Chicken - Freezing and Canning

Since there is currently a Chicken Order through Zaycon Foods in our area, I thought it might be helpful to discuss how you can store chicken.

Freezing

Select only high quality, fresh poultry to freeze. Package poultry in freezer paper, wrap using butcher wrap, or place in freezer bags. Store bought poultry needs to be over-wrapped before freezing because its clear wrap is not moisture-vapor resistant. When packaging pieces, arrange them to form a compact, square, flat package so they will stack better in the freezer. After packaging, seal and freeze immediately. Personally, I usually freeze my chicken using a vacuum sealer.  It does a great job keeping meat from getting freezer burn.

You can also cook your chicken and then freeze it.  I like to do this and either cube or shred the chicken to use in enchiladas, quesadillas, casseroles, soups, etc.  Package and freeze using one of the methods discussed in the previous paragraph.

Canning

The following information was taken from the National Center for Home Food Preservation.

Please read their section on Using Pressure Canners before beginning. If this is your first time canning, it is recommended that you also read Principles of Home Canning.

Procedure: Remove excess fat. Cut the chicken into suitable sizes for canning. Can with or without bones.  One pint jar holds approximately 1 lb of chicken.

Hot pack – Boil, steam or bake meat until about two-thirds done. Add 1 teaspoon salt per quart to the jar, if desired. Fill jars with pieces and hot broth, leaving 1-1/4 inch headspace.

Raw pack – Add 1 teaspoon salt per quart, if desired. Fill jars loosely with raw meat pieces, leaving 1-1/4 inch headspace. Do not add liquid.

Adjust lids and process following the recommendations in Table 1 or Table 2 according to the canning method used.

This document was adapted from the "Complete Guide to Home Canning," Agriculture Information Bulletin No. 539, USDA, revised 2009.

Yogurt Making

Paula taught a great yogurt making class in her home this morning! She uses the Provident Pantry nonfat dry milk to make it with although you can use other milk as well. But what a great way to rotate your milk supply! And the ingredients are all shelf stable items you can store, including yogurt starter. You can access a handout on her method HERE.

Read the handout for specific instructions, but here are the basic directions:

First, heat the milk to 180 degrees F.


Remove it from the heat and let it cool to 115 degrees F.
Whisk in the starter. You can use the Yogourmet starter


or some yogurt you've saved from your last batch of yogurt.


Optional: At this point you can add up to 1/3 cup sugar and 1-2 tsp vanilla if desired.


Pour into jar(s) and incubate in a yogurt maker


or a cooler for 4-6 hours.


There are many additional methods of incubating as well which are mentioned in the handout.

Enjoy! Yogurt is great plain, mixed with jam, topped with honey or syrup, used in smoothies, and even made into yogurt cheese.

To make yogurt cheese, line a small strainer with a double layer of cheesecloth or a flour sack towel. Place this in a bowl or dish to catch the whey that will drain off. Place the yogurt in the lined strainer and place in the refrigerator (covered lightly with cloth) overnight. The yogurt will thicken and can be used plain like sour cream or seasoned for use as a dip. Bread seasonings make great seasoning options.

A Great Resource for Dehydrating Food

A friend of mine sent me a link to this wonderful website that gives video tutorials and recipes on how to dehydrate almost any type of food. The web site is Dehydrate2Store. I've only spent a short time looking through the resources available on the site, but it sure looks like they have a lot of worthwhile information.

Milk Taste Testing

In a previous post, Paula briefly mentioned how great the milk taste testing went that we did in our class earlier this week. I wanted to give some more details and also include a link to another milk taste test that was done last month by Utah Preppers. You can get a printable copy of the "Ways to Incorporate Powdered Milk" handout HERE.

We tested the following powdered milk brands:

• Fluid Skim Milk (used as a comparison)
• Provident Pantry Instant Nonfat Dry Milk
• Country Cream Instant Nonfat Dry Milk
• Maple Island Instant Nonfat Dry Milk
• Hill Country Fare Nonfat Dry Milk (Instant)
• LDS Church Cannery Nonfat Dry Milk
• Nestle NIDO Instant Dry Whole Milk
• Morning Moo Regular Low fat Dry Milk Alternative
• Morning Moo Chocolate Low fat Dry Milk Alternative
• LDS Church Cannery Hot Chocolate Milk (tested cold)

We made up each milk the day before so each milk could be refrigerated for 24 hours before tasting for best taste.

We did not go into much detail. We rated each milk on taste on a scale of 1 - 5 with 1 being the lowest and 5 being the highest. I was quite surprised to find that there were a couple of milk brands that tasted very similar to the fluid skim milk and the rest had a very strong powdered milk taste. Most people in our group (about 45 people) rated each brand either low or high with not much in between - they either liked it or they didn't. We did not total ratings on individual brands; just asked for a show of hands on which brand people liked the best. After eliminating the choice of the unexpected fluid skim milk, the large majority of people chose Provident Pantry as their favorite. A few people chose Country Cream as their favorite, putting it in second place. A few others chose Nestle NIDO as their favorite, putting it in third place. Personally, I could tell very little difference between the Provident Pantry and the Country Cream, and even the fluid skim milk. I did vote for Provident Pantry, but it was extremely close. I asked my 15 year old son to come as well to get his opinion but he wouldn't taste all of the choices. I did get him to taste a few of them, including the Provident Pantry brand. I asked him if he thought the Provident Pantry milk would be something he would drink if we purchased it and he thought it tasted like regular milk and that it was fine.
We tasted the Morning Moo Milk Alternatives and the LDS Church Cannery Hot Chocolate Milk separately since they are all whey based products and do not have enough protein to store as a main milk substitute. I had heard rave reviews on the Morning Moo milks, but I didn't like either one of them. Since they were tasted separately, not everyone tried them. The cans were only a few months old and they were opened for the taste testing, but very few people liked them as well as the Provident Pantry. That was quite surprising to me. The other thing that really surprised me was how much I liked the LDS Church Cannery Hot Chocolate. I didn't expect to like it cold. My 15 year old son liked it so much that he drank multiple glasses of it and then came home and made up 2 qts of it to keep in the refrigerator so he could have more later!
Utah Preppers did a very detailed taste test of powdered milk brands that can be found HERE. Below is a summary of their results:

(click on the table to view larger)

Dehydrated & Freeze-Dried Foods

Our class on dehydrating showed us that making our own dehydrated food is easy and it doesn't take as long as I thought. Kelli had some great dehydrating tips which can be found HERE. She has a NESCO American Harvest dehydrator and has been very happy with it. Another brand she recommended was an Excalibur dehydrator. Some of the new convection ovens even have a setting for dehydrating foods (check your owners manual for details). Kelli suggested you look for a dehydrator that:

• has an adjustable temperature
• has the fan on the top or on the side
• is expandable (can add extra trays)

A mandolin cutter can help you cut food pieces thinly and uniformly.

Here are a few websites that give specific instructions on how to dehydrate fruits, vegetables, herbs, and jerky:

Pick Your Own
FarmGal

You can even make crackers in your food dehydrator! Kelli made some yummy flax seed crackers. She didn't have an exact recipe, but here are some basic directions:

Flax Seed Crackers

1 cup flax seeds, ground (use a coffee grinder or blender)
1 3/4 cup water
seasonings (Parmesan cheese: 1/2 - 5 Tbsp and garlic salt or powder: 1/8 - 1 1/2 tsp; or any other seasonings - you can even add finely chopped or blended vegetables)

Mix the ground flax seeds and water and let sit for 3 or more hours until gelatinous. Mix in seasonings to taste (remember that the flavors will concentrate somewhat as the crackers dehydrate.) Spread mixture as thin as possible (1/4" thick) on dehydrator trays with Teflon sheets. Dehydrate until crisp.

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We also talked about the difference between freeze-dried and dehydrated foods. That handout can be found HERE. We then had the opportunity to taste and see the difference in multiple foods. We even tried a few of the Mountain House freeze-dried entrees and they were all quite good. My family uses them when we go camping and they would be wonderful to keep in a 72 Hour Emergency Kit. It would be nice to have a real meal instead of just a granola bar in an emergency.

Here are some photos and thoughts on the food we sampled (you can click on any of the photos to enlarge them):

Pizza from the Pantry

Our Pizza from the Pantry class was a huge success - and delicious too! We even made a pizza with one half grated cheese that had been frozen and the other half rehydrated freeze-dried cheese. We couldn't tell the difference! They both melted equally well and tasted great :)

Here is a wonderful pizza dough recipe from Joeby. Click HERE for a printable copy.

Pizza Dough

1 cup warm water
1 package yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
1 teaspoon sugar
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 ½ cups flour
1 teaspoon salt

Dissolve yeast and sugar in warm water. Stir with a fork and set aside for 10 minutes, or until very foamy. Add oil to yeast mixture. Combine flour and salt in a bowl and pour yeast mixture over and mix thoroughly. Let rest for 5 – 10 minutes.

Roll dough out onto an oiled pizza pan (or cookie sheet, etc.) or roll out onto a pizza stone. (I put a little corn meal under the crust - as I roll it out - to keep the pizza from sticking and it gives the crust a great crunch.)

Add your choice of topping ingredients (be creative!)

Bake in a hot 425 degree (preheated) oven for about 20 minutes. I usually start checking at 15 minutes. The type of toppings really makes a difference in how quickly the pizza browns.

Joeby made many creative pizzas, but my favorite was one with pesto, roasted red bell peppers, and diced tomatoes. It was delicious! All the toppings were from jars or cans since we were trying to use only shelf stable items, but of course you can use fresh ingredients when available.

Canning Beans

One of the things that makes it harder for me to use beans more often is the time and planning it takes to prepare them. I now use a pressure cooker most of the time to speed up this process, but another way that can help is to have some beans already cooked and readily available by canning them. HERE is a handout from the University of Georgia, The National Center for Home Food Preservation that gives a few basic recipes for canning beans and the correct procedure for doing so.

Canning Meat Class

Earlier this fall Sharon taught a class on how to can meat. We were able to sample some previously canned meat including chicken, brisket, ground beef, and pork roast. It was all surprisingly good! Consider adding canned meats to your food supply for days when you are short on time as well as for times when you might not be able to acquire or cook meat easily. You are also able to control what ingredients are in your canned food when you do it yourself.

For a printable copy of the handout from the class, click HERE.