#rolled a fat joint but i need to make meatballs

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hmm are y’all feeling things like ??? are we experiencing emotions all the time or is it more of an event

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Written by R. Ann Parris on The Prepper Journal.

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On a budget or waste-minded, now and especially in hard times – whether they’re personal or widespread – making the most out of our time and labors, and the foods we’ve grown or purchased, is important.

There are some additional tips for increasing ease and variety in the article about food preservation from a prepper-specific perspective (http://www.theprepperjournal.com/2018/08/01/preserving-the-harvest-canning-and-dehydrating/) and there are some inexpensive tools that can make food preservation faster and a fair bit easier on the hands (and on the back, and feet, and knife sharpener…). Here I’m hitting some quickie snippets that increase the frugality, efficiency, and ease of our home preservation, as well as some that increase the variety and options we have waiting in our cupboards.

I assume some basic familiarity with the most-common preservation methods, so make sure to check out the intro articles on TPJ and get the Ball/Bernadin canning book. The Excalibur dehydrating guides and recipe booklet is available for free online for download, too. It’s largely applicable to any electric dehydrator.

Into the Eats…

Churn out tongue-pleasing treats by dehydrating things like watermelon and cantaloupe. We can just slice them, or we can give them a whirl in a blender to turn into leathers or roll-ups.

The natural sweetness isn’t just a treat for a mood boost. It’s also a way to get an energy boost from nice, natural sugars and keep on trucking awhile.

Oddball bits of produce? Can up some antipasto or spicy pickle mixes. Anything works – peppers, cauliflower, broccoli, cucumbers, zucchini, celery sticks or kohlrabi spears, summer squashes, beets, carrots, green beans or wax beans, leftover olives, pea pods, even the odd egg or some leftover smokies, meatballs, or larger sausages.

It’s especially useful for larger flat types of green beans or lima beans that normally don’t make great green beans, but that will otherwise be wrecked by changing weather or the small percent left when most of the harvest has finished and we want to turn that bed/row/field.

Those small bits can also be easily canned as veggie medleys or soup starter.

Dehydrating is also an excellent way to preserve foods when we only have little bits and pieces of any one thing, but more than we’ll eat before it goes bad (especially without refrigeration).

Canning soup blends? Like mushrooms? Throw a couple of slices into each jar. That’s all you need to have the flavor permeate.

We can also dehydrate and then mince or grind mushrooms (from cans, too), for a little bit that goes a long way in sauces and broths.

Roast veggies before pressure canning. It provides deeper flavor as well as sometimes affecting the textures that result, especially for things that are prone to going mushy.

We can dehydrate our own quick-cook beans. Boil up some extras – plain. Rinse them, spread them out to dry, and store them with a moisture or oxygen absorber. When we’re ready to make them, we can either simmer for 20-45 minutes, or soak them for the day or overnight and they’ll be ready to heat and eat.

*Cook the beans plain, and either simmer or rehydrate with seasonings.

We can do bean purees (refried, humus), too, spread out like we’re making leathers or roll-ups (spaghetti sauce and applesauce, too). We can pummel them into bits or carry strips and chips with us, then quickly rehydrate them into a meal or side, campfire or kitchen.

The dryer/harder we get those, the longer they’ll last, like any dehydrated foods.

With seasoned beans and anything that includes fats and oils, the shelf life will decrease pretty significantly compared to plain – it’s that head-scratching wheat berry, flour, pasta conundrum again.

Line a bowl or pitcher with a storage bag to save the liquids from canned and drained frozen fruits to make jelly or syrup. Not sure of the sugar content? Use tapioca or corn starch for “now”/fridge versions or try a no-sugar pectin.

Those no-sugar pectins will store for years past best-by dates in the fridge, and may come in handy some time when we’re canning and realize there’s not enough sugar. (Jams and jellies require as much sugar as fruit, just about.)

While we’re making jelly, don’t rely on recipes’ times. We can always re-boil or use syrup, but for rock-solid, consistent results, use a chilled-spoon/plate or sheeting test.

Corn cobs that have had the kernels removed can be boiled down and turned it into homemade “Karo” or “Golden Eagle” corn syrups to use as a sweetener. (The cold-plate test is an excellent way to judge how far your syrups have gone, too.)

Scraps

Almost anything we can or dehydrate creates scraps. Most of those scraps can have a second and third life. Veggie peels and bones can be made into stock. Most fruit peels and cores can be soaked and turned into jellies.

Can, freeze, or dehydrate the mash strained from making jelly. It can be used for leathers/roll-ups, teas, animal supplements and treats, or flavoring breads, muffins, yogurt, oatmeal, sorbet/ice cream, etc.

We do want to be aware of dangerous/toxic seeds and remove those as needed. However, save the “safe” seeds removed from oversized cucumbers, squashes, and pumpkins – they can go to any birds, and most can go to hogs or goats.

Once we’ve gotten the very last use out of our foods, there’s the compost option, but most of the peels, cores, pods/shells, and tips are perfectly safe to add to animals’ feed or save for treats and winter-spring health boosts.

Prep Extra Jars & Lids

Jams, jellies, and pie filling are a bit notorious for filling up a little less or a little more than a recipe calls for. That’s due to fruit’s initial water content, and how long we process it, but it can happen with anything – hot pack or cold, pressure canning meats or water bathing tomatoes.

Having an extra jar on hand makes overage no big deal. There’s no stopping to wash more.

Having a pint, half-pint, or 4-oz jelly jar on hand already clean makes it even easier to adjust on the fly when we have a little more or a little less of something.

Having the spares on hand and ready to go also means we don’t have to stop in the middle, wasting time (and, from prepper perspectives, fuels) while we chase down a lid and rewash it.

Size Matters

Sometimes life is easier with fewer choices, and it’s definitely easier to organize and arrange things if we have nice, modular pieces. Even so, while prepping for home preservation, get a variety of jar sizes.

    In a grid-down or emergency situation, we may not be able to keep leftovers very easily, and there are things we just don’t go through very fast. Small and tiny jars of herbs and condiments help with that, even now.

Some smaller jars also help us with gifts and potlucks now, and will increase options later. It lets us compile a variety of goodies instead of just one thing. That can help us with both bartering and even “brown bag” lunches later.

Which goes right along with…

Open What You’ll Use

Especially for canning, preserve foods in reasonable one-use sizes. With a big family, we might very well want chicken cubes in a full quart. For only a couple of people, pints or half-pints are more reasonable and for some of us, little jelly jars might actually be the best-fit to avoid waste.

Tiny jars are especially helpful for sausage stuffing, lil’ smokies/shortie hotdogs, rillettes or pate, etc. that might be just a snacky-meal or special treat, or that we might be pocketing to take hunting, exploring, scouting, etc.

Smaller and oddball-shaped jars are also applicable to things like ham hocks or turkey necks that will be seasoning foods more than serving as a primary protein source.

Having small jars on hand will also let us PC some of our precious meat leftovers when it’s too hot for snow-bucket coolers but power is too precious for running fridges.

(It’s not as big of a deal for dehydrating or dry goods, although we might work in sizes we can move through or easily repackage there, too.)

Stock & Pasta Pots

We can use any ol’ pot for WBC; we don’t have to buy a specific canner (although, the lift racks are admittedly nice). That means we can tailor which pot we use to fit the most jars per load, avoid stacking, or having to reach uncomfortably high.

That last will keep more people productive and useful in a crisis as wear-and-tear on the body and lack of easy meds takes its toll. It also avoids shorter people dealing with the hassle of a tall canner on a standard stove, whatever their age or physical status.

*Also, you might want to keep both short and tall people in mind when setting up outdoor and emergency-times kitchens (or any kitchen). Tall people can flip an apple crate upside down to increase counter height and short people can stand on it for extra reach, but it’s nice to limit bending and climbing and decrease slip-fall risks when possible.

Just throw forks, butter knives, canning rings, or a towel in the bottom of the pot to buffer jars, or use a pasta strainer insert. Otherwise, the jars develop weak spots at the joint of the bottom piece. It usually won’t affect this batch, but the next time those jars hit a canner, we’re likely to start seeing a higher percentage of breakage due to the weaknesses.

  Preservation Quickie Tips

There are a lot of ways we can decrease food waste – besides just tossing something for compost.

Keeping our animals in mind and holding some of the summertime gluts back for them to enjoy during winter will keep them happier and help keep their guts primed and ready for varied foods during the season of grains, bagged feed, and typically one-type grass hays.

The critter clean-up crew really deserves its own article, as do super-star mechanical helpers like a very simple mandolin or hand-crank food processor.

Meantime, there are a million ways we can make canning, especially, a little easier and faster, and increase our efficiency in preserving foods, not only making use of every last bit, but also economizing our time.

Pretty much everybody who’s been at it a while has a trick they’ve developed or picked up that’s not in most canning or dehydrating guides. It’d be great to hear a few more.

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  The post Preservation Quickfire Tips – Increasing variety, ease and yields appeared first on The Prepper Journal.

from The Prepper Journal Don't forget to visit the store and pick up some gear at The COR Outfitters. How prepared are you for emergencies? #SurvivalFirestarter #SurvivalBugOutBackpack #PrepperSurvivalPack #SHTFGear #SHTFBag

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Tsukune

Tsukune, savory Japanese grilled ground chicken meatballs, can easily be made Whole30-friendly at home. Along the way, I’ve simplified the process even further so you can broil them in the oven any time you’re craving these umami-packed bites!

Many moons ago, I fell in love with tsukune at a casual yakitori restaurant after stuffing my face with a myriad of smoky grilled chicken skewers. Our family sampled the whole menu, but the one dish we kept ordering from the kitchen was tsukune—we couldn’t get enough of the juicy meatballs glazed with a thin layer of tare sauce, a tangy and sweet soy sauce-based dipping sauce.

After I discovered my gluten intolerance, the joy was sucked out of dining at yakitori joints because none of the grilled chicken skewers could be dunked in the tasty tare sauce. Cue sad trombone.

Easy Whole30 Tare Sauce

But recently, I was able to turn my frown upside down after realizing that my super versatile All-Purpose Stir-Fry Sauce can be used in place of tare sauce! It hits the same flavor notes as a traditional tare, but it doesn’t contain soy, gluten, or refined sugar. See, non-believers? I told you All-Purpose Stir-Fry Sauce can be used to make a bazillion dishes!

Tips for making fab tsukune at home

Use ground chicken thighs, not super lean breast meat. NO ONE WANTS DRY BALLS IN THEIR MOUTH. (I buy ground chicken thighs at Whole Foods or at a Japanese grocery store. Also, a good butcher can help you grind chicken thighs! You can also cube up boneless, skinless chicken thighs and freeze them for 30 minutes before pulsing them in a food processor.)

You can store the meatball mixture in the fridge for up to a day in advance before cooking them.

Mixing finely grated dried shiitake mushroom (I use this microplane) into the batter is a game-changer! I learned this tip from my chef sister (the co-creator of my Magic Mushroom Powder) and believe me: she knows umami.

Fry up a tiny patty of the tsukune mixture to taste for seasoning. This small step will be worth it if you want delicious meatballs.

Baste the meatballs three times with All-Purpose Stir-Fry Sauce during the cooking process to ensure the meatballs are well-coated with a sheen of this fantastic sauce.

Don’t bother putting the meatballs on skewers—it’s a pain to do so, and you’ll end up taking the meatballs off the skewers to eat them anyway!

What do you serve as a side dish?

I sound like a broken record, but you can serve any vegetable side dish with tsukune. Need recommendations? You can make Instant Pot Vegetable Soup, Asian Cauliflower Fried Rice, or Smashed Cucumber and Carrot Salad. Or just toss a salad, people.

How do you store leftovers?

I store the leftovers in a sealed container in the fridge for up to 4 days or in the freezer for up to 6 months. I always freeze cooked meatballs and thaw them before I reheat them in the oven or air fryer.

Let’s make tsukune!

Serves 4 

Ingredients:

1½ pounds ground chicken thigh

1½ teaspoons Diamond Crystal kosher salt

½ teaspoon toasted sesame oil

2 scallions, minced

1 medium shallot, minced

1 dried shiitake mushroom

1 tablespoon avocado oil or high temperature cooking fat of choice

⅓ cup All-Purpose Stir-Fry Sauce

2 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds (optional)

Equipment:

Find all of my home kitchen gear here on this page.

Method:

Combine the ground chicken, salt, sesame oil, scallions, and shallot in a large bowl.

Use a microplane to grate the dried shiitake onto the meatball mixture.

Knead the mixture very thoroughly with your hands. The final texture should be sticky and tacky.

Fry up a tiny patty and taste it for seasoning. Adjust with additional salt if needed.

Cover the bowl and chill the meatball mixture in the fridge for at least an hour and up to a day. Chilling the mixture will make it easier to roll out your meatballs, but if you don’t have time, just make them right away.

When you’re ready to cook the meatballs, turn on the broiler and arrange the oven rack so that it’s 6 inches from the heating element.

While the oven heats up, brush a rimmed baking sheet or broiler pan with avocado oil. Scoop out 24 meatballs with a #40 disher (~1½ tablespoons)…

…and roll them into uniform size balls with your hands.

Arrange the chicken meatballs evenly on the greased baking sheet.

Broil the meatballs for 2 minutes, and then brush them with All-Purpose Stir-Fry Sauce. Rotate the tray 180 degrees.

Repeat the above step twice more so that the meatballs are cooked for a grand total of 8 minutes and the meatballs are basted with the sauce three times.

The meatballs are finished cooking when the tops are browned and cooked through. Make sure they don’t burn or get overcooked.

Top with toasted sesame seeds if desired. Serve immediately!

Looking for more recipe ideas? Head on over to my Recipe Index. You’ll also find exclusive recipes on my iPhone and iPad app, and in my cookbooks, Nom Nom Paleo: Food for Humans (Andrews McMeel Publishing 2013) and Ready or Not! (Andrews McMeel Publishing 2017)!

PRINTER-FRIENDLY RECIPE CARD

Tsukune (Whole30 Japanese Chicken Meatballs)

These Whole30-friendly Tsukune, a savory Japanese grilled ground chicken meatball, can easily be baked at home in the oven!

1½ pounds ground chicken thighs

1½ teaspoons Diamond Crystal kosher salt  (use only ¾ teaspoon salt if using a fine grain salt)

½ teaspoon toasted sesame oil

2 scallions (minced)

1 medium shallot (minced)

1 dried shiitake mushroom

1 tablespoon avocado oil (or high temperature cooking fat of choice)

⅓ cup All-Purpose Stir-Fry Sauce

2 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds (optional)

Combine the ground chicken, salt, sesame oil, scallions, and shallot in a large bowl. Use a microplane to grate the dried shiitake onto the meatball mixture.

Knead the mixture very thoroughly with your hands. The final texture should be sticky and tacky.

Fry up a tiny patty and taste it for seasoning. Adjust with additional salt if needed.

Cover the bowl and chill the meatball mixture in the fridge for at least an hour and up to a day. Chilling the mixture will make it easier to roll out your meatballs, but if you don’t have time, just make them right away.

When you’re ready to cook the meatballs, turn on the broiler and arrange the oven rack so that it’s 6 inches from the heating element. While the oven heats up, brush a rimmed baking sheet or broiler pan with avocado oil.

Scoop out 24 meatballs with a #40 disher (~1½ tablespoons) and roll them into uniform size balls with your hands. Arrange the chicken meatballs evenly on the greased baking sheet.

Broil the meatballs for 2 minutes, and then brush them with All-Purpose Stir-Fry Sauce. Rotate the tray 180 degrees.

Repeat the above step twice more so that the meatballs are cooked for a grand total of 8 minutes and the meatballs are basted with the sauce three times.

The meatballs are finished cooking when the tops are browned and cooked through. Make sure they don’t burn or get overcooked. (The final internal temperature should be 165°F.)

Top with toasted sesame seeds if desired. Serve immediately!

Depending on how hot your broiler is, the meatballs may take longer or shorter to cook. Just keep an eye on them and stab them with a meat thermometer to double check that they are done.

You can cook the meatballs in an air fryer at 400°F following the directions in step 7 onward.

The post Tsukune appeared first on Nom Nom Paleo®.

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The best kitchen gadgets for eating healthy

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The Insider Pick:

Eating healthy can be a challenge, but it doesn't have to be if you have the right kitchen tools to help you prep good meals. We've rounded up a few essentials that everyone should have in their kitchen.

In a world of takeout, fast food, and nuke-em-in-the-microwave meals, you might be spending less and less time in your kitchen. And that’s a shame, because not only does home cooking done right taste a lot better than prepackaged food or meals bought on the run, it’s frequently healthier and more economical, as well.

If you need some encouragement to get back in the kitchen, we’re here to help. We’ve rounded up nine kitchen gadgets that admittedly you could live without, but you probably won’t want to. Each one helps to make your food prep or cooking time a little easier, a little faster, a little healthier, or a little bit more fun. Best of all, none of them are expensive or complicated. Here are all the products we've included in the guide and the purpose they serve:

For fresh veggie noodles, get the 5-blade Spiralizer.

For quick salads, get the EZ Salad Cutting Bowl.

For healthy baking, get the Velesco Silicone Baking Mat.

For fresh herbs, get the Jenaluca Herb Scissors.

For easy straining, get the Kitchen Gizmo Snap 'N Strain Strainer.

For fresh pineapple, get the Super Z Outlet Corer.

For quick zest, get the Raniaco Zester.

For fuss-free guacamole, get the OXO Avocado Tool.

For easy meat shredding, get the Bear Paws Shredder Claws.

These gadgets are handy tools to bring back the joy of cooking and keep you healthy. Many of them inspire you to eat more fresh veggies, herbs, and fruit; while others help you prep meals with fewer oils and carbs.

Read more about each kitchen gadget in the slides below to see which ones are best for you.

A spiralizer

Spiralizer

Why you'll love it: The Spiralizer 5-Blade Vegetable Slicer turns humble veggies and fruits into noodles, curly toppings for salads, and healthy garnishes for any dish.

Zoodles and other veggie noodles are one of the hottest new trends in the kitchen, and it’s no wonder. They taste good, provide the base for whatever tasty sauce you’d like to pour on top, and pack a powerful punch of nutrients without wheat or other grains you might want to avoid. You can buy pre-spiralized zoodles in many markets these days, but they are expensive. Save your dollars, and do your own spiralizing instead.

Just choose one of the five cutlery-grade stainless-steel blade plates included with the Spiralizer 5-Blade Vegetable Slicer, clamp your veggie or fruit into position, and turn the crank. Voila, you’ve got thin curls of veggie deliciousness that are perfect for stir-frying, soups, salads, pasta dishes, bowl lunches, or just about anything else you can cook.

The spiralizer comes with five different blades, and each one produces a slightly different thickness, twist, or shred. The spiralizer holds tight to your countertop with suction-cup feet, cleans up in the dishwasher, and works beautifully to spiralize just about any fruit or veggie that’s firm, including zucchini, sweet potatoes, yellow squash, carrots, ginger, broccoli stalks, apples, pears, and cabbage.

Pros: A great way to add interest to vegetables and cut back on wheat and other carb consumption, includes three free recipe eBooks

Cons: You might eventually tire of the zoodle trend

Buy the Spiralizer 5-Blade Vegetable Slicer at Amazon for $29.99 (originally $49.99)

A salad cutting bowl

EZ Life Products

Why you'll love it: The EZ Salad Cutting Bowl takes all the fussy chopping and slicing out of salad prep so you can eat salad more often.

If too many of your lunches come from vending machines or drive-thru burger joints, you can healthy-up your diet by choosing salad at least a couple times per week. The EZ Salad Cutting Bowl makes it easy to mix up a great salad quickly.

Just add your favorite mix of veggies to the EZ Salad Cutting Bowl – lettuce, carrots, cucumbers, cabbage, celery, tomatoes, or any others you like – rinse them right in the bowl, close the bowl’s base, turn, slice through the bowl’s slits, turn again, slice once more, and then open up the cutting bowl and enjoy your chopped salad. You can make fruit salad, as well.

The EZ Salad Cutting Bowl is made of sturdy, BPA-free plastic, and easily washes in the dishwasher.  

Pros: An easy way to make tasty salads or chop veggies for use in other dishes

Cons: You’ll need a knife long enough to reach across the entire bowl

Buy the EZ Salad Cutting Bowl on Amazon for $14.99 (originally $24.99)

Some silicon baking sheets

Velasco

Why you'll love them: With the Velesco Silicone Baking Mats, stuck-on baked goods, meats, or vegetables are a thing of the past, and you’ll cut down on oils and fats, as well.

I use my aluminum baking sheets quite a bit, and not only for baking. Sheet-pan meals, heating up frozen foods, cooking bacon in the oven, and toasting seeds are all fairly common activities in my household. Scrubbing the sheets, however, was never much fun. It took me awhile to discover the joys of silicone baking mats, but once I did, there was no turning back.

I’ve had my set of two Velesco Silicone Baking Mats for a year or so now, and despite frequent use, they are still unstained and have no signs of wear or tear. They fit nicely in my 16x12-inch baking sheets, and wash-up quickly with just a swirl in the sink and a little dishwashing soap.

I also use them to line my roasting pans; they fit nearly perfectly. No more cooking-oil sprays — which leave impossible-to-remove buildup on your cookware — no more soaking and scrubbing to remove cooked-on food, no more greasing the pan before I use it. Food also cooks evenly and removes easily from the food-grade silicone material.

The half-sheet baking mats are also perfect for rolling out cookie dough or kneading bread, rolling meatballs, or making candy. Go ahead and put the mats in your dishwasher, microwave, oven, or freezer and they will come out unscathed.

Pros: No need for grease, butter, or oil on your baking sheets or roasting pans, and foods won’t stick, even if burned

Cons: None to speak of

Buy the Velasco Silicone Baking Mats on Amazon for $13.45 for a set of two (originally $22.99)

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