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Organizing your deep freezer is like going grocery shopping. You should try it – you will be surprised at the food you will find and at the money you will save!

With Ken being on permanent disability, and with me working full time in my highly stressful job, he took over as much of the cooking and grocery shopping that he could to help me out. I was even working so much overtime, that I never had time to do any baking. So after awhile, he was missing and even craving some home baked goodies. To bring you up to date, Ken is on permanent disability when he suffered a cardiac arrest of seventeen minutes. Miraculously he survived with only his memory being permanently damaged. He has a very bad short term memory, and for good reason!

Every week when Ken did the grocery shopping, he bought a pound of lard and said to himself, I am going to learn how to make a pie. But he never did, and he forgot that he bought the lard. The next week, he said the same and bought another pound of lard.

My experience about deep freezer

Last winter I decided it was time to defrost, clean out, and purge he deep freezer. Guess what I found? Twenty pounds of lard!! I also found all kinds of little bags of who knows what, unmarked and freezer burnt that I had to trash. The things I was able to identify I made into soups and stews. But the real treasure was bags and pails of frozen fruit. Ken used to make home made wine… so what do you do with twenty pounds of lard and frozen rhubarb, saskatoons, blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, huckleberries and crab apples? You make pie!

I was concerned about making fruit pies and freezing them, because the last time I did that, they were soggy. So I spoke to my sister who is a pro at this, and I am going to share with you what she told me to do. The secret is to cook and thicken the fruit, let it cool completely, then spoon it into your pie shells and freeze.

It sounds daunting, but it was easy when you do it in little bits, not all at once. One afternoon I made a few pounds of lard into pie dough, shaped them into disks wrapped in cellophane and put them in the fridge. The next morning I cooked the fruit and let it cool. By late afternoon, I rolled the dough using best storage containers for pantry, filled it with the fruit, rolled a dough for the top, and then froze it. Once they were frozen, I wrapped them into freezer bags, labeled them with what kind of pie and how to bake them. I gave away pies, we ate pies, and I filled my freezer with twenty pies exactly.

Best Food storage containers 

I normally make dough from butter and shortening, so I had to re-learn how to make it from lard. I found it was dry and didn’t re-roll very nice at all. Then I remember watching a TV show once (not a cooking show) where it was mentioned her grandmother’s secret ingredient in her pierogie dough was 7-Up. So I gave that a try, and it was the best dough ever!! It was tender and you could re-roll it many times.

My food bill was drastically reduced because I cooked all kinds of casseroles and home made soup with what I found from Ken’s shopping sprees. But the real treasure was being able to whip a pie into the oven any time we felt like one. A home made pie filled with home picked berries in several different combinations. The winter of pies – to never be repeated!

Is it time for you to check out your deep freezer? Have a look and see what you find. If you are not sure what to do with it, just post it here in your comments. I will go through my repertoire of recipes and ideas, and you too could be saving money and eating like a king!

Huge tip: Store food in Best Freezer Containers and freezer bags, not shopping bags. Always label with what the contents are and a date.

Here are my recipes:

Fool-Proof Flaky Pastry

5 cups flour
1 TB salt
Cut in 1 lb. Tender flake Lard to the size of peas
Mix in 1 cup cold 7-Up
Stir until it comes together into a ball. This is a great dough. Forget the egg and vinegar! The secret ingredient is the 7-Up! Who knew…

Roll into a log and cut into disks, wrap and chill.

Don’t roll too thin.

Fruit Filling For Pies

In large Dutch Oven (pot) fill with frozen berries
Add 2 cups sugar (or more, to taste)
2 TB of water to get it going
Simmer
Add 1 – 2 boxes Tapioca
May add cornstarch
Vanilla
To test if it has thickened enough, take 1 TB and put it on a saucer in the freezer for 20 minutes.

If it is set, it is ready.

Let the filling cool completely.

Fill the pie shells – about 3 cups of filling per pie.

Top with an upper crust.

They go from freezer to oven and bake for 1 & 1/2 hours at 350-375°

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plastic food containers  

For many housewives and home makers vacuum food sealer is one of the best inventions of our time. It is not only very practical but very helpful around the kitchen as well. Best food vacuum sealer machine keep our meat, poultry and fish fresh and clean inside our fridge. It prevents bacteria to spread inside our ice box. It also prolongs the storage life of our foods. It is also a space saver. People now can buy meat and veggies in bulk without having to worry about fridge space and spoilage.

Because of the many uses of the vacuum food sealer there are now a lot of types and a lot of different brands to choose from. The dilemma now of many buyers is how to choose the best one for their everyday use. Let us now take a look at some important tips on how to go about choosing the best vacuum food sealer in the market.

Your usage

This is actually a question for you, the buyer: how much food are you going to vacuum every day? Every week? If you can already determine the amount of food you are going to vacuum on a daily basis then that is a good start. Vacuum food sealers are designed depending on the consumer’s usage: light, medium, heavy or business. There are food vacuum sealers that are designed only for light to medium amount of food vacuuming a day and there are vacuum food sealers that are for medium to heavy duty. If you are into food business and would require a vacuum food sealer to store your food in, then you should choose something along the lines of industrial food vacuum sealers.

Your Kitchen Space

When choosing a vacuum food sealer you have to consider your kitchen space. We are talking about your counter top more specifically. There are vacuum sealers that are practically portable which you can bring anywhere. They are also very light to carry. There are vacuum food sealers which are upright and others are horizontal. You have the freedom to choose according to your kitchen space.

Sizes of what you are going to seal

Aside from your kitchen space, you should also have to determine the sizes of the food and other things that you are going to seal. There are sealers which can accommodate up to fifteen inches of sealer bags and there are others which are smaller.

Features

When the vacuum food sealer first came out of the market it is just a very simple yet practical device. But now there are so many features that this wonder appliance has to offer but of course it comes with a little extra cost. You just have to determine what sorts of features are really practical and what you actually need. There are vacuum food sealers with built in roll holder and cutter. There are others that offer hands-free operation for people who are busy and always in a hurry around the kitchen. There are others with drip free tray and antibacterial surface that are easy to clean.

For your added information, vacuum food sealers do not only safely seal your foods to stay fresh longer. They can also be used to seal other valuable items in your house. It can also help you in packing your clothes to make them less bulky. Yes, vacuum food sealers have gone a long way since its introduction. It is still doing its jobs and a lot of moms and home makers are continually discovering other uses for this wonder device.

In an effort to keep their homes and the environment safe, more and more homes are switching to glass food storage containers. And as more people make the switch, the benefits of glass containers are become clear. They keep you and your food safe, make leftovers and stored food taste better and look better while doing it. Read on to discover more of the benefits of glass refrigerator containers.

The Dangers of Plastic Containers

When plastic food storage containers first hit the market, they seemed like the final answer to all of our food storage needs. They were cheaper than glass and disposable. And because they were light, they also traveled better than glass refrigerator storage containers.

But as the world became more aware of the dangers of plastic, the honeymoon is ending. One of the first chemicals we found out about was Bisophenol A, more commonly known as BPA. BPA is trouble because it mimics estrogen once it enters the human body and has been linked to breast cancer cell growth and lowered sperm count.

In 2004, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) conducted a study to gauge the extent of exposure to BPA in the United States. They found BPA in nearly all of the urine samples they took. Unless labeled as BPA free, all polycarbonate plastic (labeled as number 7 recyclable on its base) food storage containers contain BPA.

Any food stored in those containers is likely to leach into your food. The danger of leaching is even higher if those plastic containers are scrubbed vigorously or heated in the microwave at any point. Since those two instances cover most of the ways we use plastic containers in our homes, the risk of exposure is high.

Reasons to Switch to Glass Containers

Glass refrigerator storage containers aren’t just safe; they’re more aesthetically pleasing too. The rectangular and round containers bring to mind a simpler time when glass containers were the norm. There are plenty of vintage glass containers on the market that will make your leftovers look better and make the neighbors ask where you got them.

And glass refrigerator storage containers are even more sturdy than plastic. It can survive the freezer, the oven, the microwave and the dishwasher. Since they’re made from tempered glass, they resist chips, cracks and other dings even when you put them right from the freezer to the microwave. And they’ll do it without accumulating stubborn stains, smells or warps.

The final, most compelling argument is the food. When you switch to glass refrigerator storage containers, you’ll immediately notice how much fresher your food tastes. Part of the reason is that glass keeps your food colder. That not only means better tasting food, but less cooling work for your refrigerator. Once you make the switch, you may even notice your energy bill going down.

Easy Ways to Switch to Glass

Now that you’ve made the decision to switch to glass refrigerator storage containers, the transition doesn’t have to be a painful one. Glass food storage containers have come a long way from their vintage roots. Unlike old-school cracker jars, mason jars or Montana jars, modern glass refrigerator storage containers don’t have rusty metal — which can also be lined with BPA — lids that spark in the microwave. Most come with flexible plastic or silicone lids.

These lids are flexible enough to keep freshness sealed in. And the plastic versions are available BPA and PET free. If you want to minimize the artificial materials in your containers, you can find glass storage containers with glass lids and cardboard lining.

Shop in the right places and you can find glass refrigerator storage containers in all sizes. Use small glass food storage containers for snacks or pick containers large enough to fit last night’s leftover roast. And because glass refrigerator storage containers look as nice as serving dishes, they can go right on the table. That means better dinner presentation and less clean-up afterwards.

For all these reasons and more, the switch to best glass food storage containers is a good one. The right  food storage containers will give you peace of mind that the food you serve your family is safe. And they look so great that you’ll have your friends sign a release before you let them take your glass refrigerator storage containers out of your kitchen.

Perhaps you heard some legends about housewives whose pressure cooker exploded and all the heating contents of the pot spread out on the kitchen’s walls, or even worse, on the housewife. Fortunately, this kind of stories is a thing of the past. Today’s pressure cookers are equipped with many safety features that make pressure cooking one of the most pleasant and safe ways of preparing dinner for your loved ones.

The safety issue of the use of the pressure cooker

The early pressure cookers needed to be put in the sink and only by running cold water over them will the lid come off. Carrying the hot pot around the kitchen seemed scary enough for cooks to dismiss pressure cookers. On top of that, the lid could be accidentally opened while still under pressure.

This is no longer the case nowadays. New generation pressure cookers release pressure just by removing them from the heat source. Some have automatic pressure release valves, so you don’t have to bother. The lid cannot be opened before all the pressure has been released from the cooker. All the cookers have indicators that show you when it is safe to open the lid.  Ninja pressure cooker models have three safety valves that release pressure in case it builds dangerously high.

The pressure cookers you can find on the market today are safe, so you have very little to worry about. Once you use the cooker right and follow all the instructions, there is absolutely no chance for things to go wrong.

Here are some basic things you should know in order to cook safely and deliciously as a real chef would:

Always check the pressure cooker before using it

Before pressure cooking, you have to check the cooker and see if it is in excellent condition. Is the rubber gasket cracked, ripped or dried? If so, you should replace it immediately. It is advisable to replace the gasket annually because it can deteriorate with time and use. It is always wise to order extra rubbers, just in case there is a need to replace it. Also, check if the cooker is properly cleaned. Old food that got stuck in the machine could prevent normal functioning. Once you found your cooker to be in the right shape, you can start putting the ingredients inside.

Use the exact amounts of ingredients and water suggested in the recipes

You should not overfill the cooker with ingredients. One-third of the pot, for most foods, or a half, for foods that swell, is enough. Check your recipes and see exactly the amount suggested. Make sure you use enough liquid for steam to build up. Usually, you can find out what the necessary amount of water is from recipes.

It is better to avoid frothing foods because the foam created can affect the machine. In case you have to use foods that froth, put only a very small amount in the cooker, and follow all the instructions in the recipe.

Do not fry foods in the pressure cooker

Never put more than a drop of oil in the cooker. Frying food in pressure cookers is extremely dangerous!

 Safely release pressure

Before opening the lid, you have to release all the pressure inside. You can do it either naturally, by turning off the heat and letting the cooker cool off, or by using the steam release valve of the cooker. It is extremely important to protect your hands when handling the pressure cooker. Release steam away from your face and body, because the high temperatures could burn your skin.

Clean your cooker

After use, always clean the cooker properly. Make sure the valves aren’t stuck and the rubber gasket is clean, thus preparing the pressure cooker for the next meal.