Food Storage Recipe - Crockpot Potato Soup

Making use of a slow cooker is the best kitchen item to have for cooking. You simply put all the ingredients in, season and top it off with the lid. It's as easy as cake.. Several hours later you can spoon out your recipe in a bowl and then what's left over is frozen for later eating pleasure.

Crockpot potato soup.

NEED:

7  potatoes

3 small baby onions

4 stalk celery

1 lb package turkey sausage

2 cups chicken stock

2 cups milk

2 cups regular heavy cream

1 Tbsp Mrs. Dash garlic and herb seasoning

Salt and white pepper to taste

Peel the potatoes, wash and put in a bowl of water. Cut up the onions and celery. For this recipe, I used 3 small baby onions, but 1 large one will be okay. I used turkey polish sausage for this recipe since I wanted to go a lighter version of the soup. Cut the sausage and potatoes into 1 inch pieces and add to Crockpot. Add in the cut vegetables. I had some reserved chicken stock and poured it over the meat and vegetables in the Crockpot. Add in 2 cups milk and 2 cups regular heavy cream. Season with garlic and herb seasoning, salt and white pepper; cover and slow cook on low for about 6 hours or until the vegetables are fork tender. Serve hot with a grilled cheese sandwich on the side.

Prepare For Winter Power Outage

There is an easy way to prepare for being able to keep warm in the winter during a power outage ~ Just have the thought in your head of how you would prepare for your family IF you had to sleep outside during the winter. You are not going to be sleeping outside, but if the power is out during a winter storm and it gets below zero, than it is going to feel like you are outside.

Stock up on winter grade sleeping bags, down comforters, and heavy wool blankets. Also keep a few extra blankets in your car. You can all huddle under blankets in a worst case scenario. But, if you do not want to just sit all huddled up , you can close off one room and heat it up. You are lucky if you have a fire-place or wood burning stove. But, if you do not have one than you need to get some other form of heat for an emergency. Invest in a kerosene heater, a propane heater, or pellet stove. Stock up on the fuel for them too.

You can easily prepare for a worst case scenario winter storm. Just use common sense. Winterize your home, stock up on food, winter clothing, and heat supplies.

Off the Grid Eating: More Recipes for Survival and Enjoyment without Electricity

Off the Grid Eating: More Recipes for Survival and Enjoyment without Electricity (Prepper's Kitchen Book 2) was a free kindle book when this post was written. But be warned…

This book is not for everyone.

It’s for YOU.

This book is only for you brave, wild souls who choose a different path.

Do you hunt, camp, or wander? Do you simply want to know more about getting out there and living well?

Most of the people you see and know wouldn’t be able to get a
decent fire started with a flamethrower much less cook anything worth eating over it.

As in book 1, we’re taking wood stoves, rocket stoves, Dutch ovens, and
good ole open fire cooking to the next level.

I don’t have to tell you how liberating it is to be free of our society’s madness for even a few days,
but our nation’s electrical grid is more fragile than most people realize.

Whether by choice or necessity, you are out living in the wild….
You’ll be glad to have tried what you find here.

If you are new to this or even if you aren’t, for purchasing this book
(or even if you’re just previewing this)

I have a FREE Going off the Grid Quick Start Guide for you at:

www.offgridlivin.com

Take a look at this table of contents.....

You will learn how to prepare the following like a pro

Taste the Bacon Pancakes
Hungry Morning Breakfast Skillet
Cinnamon and Sour Cream Breakfast Cake
Chinese-Style Vegetable Fried Rice
Ground Beef and Kidney Bean Chili
Potato-Leek Soup
Cuban-Style Ground Beef
Baked Macaroni and Cheese
Baked Meatloaf
Chicken and Dumplings
Roasted Rabbit
Veracruz Red Snapper
Gardener's Chicken
Coq Au Vin
Turtle Soup
Ham Hocked Pintos
Black-Eyed Peas and Rice
Fruit Salad with Orange-Poppy Seed Dressing
Hush Puppies
Everything Nice Oatmeal Cake
Two Tone Cheesecake
Favorite Fruit Cobbler
Navajo Fry Bread
Golden Apricot-Walnut Bread
Amish-Style White Bread

Winter Plumbing Tips - How To Keep Your Pipes From Freezing

One of the most common plumbing problems in cold weather is freezing pipes. Pipes freeze in a high percentage of homes in areas where the temperature dips below freezing. Because this causes serious damage to pipes and home plumbing systems, it's something that you've got to be proactive about dealing with.

What happens is that when the temperature gets below freezing, stagnant water that's just sitting in the pipes freezes. When it becomes ice, it expands, putting thousands of pounds of pressure on the pipes. This cracks the metal can causes everything to go out of whack. When the ice thaws, you've got cracked pipes and the water can't get where it needs to go. When you turn on the faucet, nothing comes out at all. This means that things have already gotten bad.

What You Can Do About It

First of all, make sure that you've got insulation on all of your piping. If you have pipes that are exposed to the outside temperatures, take special care to make sure that they are fully insulated. You can buy foam insulation from any hardware store and install it yourself. It's an easy job that can be done in just a few hours with simple tools.

For plumbing that is located in kitchen cabinets or other places that might get colder than the rest of the house, open them up so that some warmth gets in there. Especially watch pipes that are located in attics and basements where there will be cold temperatures. Open up these areas to keep them warm when the weather gets its coldest.

Since standing water is the cause of freezing pipes, you should also run some water through the plumbing system occasionally. Turn on the taps to let a little bit of water trickle out when it gets especially cold outside. If you keep the water moving through all of your faucets, it will keep the pipes from icing.

Also make sure that you don't have any clogged drains. This is another opportunity for water to stagnate and turn into ice. Keep all of your pipes clear and avoid putting anything in them that is hard to dissolve like fat, grease and oil.

If you're going to go away for a vacation, make sure you've got everything well insulated. Drain all of your pipes so that there is no water left to freeze.

What To Do When Your Pipes Have Frozen

Once your pipes are frozen, all is not lost. You can warm up the plumbing and get the water flowing again in most cases. Try running lukewarm water through the pipes or heating them up with a hair dryer. A little bit of heating will do; just enough to get it melting. If you get the water too hot, this will cause further problems in the pipes.

If the pipes are already cracked, there is nothing left to do but call the plumbing experts and have them reinstall piping. This is an expensive and involved job, so make sure that you prevent freezing first. Keeping an eye on your piping and making sure it doesn't freeze is a good way to save money.

Choose a Dallas Plumbing company that can give you solid customer service and a fast solution. For more information, visit http://www.angieslist.com

Food Storage Recipe - Broccoli Rice

Simple recipe that is great with anything.

NEED:

2 cups of white rice

1/2 cup of chopped, fresh broccoli

1 tablespoon butter

1/2 teaspoon salt

a bit of finely diced onion, not too much

4 cups of water

Steam the broccoli and onion in a bit of water for about 8 minutes.

In another pot start the rice in the 4 cups of water. Add the butter and salt to it while it is cooking.

Bring the rice to a boil and cook, uncovered , for 15 to 20 minutes.

Add the broccoli to the rice and stir. 

Gardening Information - Creating Cold Frames and Hot Tents

Depending on where you live you may need to find ways to extend the growing season. In the higher elevations winter may come early and stay late. the freezing temperatures make getting a garden in the ground early a futile effort. There are some techniques you can use to get more growing season. What I'm talking about is creating a micro climate for your plants, commonly called a hot house or green house. However you don't need a big expensive structure to sprout plants and give them a head start. Using inexpensive plastic sheeting and some stakes you can control the climate of some small areas where your sprouting beds are located.

Though it can be a bit of a challenge but the pay off is a larger more successful and productive garden. In early spring when the weather is starting to get nice but still less than optimal you can make a cold frame. A cold frame is a box frame of a box with a lid, everywhere there would be a solid surface you install 6 mil clear poly sheeting. When the sun hits the plastic the heat gets trapped in the cold frame making a hot house environment where you can place potted plants.

Use a saucer in the kitchen and place a folded paper towel on it. Make it wet, open the fold and pour in your seeds, radish, carrot, corn, whatever you want to grow could be flowers. Set the saucer on the window sill after pouring off the excess water. You will need to watch and make sure the paper stays damp to near wetness and in a few days the seeds will germinate and start to grow.

Plant your sprouts in used egg cartons, the old gray paper type, because they absorb moisture whereas the Styrofoam egg cartons will not. fill the egg carton with potting soil add some water and place in the cold frame. You may need to transplant them into small two and three inch containers as they grow. By the time you can till the soil and plant you should have some 3 to 5 inch plants or larger to go in the ground and you've pulled a fast one on mother nature.

Your cold frame/ hot house could get hot enough you need to place a shade over it in the hottest time of the day so as not to cook you plants or you can open the lid a crack to let hot air escape, you just need to tend it, like anything else.

If you've already got some plants in the ground and you don't want them to freeze you can drive in a stake next to the plant and cut a large circle of plastic poke a small hole in the center of the plastic and slide it onto the stick then take the outer edge and secure it to the ground with a little soil or some stones use a stapler to attach the top to the stake. It looks like a t-pee when your done and it will trap heat, moisture and sunlight inside where the plant is. Again watch it doesn't get too hot.

With some creative use of plastic you can make micro climates that help you get ahead start on the growing season. Hope you have a remarkable garden experience today.

You'll find great information and lots of gardening resources at http://www.squidoo.com/containerplantsflowers also http://www.squidoo.com/buyplants

Chips: Most Delicious Homemade Chips Recipes

Chips: Most Delicious Homemade Chips Recipes: Deliciously Seasoned Potato, Sweet Potato, Vegetable, Fruit, Flour and Legume Chips (Delicious Recipes Book 4) was a free book for the kindle at the time of this posting.

Love potato chips? We all do of course. But this love comes with a heavy price tag. Not only to our wallats but also our health. Today's store bought potato chips are loaded with saturated fat and GMO ingredients.

Making your own chips at home is easy convenient and healthy. This recipe book is filled with mouth watering recipes you and your whole family is going to love.

Chip recipes have never been easier. ANYONE can make them. Tried true ad tested you are going to fall in love with the recipes contained in this book

Here Is A Preview Of Some of The Recipes Contained in This Book...

• Cheesy Herb Potato Chips
• Chili Cheese Corn Chips
• Cheezy Bacon Baked Chips
• Zest Carrot Chips
• Spiced Apple Chips
• Crumbled Avocado Chips and Lemon Dipping Sauce
• Crunchy Cinnamon Banana Chips
• Orange Thyme Sweet Potato Chips
• Much, much more!

Dutch Oven Cookbook for Meals and Desserts

Dutch Oven Cookbook for Meals and Desserts: A Dutch Oven Camping Cookbook Full with Delicious Dutch Oven Recipes was a free book for the kindle when this post was written.Dutch Oven Cookbook for Meals and Desserts is comprised of 25 easy-to-cook recipes of both savory and sweet dishes.

The book has proven that the Dutch oven “can be used in multiple ways.”

The thing that is most inviting is that in most Dutch oven recipes, all you have to do is dump all or most of the ingredients and let the Dutch Oven do the trick.

So, if you have been handed down one of these wonderful kitchen equipment then grab this Dutch oven camping cookbook at once so that you can make the most of it.

Basic Survival and Communications Skills in the Aftermath

Basic Survival and Communications Skills in the Aftermath was a free kindle book wt the time of this posting.

 Nuclear war looms, an errant asteroid is headed for Earth, Yellowstone is showing signs of an impending explosion. There will be survivors. Are you going to be one of them? If so, how are you going to survive and contact your friends and loved ones?

Even though the world has no set time of destruction and that day might never come, or perhaps next Thursday while you're on your way home from work could be the very day the killing blow comes. Will you be prepared?

Join the author in an imaginative exploration of several scenarios of "What Might Happen" and practical ideas on mitigation of the "Aftermath". Survival isn't always about stocking food and water in a mountain hideaway, collecting the best knives, guns and most ammo. Discover the important information you've been missing! This book was written specifically for the Kindle devices in mind.

Montana Homestead

Montana Homestead: How I Built My Bugout Homestead Off Grid In The Wilderness was a free book for the kindle when this was posted.
The author takes the reader on a journey from his first awareness of the need to prep and survive to his eventual decision to move off grid into the wilderness of Montana and start a bugout homestead.
Not a “How To” manual, but more of a journal outlining the events and the readying of the new homestead. With dozens of photographs and detailed explanations of methods, he narrates how he built an 800 square foot cabin with the help of only his wife and kids and a few simple tools.
Featuring sections on grey water discharge systems, installing a well pump, how to supply water off-grid, and calculations on how much land is needed and what kinds of food to grow on it.