Any Cooks on here?

[cntrygrlcansurvive]

Do any of you bake your own bread, or do any canning?

Also i am looking to find more information on , what i guess you call "off the Grid" living. I want to hear form anyone that is doing/living the "self-sustaining" farm. I want to learn about what types of e=veggies you are growing and what types/breeds of animals you are using as well.

[cudalyon]

Bread, no.........Canning yep! You can can about anything that you can grow. Go to your loacal book store, (Or walmart for me) and pick up a canning book. Ball makes a great one.

[cntrygrlcansurvive]

ok i have just about masterd the bread making. but havnt tried to can anything just yet.

[Brosia]

I've been visiting a lot of preparation/survivalist web sites, and everyone is saying buy lots of wheat.... but I wouldn't know what the heck to do with it! Baking bread is definitely a skill to learn that's high on my list. I'll also be hitting the walmart this weekend and buying myself a pressure canner. I was thinking of starting a little container garden in my house this winter with uv light bulbs, and I'm ripping up half the yard come spring for a garden. I'd like to raise a chicken or two, but that's not allowed in my town (though what they don't know won't hurt them....) I've seen advertisements for a solar/wind power plan that claims you can build a small solar panel or small wind turbine system for under $200..... wondering if i should spend the $47 to order it. I would love to at least drop my electric bill (again, I'm sure wind turbines are not allowed in my town, and I'm sure you need all sorts of permits for solar power.... but what they don't know.....)


otherwise, I am still totally on the grid, non- self-sustaining, but doing everything in my power to change that. thank goodness it's so quiet here at work, I'm spending hours researching, and my boss doesn't complain too much.

[Rustyshakelford]

Do any of you bake your own bread, or do any canning?

Also i am looking to find more information on , what i guess you call "off the Grid" living. I want to hear form anyone that is doing/living the "self-sustaining" farm. I want to learn about what types of e=veggies you are growing and what types/breeds of animals you are using as well.

I bake my own bread. All of my own bread in fact.

[cowboy450]

I do my own canning. Not got around to learning to bake bread yet. I do make killer biscuits however.

[Rustyshakelford]

Rusty,

When you make your own bread, how longs the shelf life?

How about a bread recipe?

Not very long. No preservatives. Maybe 3 -4 days max.

Recipe is easy. Unbleached white flour, teaspoon of salt, tablespoon of sugar or honey, package of yeast, and liquids. Liquid could be beer, water, or milk. You know what dough looks like, put the flour in and add the salt and sugar, and add liquids until the consitency is that of dough. Knead it real well (20 minutes). Put it in a glass or stainless bowel and let it rise (about an hour) in a warm spot and covered with a towel. After it has risen, knead it for about 10 minutes and let it rise again in a greased loaf pan until it looks like a loaf of bread. Bake it at 400 degrees until brown.


I cheat and use a bread machine to do the kneading. But I bake it in a normal bread pan.

For a great variation, use semolina flour straight or mixed 50/50 with unbleached white flour. You can also add a couple of spoons of sour cream or a couple teaspoons of bacon grease.

Almost all of my homemade bread is 100% semolina flour. It is VERY expensive...but it is worth it.

[kenno]

I do bread about once a decade just to stay in practice.
Brosia
The wheat is for long term storage because it shelf life is longer than flour. Whole wheat grains/kernnels take alot of processing to make flour or even porage. It also takes alot of that grain to make a pound of flour. Personaly, I store flour, I stick a large bag in the deep freeze @ -15 for a couple of weeks to kill the weivel eggs et. al. then put the flour in a mylar bag with a desicant pack and sealed w/nylon cable tie, then in a 5 gallon bucket with a Gamma screw lid. In my experience this is good for 5 years, but I live in a low humidity area and store my stuff in a cool dark space.
PS Gamma screw lids have a O ring seal

[Zombie Axe]

Wife grinds her own grain, makes our bread, and it is GOOD :) She loves this website www.simplylivingsmart.com as has learned alot from it. Also consider your local county extension agent, lots of resources there!

We also have a means to bake when the grid is down: http://zombieaxe.blogspot.com/search?q=camp+chef+oven

We can some of our produce, dehydrate, and EAT it fresh! LOL

When the fruit trees, bushes, and muscadines start producing we will be busy!!! One word of advice for those that are moving to their retreat property/homestead, you need to plant fruit trees and bushes ASAP, as some take a few years to bear fruit!!!

Gonna build a chicken coop over Christmas (will post pics if I don't get hung up on it :( ) and I need to fence a pasture for some milk goats. Lots on my plate, but one of these days I'll 'git-r-done':D

[Rustyshakelford]

I guess I could do a pictorial on bread baking if you want.

[cntrygrlcansurvive]

Well I personally have got the bread baking down.
But would love to hear more from Zombie Axe as his projects progress.

[Omegaman]

I can bake most types of breads. I am good at cooking wild game, fish and indigenous edible flowers and plants. I have a 2 dehydrators I built, 1 large electric and 1 medium solar one. I also have a large homemade smoker. My weak spot is canning so I am taking a class on canning this winter because I love dilly beans and pickled fiddle heads. I can cook standard fair also, you know baked stuffed lobster with keylime butter sauce and jasmine rice followed by indian pudding. Or mac and cheese if needed.:rolleyes:

[themachenic,]

yes i can bake.very easy

[jimLE]

I have limited storage space.so I haven't gotten around to bread yet.right now.im working on a big ole batch of chils with beans.hopefully i'll have 33 pints of it with some left over to eat.by the time im done with it.

[RICHFL]

To get around the town laws see what they say about pet birds. Chickens can become a pet just by handling them. Good for eggs but hard to process for meat. So give them names and have fun. Here we are allowed up to 6 birds as pets.