Food Storage (for Camping Events) #3 - Dehydrated Cinnimon Sugar Apples, dehydrated rice, and veggie stock

I decided not to post right away about my 1st attempt using the dehydrator a few days ago, which involved several bags of cranberries I found on sale at Woodmans, because I wasn't satisfied with the end result. I know one thing I learned, cranberries are horribly hard to dehydrate properly even if you mince them in the processor or blanch them on the stove. They turn it very hard and crunchy. I think they'll work fine in the pemmincan when I get around to making that. Right now they're in several small jars in my cabinet for short-term storage and experimentation. Maybe I'll look up some instructions on how to do cranraisins see if there's a middle ground to the drying process.

Today I started the veggie broth in the crockpot, prepping some rice to try dehydrated cooked rice to see how that works, and finally putting some cinnamon sugar apples into the dehydrater. I used my apple peeler/corer which worked pretty well, though struggled with these apples a bit I think because they were overripe. Maybe the galas don't work as well I don't know. It could be I just have a cheap peeler, and in that case I need to get something better when I can. I'll try some less ripe apples next time and see. I'll know by late tomorrow whether it worked or not.

Now back to the dehydrated cooked rice. I know it sounds a little odd, but I was watching some videos by some backpackers it seemed a cheap and easy way to create instant rice which I could just throw into dishes on the campfire to make them more filling, or rehydrate for a nice base for meals. Going to make some and then rehydrate a little to see how it tastes.

Tomorrow's exciting because as soon as the apples are done I'm going to clean out the dehydrator and prep it to make the powdered chicken stock. The stock from the two full crock pots worth of chicken has been chilling in the fridge for a couple days. I have already skimmed the fat off it once (got off nearly an inch of fat across the surface) and am sitting it in the fridge the 2nd time just to see if I get any more. It already has a very gelled consistency to it, but I'll cook it down a bit more just to be certain before placing it on the fruit roll inserts for the dehydrator.

Food Storage (for Camping Events) #2 - Period Pickled Eggs

Well I made 2 batches of chicken in the crockpot that were cooked so nicely they literally fell off the bone (yum!), and then used some apple vinegar to boil down the bones and skin to make stock. The stock is now cooling in the fridge so that the fat separates for removal before it is dehydrated. Once I dehydrate the batch, I'll post an update on that. if it works all have a great method to make chicken stock powder to take with me to camping events.

I began doing some research on medieval forms of preserving food since I'd like to have meals I didn't have to have a cooler and ice for that would last several days safely. Information on pickling popped up in knowing how much my family likes eggs, I figure that would be a place to start. Right now I'm just gathering notes on what I need since it'll be a couple days before I can actually do the pickling. It seems simple enough.

6 to 10 eggs, boiled and peeled (depending on the size of the jar)
1/4 tea. salt, cinnamon, coriander (the recipe calls for these spices, but the person doing it uses cumin instead of coriander. Knowing how well the 2 good together, I am thinking I should 1/8 teaspoon of cumin as well and see what happens)
glass jar ( I have a huge one that might work for this, might even fit his much as10 eggs, or I might just make a smaller batch and experiment with my half-gallon jar)

vinegar to cover (thinking to use apple vinegar for this)

I just have to boil the eggs, cooling them down enough to peel them. Then I roll the eggs into the spices (mixed up) and place them in the jar. I think just for the heck of it I might add some garlic and onions to the mix. Then I cover it all up with vinegar and put the lid on tight. The original website didn't say how long to let the eggs sit, but most the other places I saw said 2 weeks at least in the fridge before eating.

Easy Peeled Hard Boiled Eggs

Food Storage (for Camping Events) #1

Okay the school semester is over and I'm making plans for being able to camp with the kids at SCA events next year. I've traded with a friend for a modern tent (10 man, I traded a Doumbek for it). I still have to pick the tent up and make room to store it along with the rest of the camping stuff I'll be gathering over the next few months. Clearing out space in the attic over the next week or so. I have another friend offering me a couple cots. I've been gifted a lantern for outside (wood w/ candle) and an electric lantern for inside the tent (battery powered). Its a start. We don't have room to cart a lot, but I want to make sure we at least have what we need for my city kids to be comfortable and not cranky so more fun is had for all.

One thing I've thought a lot about is feeding ourselves there. One kid is a semi vegetarian (he eats fish only) and the other kid is a meat eater so not only do I have to consider their tastes/needs, I also have to find the best way to store the most (they are both around teen ages, so hearty eaters) without needing to use a cooler. I have been looking at several options. Dehydrated foods (hoping to pick up a dehydrator this week to start trying out some of this), vacuum sealing (I just bought a handheld sealer online along with attachments for sealing regular and wide mouthed jars), and pressure canned meats (need to get a good pressure cooker). With well stored dry goods, and along with the medieval spices research I've been doing (another post coming on that), I figure I should be able to have a good bit of versatility in my meal planning.

The first thing I think I'd going to prep is bases for soups and stews. For example chicken and veggie stock. Now I know I could just freeze them, but that would still required cold storage at events. For this reason I plan to experiment with making my own stock powders that I can just rehydrate as I need them. This is easy enough with the veggie stock because I can just dehydrate the veggies desperately and then mix them for powdering. The chicken stock option took some research because its need to be cooked to a liquid state and then gelled when cooled. I did find mention of removing the fat and then cooking the stock down to a paste that can then be placed on the fruit leather trays on a dehydrator. I plan to try this and see how it works. I'm a big fan of slow cooker meals so I have been looking at chicken recipes that I could later turn into batches of broth. I want to keep the broth simple so I can add whatever spices later I want to without flavors clashing. I found some good recipes for slow cooker chicken though I'd like to play with using more period spices then the recipes I've found call for. After the family is done with the chicken then I'll take to bones a make me some broth. :)

The best recipe I found was this one (see vid below) which uses apples as one of the ingredients which seemed much milder taste (I was thinking of the neutralish stock I needed for later) then the others which were using lemons. I don't have the chicken stock she asks for, but I do have some veggie stock left I think, so I'll just use that instead. I don't think I'm going to add the mushrooms this time. Thing #2 is not fond of them so since this is her first time having chicken this way best to add as many "preteen disapproved" things as possible. I'm also going to play with the spices a bit, maybe hit the Spice House today to get some of the period spices I've been wanting.

A People's History Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner - Documentary

I found a very cool documentary on Period food culture in England.