three more containers with healthy stock for the freezer.

I do like the idea (as mentioned in comments recently) of placing meals in Ziploc bags for easy storage in the freezer.  There was a really popular cookbook at one time where the two women got together once a month to prepare meals for the freezer and if I remember, they mostly used Ziploc bags that they froze flat for easy storage.  Was it called Once a Month Cooking?

I can't do a lot these days but I can do a little and making chicken (bone) stock is one of them.  Soup takes time but it is easy.  Another change I have made is to keep on hand some quick frozen food to use in the air fryer instead of stopping for overly expensive fast food when I have had appointments taking me away from home. 

I will pay for a Chinese take out meal for each of us because it tends to be healthy, full of vegetables, and there is enough for leftovers the next day. Which makes it quite reasonable.  It is still possible to get a reasonably priced meal at the local drive-in but it will close for the season soon. With our dollars buying less, we have all had to rethink priorities.

The air fryer was a gift and the more I use it, the more I like using it.  It also uses less electricity than turning the oven on.  I know a lot of friends love slow cookers but I ended up giving mine to Goodwill a few years ago after not using it for many years.  I just cook differently.  However, the air fryer has proven to be a winner and has earned space (which there is not much of at all) on the kitchen counter.

I pulled a few favorite cookbooks off the shelves this past week for cool/cold weather ideas.  I ended up making the apple cranberry crisp (without cranberries) from Susan Branch's Fall book and it was delicious.  She doesn't add sugar to the apples, brown sugar is just in the "crisp" part so it is not overly sweetened. I am going to try it with cranberries added soon.

I have been taking a bit of a vacation from prepper videos and as mentioned before, I stopped watching a few of them.  Especially those that were ranting more than giving good advice. It is easy enough to have anxiety without listening to rantings.  However, just from what I have been hearing from people I still listen to (like the Boots on the Ground segments of Southernprepper1), anything one can do to put back extra will be helpful.

It was so good to hear from long missing friends again! I am sorry if any of you wrote an email that I did not respond to over the spring or summer.  I had some that I had pinned to get back to later and they didn't show up on the tablet.  They were not in view until I brought up my blog emails on the computer, which I didn't do for a long time.   I'm not ignoring anyone, at least on purpose.

Keep alert but fear not!

Mentioned in this Blog Post

The black bean burger recipe (we rarely eat it on any bun)... here.

Susan Branch's Apple Cranberry Crisp recipe... here.

Article about crop failures in Italy... here.  (Interesting article!)

Image: This was from a long ago trip to Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts.  I love seeing how women used to preserve food for the winter.

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Lots of stuff happening!

AP Photo Hurricane Ian

Like so many people, I have been praying for residents of the Western coast of Florida.  I haven't heard the latest statistics since Thursday but just looking at early photos of the destruction, it looks as bad as Katrina where it made landfall.

The scenes the day before the hurricane was to  hit reminded me again why we need to keep food and water in our homes prior to any emergency situation.  Lines of people were waiting to get into the grocery stores and considering how low some stores already were on stock, bottled water was unavailable quite early.

If nothing else, having even a couple weeks worth of shelf stable food, medications, pet supplies, etc. put back can keep you from being a victim.  Going through such a storm is bad enough.  I can't imagine what it would be like after the storm when it may be impossible to leave your home for awhile safely.

This has been a busy week with a three-month doctor's checkup on Tuesday, our carpets in the living room and family room getting cleaned for the first time in three years on Wednesday, and our annual furnace checkup on Friday.  Well, annual before COVID!

Our furnace and air conditioners are both quite old and we knew this might be the year they had to be replaced. Usually, they tell us they can last another year.  This week, when asked about replacing them, we were told it would be a good idea to replace them now because due to new EPA standards, the cost of a new furnace will go up 25% on January 1st.  Yikes!

Thankfully, we had been tucking away a "furnace and air conditioning" fund in our savings account and we only had to dip into it once.  So, with a cash discount, we had just enough to pay for them.  We are doing our best to stay out of debt, especially with interest rates climbing.

I can't tell you the feeling of relief it is to not worry about the furnace or air conditioner breaking down.  It was a gift from God that both stayed running until we could save what we needed and just before the furnace price would go up substantially.  

I admit, it was tempting to have money in savings when we really need a new sofa in the family room, not to mention rebuilding the deck.  But the savings were there for our first priority... heat and air conditioning. 

This whole furnace purchase thing has reminded me of the importance of praying about even what seems small in God's eyes.  Actually, nothing having to do with His people is small to Him.  I kept getting a nudge that we needed to have the furnace technician in before it became very cold.  

I thought perhaps that nudge was for safety reasons but it ended up He was nudging us to be able to purchase a new furnace while it was in stock and before we had to switch to the super energy efficient and much more expensive furnace after the beginning of the new year.  The furnace we did purchase is much more energy efficient already than the old one was.

I went to Meijer on Thursday for some groceries we needed before the weekend and my friends, I don't remember so many empty shelves since 2020.  There are some shelves with no product on them but quite a few that had a limited amount of product available.  Not to mention the very high prices.

You can really tell there is a problem with a lack of potatoes.  Those small pouches of instant potatoes had gone up in price a lot this past six months or so and now that shelf was almost empty.  The larger boxes of instant potatoes were very limited.  I hope the shortages end with the new harvest.

I have to go to Aldi on Monday or Tuesday, it will be interesting to see what their stock looks like in the next few months since it is a German company.  I know Aldi USA gets a lot of products from America but many of my favorites are either German or European.  

We all need to be in prayer about what God would have us do to prepare should there be more shortages and higher inflation, both of which look like a real probability.  Whether you decide now is the time to finally buy that needed new furnace or you decide to start putting back some beans and rice, the important thing always is to be obedient to God's calling.

Mentioned in this Blog Post

Well, I mentioned potatoes so I will tuck this in here.  The instant potato flakes I like (and are supposed to store very well) can be found on Amazon... here.  They have gone up in price since I purchased them, as have all potato products.

I like these because they are simple, just potatoes.   

Disclaimer:  Most links to Amazon.com are Associate links.

Image:  AP Photo, Photographer Phelan Ebenhack

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - A change of seasons has arrived

It seems like we went from full out Summer one day to Fall the next day.  While I am very happy to have cooler temperatures after a sizzling summer, the changes are a little difficult to absorb so soon.  

We did turn on our furnace today for awhile.  I was hoping we could wait until after our annual furnace tune up happened next week. I have dust allergies and yes... we did open all the windows and... I sneezed and felt terrible for awhile.  But my annual dread of starting the furnace up is over for another year. 

I am sorry that comments did not get moderated again until yesterday.  It was also a week when the Sunday Afternoon Tea post would not "take" on Facebook.  The lateness of the moderating had to do with my busy schedule and who knows what is going on with Blogger?

Early in the week, I had to send an Amazon return at the UPS Store, which is about thirty minutes from where I live.  So, while in town I ran some errands to get them out of the way and not waste gas. The price of gas is beginning to creep up again, not that it went all that low.

The remainder of this past week has been working on a huge project that had a simple beginning.  I think I shared here that I found the exact kind of dorm refrigerator I wanted on clearance for $37.00 plus change at Kroger.  They are very good about moving seasonal items out by putting them on clearance.  I'm sure they were selling dorm refrigerators only while the students were returning.

You may remember that a dear friend bought me an amazing gift, a small solar generator and solar panels to use during times of power outages.  We do get short term outages where I live in the country but there is also a lot more talk about possible power outages on a regional and national level.

She was concerned about the safety of my insulin, which needs to be refrigerated. Purchasing a dorm size refrigerator had been on my "list of things to do" for awhile.  It is perfect to use with a small generator.  So, I was very happy to find it on clearance.  I was at Meijer later that week and the same brand was still full price there.

Well, the box with the dorm refrigerator sat in my living room for a few weeks while I decided where it could find a permanent home.  That took a lot of pondering and praying for wisdom until one day I thought of a solution.  It required changing books from one bookshelf to another, moving items from those shelves to another, and then moving a small bookshelf to the garage.

The changes all look good and even though it required getting rid of some books that I knew the kids would not be interested in eventually, I like the way it turned out.  Since I was already decluttering and changing things around, I decided to get rid of a tall, narrow shelf in the dining area that has held various Boston Ferns almost since we moved here.

Honestly, I got to a point last Spring that I didn't want to sweep up the dead ferns, anymore.  Boston Ferns do not like our house in Winter and they complain by shedding all over the wood floor.  I will still hang a Boston fern on the porch each year as long as they do not go up in price too much.

I think I have reached an age when I need easy more than ever.  Including plants that are easy to take care of rather than the flighty difficult prima donna ferns.  That may be why I have so many spider plants in the house.  They are the cats of the plant world.  Give them attention when they want it and then leave them to their own company.

As for the pantry this week, I didn't do much food shopping but Kroger had a big sale on their 4-pack cans of vegetables.  I bought three 4-packs of green beans while they were almost half price. I use the cut green beans in vegetable soup and stews.  

Last year, I thought I had put back plenty cans of green beans for the winter but I was surprised to have used them all when I needed a can for soup.  This year, I am determined to have enough. Especially when purchased on sale.

Many grocery stores used to have annual sales on their canned vegetables around September each year.  They were getting rid of last year's crop to make room for this year's crop on the shelves but you really can't tell the difference in only one year. I expect that was why Kroger was having these sales, too.

I had to purchase a bag of potatoes for the first time in awhile.  I only needed a three pound bag of Yukon gold potatoes and I should have known they were going to be expensive when I couldn't find a price displayed.  It wasn't until I arrived home and was looking at the receipt that I saw they were well over $6.00.  For three pounds.  I don't ever remember potatoes being so expensive.

With cooler weather back, I made chicken stock using a whole chicken one day.  I removed all the breast meat from the chicken before it cooked too long and then added more water and simmered it about another couple of hours.  Along with onion and celery, it made a good rich stock.

Besides using the white meat in the chicken vegetable soup, I made chicken pot pie and chicken tacos from the remaining chicken breast.  Sometimes I just freeze the extra cooked chicken if I have other meals planned that week.  However, this week it stretched into three (more since we had soup for a couple dinners) meals.

Sometimes I also make the soup and then place it in one or two quart size freezer containers and label it for the deep freeze.  I also do this when I make chili. It doesn't make sense to make soup, chili, etc. for just two people but filling the deep freeze with soups and stews (and chili) makes a lot of sense.

I am finishing today's blog post late on Saturday.  So, should there be typos and grammar errors, please be forgiving.  Colder weather also makes me very tired and sleepy at first.  I have great admiration for animals like bears who are sensible and sleep through winter.  Of course, then who would make the soup and bread?

I also didn't get an opportunity to do much research this week but things are kind of quiet on YouTube, anyway.  Especially since I now only follow those vloggers who provide good information and instruction while staying away from scare tactics.  

Should there be any good information, I will pass it on here. 

Image: Friendly Village china, Pumpkin bars

Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Has the dog doo-doo already hit the fan?

 The pantry post will be a little different today.  Instead of more practical advice, I want to share thoughts from my research.  One realization that kept coming back to my mind was that we all need to listen to God for what He would have us do in the coming months and years.

This last week was somewhat busy so to unwind (I know, it is a strange way to unwind), I read some articles and watched YouTube videos talking about the various scenarios going on around the world and how some people were preparing.  Each household was different but they all felt the seriousness of the times in which we live.

It made me realize just how much God has to be holding back true calamity in most areas... some are already seeing it... to have the world be so close to collapse in various places that it hasn't happened, yet.

I do believe God has been holding back world wide calamities on a massive scale for sometime now.  As a young child, I remember thinking the Russians were going to march down the streets of my small town any day.  This was during the Cuban Missile Crisis.  I doubt anyone at the time would have put a bet on over fifty years going by with no nuclear battles happening.

There are now numerous nations with the capability of releasing nuclear missiles but God has continued to hold them back.  I tend to agree with Billy Graham, who always said he believed we will not see nuclear war until the time of the Tribulation because of the destruction it would create.

I didn't think much about the U. S. being in danger at home until 9/11, which many preachers and Bible teachers who teach about prophecy now see as the first real birth pain most of us felt.  Many do think the world wars were preliminary birth pains, too.

I never thought much about famine coming to America or anywhere but third world countries.  There were various shortages from time to time, usually due to wars or weather, but no one I knew was concerned about famine in a nation that is a leading expert of food to the world.  The grocery stores were full of anything and everything as long as one had the money to purchase it.

There have been experts for a long time warning that the Western states of the U.S. could not sustain the amount of water needed already as more cities were being built that needed access to that same water. Throw in a few years of extreme drought and the worst case scenarios have arrived in our West Coast farmlands.

Even the thought of having the government tell us what kind of car we could drive or where our thermostats were to be set was not even on my radar.  Now, we were told during 1970s energy crisis to make every attempt to use less energy but those were recommendations and never requirements.

As I was reading and watching last week, I realized that there were far more than one SHTF scenarios going on and even in my own country, they were overlapping each other.  While 9/11 may have been sudden and the pandemic was sudden, since then we have had a slow burn in the forest of such scenarios.  

They been hidden under the brush so to speak until we saw flare ups here and there in the past few years.  Two years ago when my husband burned a lot of brush and tree limbs where our garden used to be, it looked like the fire was out until the sun went down and the ground in that area was an orange glow where the fire was still smoldering.

I think that is what has been occurring worldwide, not just in this country.  The troubles have been laying supposedly dormant but instead were a smoldering fire... popping up here and there but actually were continuing all around us.  Worldwide smoldering SHTF scenarios.

Mostly this is not good news.  However, I think there are two areas where all the world wide bad news may actually be good for us.  First, for the Christian who believes in Christ's return, the events line up with the Bible... especially Romans 1 and Matthew 24... of what the world will look like upon His return.

The second reason that I see good in these scenarios is that people are beginning to wake up to the need to be prepared.  I have family members roll their eyes when I tell them they need to have at least "a little extra" put back.  It is always better to do something even though you cannot do everything to be prepared.

I try to gently share that it is wise to have at least two or three weeks worth of food in your pantry.  Even the most basic food and necessities will keep the family from having to get out of the house for the grocery store.  Of course, now in this age of shortages and empty shelves, it should be even more important.

I know many, many families who keep about a week's worth of groceries and no extra water in their house.  These are not poor people, either.  Why?  I think most people fall under a couple categories for not preparing for SHTF scenarios.  

Many don't believe these scenarios will ever happen to them or the area where they live.  Although, with everything happening in the world these days, many are waking up to the reality that hard times can come... and quickly.

I think for some of them... and us... we haven't experienced that kind of world before and we overlook the nudging of God to put back extra or to make a purchase "right now" if we have the funds available.

As much as I try to follow those nudges from God, I still miss it at times.  For instance, before the baby formula fiasco, I felt like I should find out what baby formula the newest family member used and put a couple containers back.  

I told myself that they had plenty of income if they wanted to put back formula and I didn't do it.  The little guy had terrible diaper rash and tummy problems because they had to use what formula they could find.  Lesson learned... follow God's lead even if it doesn't make sense.

Putting a little back at a time to be able to give in an emergency situation was His latest nudge and I have obeyed that.  Last week when at the grocery store, I picked up a couple bags of rice to be able to share.  I plan to continue as the budget allows.  Basic food has gone up a lot but much is still inexpensive.

I'm quite surprised by some items that are in short supply already like sugar and salt.  Of course, not every store is out of sugar or salt, they are limited... but what will next year bring?  I read this week that Italy is experiencing terrible weather conditions in their rice growing regions and that their olive oil (olives) and passata (tomatoes) crops are in trouble 

The shortage of wheat due to war and weather has increased the price of flour and wheat products such as pasta already. It is not uncommon to see empty shelves where pasta should be off and on.  I have read there are shortages of some vegetable oils already.  Tomato products are expected to become in short supply in the States due to weather.

So, what shortages have I noticed here?  The usual shortages continue such as peanut butter and jelly but right now it is hit and miss.  Sometimes I see full shelves and the next week those same shelves will be empty.  

One indication I have found the past two years if there are shortages is on the canned meat shelves.  I have noticed that Keystone beef has not only gone up in price significantly but Wal-Mart didn't have any on their shelves last week and Meijer had one can when I checked.

If there is something you absolutely need and you have the funds, I would not put it off.  I am so glad we decided two years ago to have dental work caught up, a little at a time.  It wasn't easy making room in the budget when we started but my husband is caught up with dental work and I will be in November.

We had a $400+ car repair last week that couldn't wait but it was better to get the car repaired and keep it going as long as possible than pay the price for used cars right now.  We know this car has been well taken care of and we would not know if another used car, even if it was a newer model, had been properly maintained.

I am now at the point where every day, I ask God for His wisdom regarding tomorrow's needs as well as today's... and to lead me to ways to be prepared.   Mostly, I need to continue trusting in His provision for those things I will need but there is not the room or the budget to do anything else.

Besides trusting Him, what we must do is to pay serious attention to what the world events are showing us.  God tells us in the Book of James that He will give wisdom to those who ask for it and I have seen that prayer come to pass over and over again through the years.

We don't have to fear anything but we do need to pay attention to God's leading.  He knows our past, present, and our future and will lead us always to do what is best for us and for our loved ones.