Reverse Two-Year Food Supply

In the not too recent past, I have been known to get ahead, significantly ahead, storing food products I might use in the future. Now Bonnie and I are trying the reverse process. We are trying to eat every item in our panty – just get those shelves bare holding only minimal supplies. “There go the raisins in the double batch of Morning Glory Muffins! No use buying any more until we have used up the nuts and coconut as well.” Then I headed for the jars of lentils and next the gallon jar of mixed dried beans.

The freezer has also been yielding up treasures – pork from the 2012 pig roast, loaves of speciality bread tucked away in non-descript plastic bags, as well as one cup containers of soups for Bonnie to take to work. Now we identify the new ones by putting the date on them; we eat everything that is undated – which could end up being dangerous if it weren’t all frozen.

I made jam out of August’s over abundant raspberries, put raspberries in every batch of muffins and am aiming at raspberry smoothies with the rest of the berries. On that point, we forgot to cut down the canes last year, so the berries came back for three summer months, but not in abundance. Well, I didn’t think it was abundance until I began picking them. That was taking me an hour and a half every two days. Still, more berries will be produced if I can take down the old canes. When I get back to the lake next week, I am marching up the hill in my winter boots and breaking those canes off, since I missed doing that last year. I want to get all the berries possible, given my joy at using up freezer supplies in the winter. Yum, to the jam at least! Hip hurrah to the fantastic grocery bill saving. Given there has been no famine, this must be what I was gathering all of that food for.

Arta