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Cooking – Page 4 – Homesteader Depot

Homesteader Depot

Tag: Cooking

  • Five Must-Have Cast Iron Pieces

    Five Must-Have Cast Iron Pieces

    When first making the switch from toxic nonstick cookware to cast iron, you may have a few reservations about the care or cost, especially if you run your homestead on a tight budget. The good news is that cast iron cookware outlasts its nonstick and other counterparts by decades, even centuries; you won’t be replacing cheap pots and pans every few years. This coupled with a good grasp of the simple process of caring for your cookware, leaves no reason not to take the plunge! If you’re ready to start your cast iron collection, check out these essentials first!

     

    • Dutch oven: A good, high capacity dutch oven is a staple in any cast iron stash. Use this for baking bread, cooking soups, grains, legumes, and hearty casseroles.
    • Skillet: Skillets come in all shapes and sizes for use in almost any type of cooking. Get started with a standard 8- or 10-inch.
    • Grill pan: Ditch the bulky countertop grill and make restaurant-quality burgers and steaks with a grill pan. Great for use during the winter months when you want the perfect steak without cooking out in the cold!
    • Pots: Cast iron pots are a healthier alternative for boiling and steaming. From a multi-gallon stockpot to a cute little teapot, there are plenty of options available.
    • Baking dishes: Whether you’re whipping up a batch of cookies, a pan of cornbread, or a deep-dish pizza, there are myriad different styles and shapes of pans to get the job done. Artisan cast iron makers even offer dishes in novelty shapes such as states or animals.

    There’s no need to break the bank or clutter up the kitchen when becoming a cast iron convert. Yard sales, thrift stores are great places to find vintage pieces. Even big-box retailers are tapping into the growing market and offering affordable cookware selections. It’s easier than ever to start a great collection, but be careful- it can be addictive. But with cast iron, there’s no such thing as too much!

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  • How to Make Homemade Almond Extract

    How to Make Homemade Almond Extract

    I love DIY everything, and extracts are surprisingly easy. At the store, extracts for baking and flavoring foods can be surprisingly expensive, especially if you’d like organic or natural extracts of any kind. Almond extract is great to have for baking of all kind as the subtly sweet flavor of almonds makes for delicious cakes and cookies.

    The process for making your own is very simple. Since it only requires 15 raw almonds, it shouldn’t be too expensive to make this organic and natural, with some decent-quality vodka as well. You could make this large batch and put into smaller bottles for gifts or even to add to your farmer’s market stand if you have one.

    Ingredients 

    15 raw almonds

    2 cups of 80 proof vodka

    1 pint sized mason jar

    Jar or bottle for long term storage

    Directions to make one pint of Homemade Almond Extract

    1. First, blanch your almonds, if you don’t already have them blanched. Boil one pot of water and put your 15 almonds for 1 minute-be precise, set a timer. When the minute is up, drain quickly and run under cold water. Lay out on a tea towel to cool. The skin should look shriveled, and once they’re cooled you should be able to easily remove the skin from all the almonds.
    2. Roughly chop the blanched almonds and put them in your pint jar.
    3. Pour the vodka over the chopped almonds and secure the lid.
    4. Shake vigorously and place in a cool, dark place.
    5. Let sit for at least 6 weeks, or more if you’d like a bolder flavor. As it sits, make sure to shake every other day or so.
    6. Once the desired sitting time is up,  you can strain through a cheesecloth or coffee filter and pour into the bottle you’d like to use for storage. You can reuse the mason jar, or pour into smaller amber bottles for gifts or even sale.

    Enjoy!

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  • How to Cook Bone Broth in Your Slow Cooker

    How to Cook Bone Broth in Your Slow Cooker

    Bone broth is a total foodie fad, and for good reason. The vitamins and minerals from bones are great for you, for many reasons.

    Regularly consuming bone broth can help prevent osteoporosis, keep skin youthful and healthy, strengthen your immune system, help repair muscles and help you grow strong hair and nails.

    For a homesteader, bone broth is very appealing if you are regularly butchering animals, as you can freeze the bones from virtually any animal and use for bone broth later. It’s a great way to use up every part of the animal and harness the healthy nutrients hidden in the bone.

    If you don’t have animals you regularly slaughter, you can get bones from large bone-in roasts, when you roast a whole chicken or turkey, or you may be able to buy or even get free bones from your local butcher. Just ask!

    Here’s how to make it in a slow cooker:

    Ingredients: 

    2 lbs large animal bones

    2 carrots, chopped

    1/2 stalk celery, chopped

    3 tbs vinegar

    Instructions. 

    1. This step is optional, but to get the maximum flavor out of your bones, roast them in the oven on a cookie sheet for about 15 minutes at 350 degrees.
    2. Place your bones in your slow cooker, and fill with water until almost full. Depending on the size of your slow cooker, this might be about 4-6 quarts.
    3. Measure in the vinegar, and let the bones and vinegar sit in the cold water together for about 20 minutes. This helps extract the minerals from the bone broth.
    4. Add your vegetables and turn on to low.
    5. Let cook for 24 hours.
    6. After 24 hours, you should have a rich, fragrant, dark-colored broth. Strain out the bones and vegetables. You can cover the bones and vegetables with an equal amount of water and do another batch if you wish, but this will be considerably weaker.
    7. Store your broth. It keeps for about a week in the fridge, so it’s best to save whatever you would like to use in the coming week in the fridge, and freeze the rest.

    Enjoy!

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  • Creative Ways to Freeze Eggs

    Creative Ways to Freeze Eggs

    If you are ever faced with an abundance of eggs and not enough time to make something with all of them, it can be overwhelming! Eggs, especially of the farm-fresh variety, are such awesome, healthy, cheap (or free, if you have your own chickens!), and versatile sources of nutrients that it is imperative to use them efficiently.

    One really great option for preserving eggs with any of the following freezer methods is not only having eggs through the winter as production slows, but also to make them quick, easy, and relatively mess-free to use!

    Baking in Muffin Tins

    A really simple way to preserve eggs is to bake them individually in muffin tins and then freeze. They can be reheated quickly and easily for egg muffin sandwiches in the morning! Way cheaper and healthier than the fast food alternative.

    What you do is lightly coat muffin tins with cooking spray or butter and crack an egg in each round. Bake at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes, then let cool, stick in Ziplock bags, and simply pop in the freezer! These will last up to a year frozen.

    Freezing Raw 

    This works surprisingly well for scrambled eggs or being added to any kind of batter.

    What you do is beat together the raw eggs and pour into ice cube trays. 2 cubes is about 1 egg. Once frozen, you can pop them out of the tray and put them in a Ziplock bag. Just thaw in the refrigerator overnight to use the next morning. These will keep up to 6 months.

    Related Article:  Why Are My Chickens Not Laying Eggs?

    Freeze Scrambled

    This is a very easy way to freeze and reuse, for things like breakfast burritos or easy morning scrambles. It’s about as simple as it sounds: scramble up the eggs you want to preserve, let cool to room temperature, wrap up in freezer parchment paper and stick in a zip-lock bag. They will last up to a year. Simply thaw in the fridge overnight; you can also store these in the fridge and they will last up to a month!

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  • How to Clean Cast Iron

    How to Clean Cast Iron

    Cast iron cookware is fantastic. It is durable, lasts forever, can be used over an open flame and is often called “the original non-stick”. A cast-iron skillet is an essential to any homestead kitchen. However, they have to be cared for properly. There are differing opinions on how to properly clean cast iron, so this is just one way that I have found works best for me. Based on what kind of cleaning supplies and fat you regularly have available to season with, you might find a different method works for you. But I’ve been cleaning my cast iron skillets this way for years, and they’re in great shape. I also find that this  method keeps them very non-stick, making them less likely to need to be cleaned with any more than a quick swipe of a paper towel after most uses.

    The Secret to Keeping Cast Iron Well-Conditioned

    The secret to my method of cleaning cast iron is the use of bacon fat. About once or twice a month, I fry up a package of bacon and save ALL the drippings. I keep a small, 4-oz glass container with a lid in my fridge that I fill up with the drippings. This is what I use to season my cast iron, which I’ll explain later. You can use essentially any kind of fat, such as rendered tallow, olive oil, or coconut oil, which are other popular and effective options. I personally have found animal fat drippings such as bacon grease to be the most effective.

    The Cleaning Process

    When you have a dirty cast iron skillet, always see if you can simply wipe out the food residue with a damp paper towel or cloth first. A lot of the time, this will be sufficient, and you can simply rub all the food residue out, heat over a very low flame until the moisture is gone, and apply more bacon grease. However, often times this won’t be enough. If you have food residue that can’t be simply wiped up, follow these steps:

    1. Rinse your cast iron skillet with warm water and NO SOAP. Gently scrub with a plastic or natural fiber cleaning brush or sea salt, if needed. If you have some stubborn gunk, let soak for about ten minutes, but never much longer than that or your cast iron might rust.
    2. Once you have thoroughly removed the majority of the food residue, rinse, and blot the majority of the moisture off with a dish towel. Your dish towel will most likely get a little gunky at this point, so make sure it’s one that you’re able to wash right away. Don’t worry at all about getting all the moisture though, just whatever is dripping off, and move on to the next step:
    3. Put your skillet on the stove over a low flame, and let it dry this way. WARNING: don’t forget about it! Set a timer for 5 minutes if you’re worried you’ll forget.
    4. Once the skillet is hot and fully dry, grease it thoroughly with your bacon drippings or fat of choice. Make sure to fully coat the whole inside of the skillet so that it looks “wet” again.
    5. You’re done! The heat from the drying process will sort of “lock in” the fat and make the skillet more non-stick for the next time you use it.

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  • Slow Cooker Coq Au Vin (How to Cook a Rooster)

    Slow Cooker Coq Au Vin (How to Cook a Rooster)

    When it comes time to butcher some roosters to reduce their numbers in your flock, you might find them quite tough and difficult to butcher. Roosters make for particularly tough meat, and need to be cooked properly in order to enjoy them, but when you do, they can provide a delicious and rich flavor that will make you glad you ever had roosters.

    This recipe is loosely based on Julia Child’s Coq au Vin recipe, which you can check out and follow more closely if you like, but of course most Coq au Vin recipes you will find use store-bought chicken parts, as the majority of city dwellers don’t have access to country roosters!

    You can easily adjust and adapt this as you like, but the trick is the slow cooking process and the wine, which will soften and bring out the best flavor of the rooster.

    Ingredients: 

    1-2 roosters, plucked and butchered

    1-2 bottles of red wine

    3-4 cups chicken stock or broth

    1-2 onions or shallots

    thyme

    Recipe: 

    1. As soon as your rooster is slaughtered and butchered, place the pieces in a bowl or tupperware, pour half the wine over it, enough to thoroughly soak the rooster (and ideally immerse it, but of course wine is expensive). Let soak overnight, up to 24 hours.
    2. Once you are ready to cook, caramelize your onions or shallots in a skillet and place in your slow cooker. Set aside .
    3. In the same skillet, using more butter or oil, gently brown your rooster pieces on all sides.
    4. Place the rooster pieces in the slow cooker on top of the onions and sprinkle with thyme, salt and pepper
    5. Cover the rooster pieces with the remaining wine and chicken stock.
    6. Cook on low for 6-8 hours, checking regularly to see how tender the rooster meat has become. Once it is tender to your liking, it’s done.

    This is a great way to prepare several roosters at once, if you’ve got small roosters and would like to use the meat in other dishes, but it can be served as is as well, with a side of roasted potatoes and a simple salad perhaps. Enjoy!

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  • Benefits to Cooking with Cast Iron

    Benefits to Cooking with Cast Iron

    Cast Iron pans may seem like a relic of the past, but they are still in use today in modern kitchens across the world because these pans have stood the test of time.  So with more options than ever, why should you choose cast iron over alternatives like aluminum, stainless steel, or non-stick cookware?  Here are just a few of the benefits to be had from cooking on cast iron.

     

    Avoid The “Teflon Flu”

    Non-stick cookware is coated with a synthetic polymer called polytetrafluorethylene, or PTFE.  This coating can degrade in high temperatures (something kinda common in cooking) and release toxic gases.  These gasses can kill pet birds that are in the kitchen while you are cooking, like the canary in the coal mine.  They also cause flu-like symptoms sometimes referred to as the “Teflon flu”, long-term exposure can lead to further health problems.  If the surfaces are scratched they can flake off particles of PTFE into your food that you will eat.  It is said that these particles are inert and won’t harm you, but I’d error on the side of safety on this one.

    Iron Intake

    While aluminum isn’t as toxic as Teflon and stainless steel doesn’t release any harmful fumes, cooking with cast iron could actually improve your health.  Cooking with cast iron can increase your iron intake.  Healthy iron levels can boost your immune system and your energy level.

    The Price is Right

    Cast iron pans of similar size and quality to their stainless steel counterparts save you as much as 60% on initial costs and they wear well over time.

    Versatility

    Cast iron cookware can be used in the oven, and in an emergency can be used over any heat source including an open wood fire.

     

    Cast iron cookware isn’t still in use today because of a lack of options, but because it is better than other options.  If you haven’t cooked on cast iron yet then you don’t know what you are missing, and you might be making yourself sick while you’re at it.

     

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  • Skills to Build While You Wish You Could Homestead

    Skills to Build While You Wish You Could Homestead

    Whether you’re stuck in a cramped apartment in the city or living in a suburban starter home while you save up to buy land, there’s no reason you can’t start building your homesteader skills now, as you dream of more self-reliant times ahead. You can check out our guide to how to homestead in a city if you can’t wait to free yourself from the grid, and also start developing the following skills to be ready when the time comes to fully escape the plugged in life:

     

    1. Bake your own bread: We tend to take our packaged, fluffy white supermarket loaves for granted, but there is nothing as delicious or satisfying as freshly baked homemade bread. It’s not too difficult to master, and doesn’t require anything more than what you can buy from said supermarket. And in addition to delicious bread, it will provide you with more of a sense of control over what goes into your food and a whole lot of respect for homesteaders of yore-who grew, milled and baked to get their daily bread.

     

    1. Pickling and Canning: There’s no reason you need to be growing your own crops to start preserving food. It’s always good to have a nice supply of foods that don’t need to be refrigerated, and really rewarding to make them yourself. Pickling is great because pickled and fermented foods are actually an amazing source of probiotics, and canning your own food is a great way to take advantage of marked-down produce at the supermarket as well as a healthy alternative to most GMO, BPA, toxin-ridden store-bought canned products.
      Check out: 7 Steps for Easy Canning

     

    1. Render tallow and lard: Mostly a forgotten homesteading art, rendering tallow and lard can be both greatly rewarding and cost-effective. Using often-times free scraps from butcher shops, or, if you’re lucky enough to know a hunter or farmer, the remains of a deer or cow after butchering, tallow and lard can be used in place of conventional oil or store-bought butter and tend to be far more delicious and nutritious.

     

    1. Make your own soap: The cost-effectiveness of making one’s own soap is probably the best reason to try it-homemade-soapbut, like making your own bread or canned products, also gives you a sense of control over what is going in your soap and knowing it’s safe. If you can get over the fear of working with lye, soap-making can be a blast, and odds are you won’t go back after you’ve tried it. Just make sure to follow basic safety precautions and you’ll be making all your family members homemade vanilla-lavender-coconut suds in no time!
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    1. Butcher a chicken: OK, so odds are, if you live in the city or suburbs, you probably don’t have access to a live chicken, but that doesn’t mean you can’t start practicing butchering now. Most supermarkets and butchers sell whole chicken, and they’re always much cheaper than chicken cuts. It’s a great way to whet your pallet for butchering, and you can use the giblets for gravy and bones for tallow-learning how to use the whole animal will give you a great taste for proper homesteading!

     

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