Tag: food storage

Essential Tips for Emergency Preparedness

Published on by Susie @ Pollywog's Place BlogLeave a comment

Howdy folks!

How have you been? It’s been busy here, as usual, and I’m writing this post a few months before it will actually publish so in real life I’ve just planted my winter garden. I’m pretty excited as this as I haven’t actually done this before but I am looking forward to having fresh veggies in the next month or two!

I love to garden so for me I don’t see this as part of a ‘prepper’ thing but for many people learning to garden is part of their emergency preparations. I am always looking for new suggestions on ways to better prepare our family for emergencies. We recently had two really bad hurricanes (Helene and Milton) that caused a lot of devastation in widespread areas.

Fortunately, we were not severely affected by either one but it did show us some ‘weak’ areas that we needed to fix. After Hurricane Debby (before Helene) we lost a freezer which made us realize that frozen foods would not be a very sustainable option in a long-term emergency.

While we aren’t supposed to live in fear I do feel that the Bible tells us to be prepared. Joseph helped Egypt prepare for the famine that was to come and helped save a lot of people.

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Livingroom Remodel… it looks so good!

Published on by Susie @ Pollywog's Place Blog5 Comments

In one of my last posts, I showed a quick peek of how our remodel was going and how one thing always leads to another. Well, it is finally finished and it is looking so good!

These were some of the ‘Before’ after we had just finished a major decluttering:

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DIY Walk-In Pantry Makeover #2

Published on by Susie @ Pollywog's Place Blog8 Comments

Hey, ya’ll! It’s been a bit busy around here with this pantry makeover. I know I’ve mentioned it a few times but I haven’t really posted many pictures because it wasn’t really to the point that I was quite loving it.

How many times does it take to get a pantry just right?

Well, after seven days and about seven different configurations, I think I have it where I like LOVE it. The best part is that this isn’t permanent(although it could be) and it would be a great option for anyone renting or just needing something temporary. It has definitely brought things to my attention and helped me create a better flow for our kitchen areas. Here is the post about my original DIY Pantry that I have been missing!

Here is the best picture I have of where we started from:

It worked but it wasn’t the best use of space and I just wasn’t happy with it. We have a second refrigerator to the left of this picture and I really didn’t like it being in that area.

We had drawn up some ideas to build a room here to use as a walk-in pantry but we decided that we needed to do some other projects before we do this so I needed to do something very budget-friendly as Christmas is coming up soon too! I’ll post links for the supplies at the end of the post.

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Meal Prepping: Freezing Veggies

Published on by Susie @ Pollywog's Place Blog1 Comment

Life has been a bit crazy around here with kids, housework, homeschool, square dancing, and just day to day things. I am always trying to find ways to make life a little bit simpler and easier for everyone.

Today I have been a bit busy trying to prep a few things to make mealtime a little bit easier for me. (I did this a lot last year but somehow got out of the habit.) I try to keep up with my meal planning and this helps a lot with the prep work. As I work on reinforcing this habit I will try to do various posts to help others with this task also.

Today has been prepping veggies. I really love mushrooms and can often find them on sale but they don’t keep long in the refrigerator. My solution is to freeze them right away if I am not using them. You can do this a couple of different ways.

One way is to:

  1. Slice or chop them as desired.
  2. Cook them and let them cool.
  3. Spread them out on a cookie sheet and freeze 2-3 hours.
  4. Scoop the frozen mushroom into baggies and place in the freezer until needed.

You can also freeze them raw by following the steps above and omitting step 2.

I do the same thing with bell peppers and onions. I will usually slice a few onions/peppers and dice a few as well. This is really great to do when you find those sales on bulk amounts of veggies. This helps to reduce the amount of waste you may have. Just be sure that you are using clean, fresh veggies that are in good condition.

These vegetables can be used in many of your normal dishes. When you freeze them on the cookie sheet to start with it helps keep them from clumping together and makes it easier to remove the amount you need without thawing out the whole bag.

Other veggies can be frozen and stored the same way but some, like baby carrots, may need another method called blanching:

  1. Bring 4-6 quarts of water to a boil on the stove.
  2. Add 1-1/2 lbs of carrots (or other veggies)
  3. Bring to a boil and boil for 3-5 minutes.
  4. Quickly drain and cool the carrots with cold water for another 3-5 minutes.
  5. Drain and dry.
  6. Use steps 3-4 from above.

I normally use my most of my prepped vegetables within 2-3 months but some of them can keep as long as 12 months at a time.

Below is a link that I found to help determine what vegetables can be frozen and what method to use. It also goes into more detail about the different methods.

Freezing Vegetables – National Center for Home Food Preservation