DITL - A Good Day

I managed to get a few things done that I haven't been able to do due to my back and neck injuries. I woke up early in the morning to say goodbye to our friend who camped out overnight. Then I realized that I was feeling better, so I took advantage of the situation. 

I made 3 loaves of 9-grain bread. I've only baked bread twice in the past 7 months.  

I potted a plant that our friend gave us.

I lit a candle. FYI - Some of the WoodWick candles are
marked down $10 at Wal-Mart.

I turned on some worship music first thing in the morning
and enjoyed a cup of Jane. (Tea)

I spent the day before playing games in the truck camper
with our friend.

I really have not been cooking very much. Just enough to get by and we have been using some unhealthy packaged foods. I made Number One Husband oatmeal for breakfast and tostadas for lunch. I made a batch of chicken salad to go with the bread. 

There were plenty of dishes and I got caught up on the laundry. It's been raining, so it has not been possible to hang out all the clothes. We had a break in the weather, so I managed to get two loads dried outside.

We have been experiencing problems with our solar system. It looks like we have to have the whole system replaced. The war is impeding our progress on our water project also. When it rains, it pours but the sun always returns.

I am trying my hand at sourdough soon when it warms up just a little bit more. I will be sharing this adventure here on the blog and more...

Have a blessed day,

Mrs. Smith

Baking Day...

It was supposed to be the perfect baking day. I checked the weather forecast, and it was going to be sunny all day. We should have had plenty of solar power to use the oven without running the generator, however it is now snowing. Crazy! 

If we are careful, we should make it through the nighttime hours without needing to supplement our power. It turns very cold as soon as the sun sets. In the single digits actually. We are running both the fireplace and the supplemental heater. 

Potato bread sandwich loaves.

We ate most of the cookies and a few Bierocks before I took pictures.

These are the last two Oatmeal Date cookies. I froze the rest of the cookie dough. 

Bierocks

The loaves turned out beautifully.

Now that the dishes are done, and the kitchen is clean it's time to take a break. Once the baked goods have cooled, I will put them all away. I'm not sure what is on the menu for tomorrow. I probably just need to defrost something and take it from there. 

I pulled out some butter beans and chicken breasts. I will add bread and coleslaw, and we will have a very simple meal. The butter beans have been screaming "pick me" every time I open up the freezer. 
 I put them on top when I cleaned out the freezer a few weeks ago. 

Shalom,

Mrs. Smith

Meal Prep For Two - Freezer Meals - Baking Day - Day 1

It has been a hot minute since I have prepared freezer meals, but I am tired of cooking, clean up and repeat three times a day or just grabbing whatever until we are out of whatever. So, I donned my apron and enlisted Number One for help. 

We did our baking today that included biscuits, bread and granola. It was a great sunny day for off-grid baking. Our oven uses a lot of power to power the heating element even though we have a propane stove, so baking on a sunny day works best for us. 

Let's start with the biscuits. We tripled the recipe.

Biscuits (makes10 biscuits)

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. 

Wisk together in a large bowl:

2 C flour

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tbs sugar

1/2 tsp salt

Drop in:

5 to 6 tbs cold butter

Cut in butter with a pastry blender or two knives until mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs.

Add 3/4 C milk. Mix until the dry ingredients are moistened. Do not over mix. Form into a loose ball and press on a lightly floured surface until the dough is about 3/4 inch thick. Cut into 10 biscuits. Melt a tablespoon of butter in a pie pan or cast-iron skillet in the preheated oven. Place the biscuits in the melted butter coating both sides of the biscuits. Bake for 12-14 minutes until golden brown. Serve hot. 

For best results, keep up with the dishes as you go. That way you can move right into the next order of business. 

Sorry about my dirty oven. I had a large spillover and have not deep cleaned it yet. I don't want to do it while we are inside during the cold winter months with no open windows.

I was cooking the turkey bacon and gravy while making the biscuits. 

These are the ugly biscuits that you get after pressing out the dough scraps. They are great for biscuits and gravy. I am missing several pictures, like the pretty pan of biscuits, that I took after baking. I should have checked.

Breakfast is served. 

I made bacon and cheese biscuits out of the pretty biscuits.

I wrapped them in plastic wrap, bagged them up and froze them.

We froze the raw biscuits on a cookie sheet. 

Once frozen we placed them in a baggie with the baking instructions written on the bag.

More clean-up happened before moving on to baking the granola.

Granola: Follow the link below for the recipe. 

Homemade Granola

Granola is Number One's department. We tripled the recipe.

Syrup mixture

Oats and nuts

Mixed all together until oats and nuts are coated.

Ready for the oven

While Number One was taking care of the granola, I was making the bread dough.

A triple recipe almost makes a gallon of granola.

Homemade Bread:

Number One slices the bread. I am not good at it at all.

I am putting together buttered cheese bread for grilled cheese sandwiches.

I wrapped them in plastic wrap.

In between, I made a grilled cheese sandwich with bacon for Number One's dinner.

I ate the ends of the fresh bread for my dinner.

I made up six sandwiches.

I bagged up the un-grilled grilled cheese sandwiches and put them in the freezer. 

This is what we accomplished on our baking day. Tomorrow is a new day, and we have more meal preps planned. I will continue to blog as we go. Thanks for coming along...

Things To Be Happy About:

Cleaving unto one another

Bedtime after a long baking day

Plastic wrap

Saving and re-using bread bags because I can't find bags to fit my homemade loaves of bread.

Remembering to water my houseplants before they perish for good.

A helping hand

Goodnight,

Mrs. Smith