You do so well at being efficeient. I am back up and fighting the fight but I got home from work today and I'm lucky I made it from the front door to the coffee pot. I am feeling the week and at the moment catching up with all you friends around the world who like me are just muddling through it all. Have a great weekend Karen and all in the community.
Busy day here too. I just cooked 5 lbs of Yukon Gold (yellow potatoes) and made mashed potatoes for the freezer. Potatoes are cooling and I will vacuum seal and freeze. I sent you some videos on how you can freeze other types of potatoes. When you get some time have a look.
I really need to get a slicer! We had a cool snap so I pulled out my dehydrator. I had gotten a great deal on shallots at the Indian store, and I had cabbage, onions, peppers and tomatoes to do. It's getting hot again, 95-95.5 this week, but the next cool weather and I will be dehydrating more cheese.
Karen, you could put the pork rind on low in the airfryer or oven and let all the fat render down and use it for cooking with. Strain the fat while it's still liquid and give the bits to the pets. I have 3 jars in my fridge for Chicken, Beef & pork fat. Saves buying Lard/oil or at least cut's down on how much you buy.
Good idea! I save bacon fat, heated high and strained; it keeps sealed on the shelf. would think that beef and pork would also be safe if you use sterile jars and put canning lids on them while hot so they seal, as I do bacon. I would be leery myself of unrefrigerated chicken fat, but I suppose doing it as they did in the past, it might work.I had not thought of keeping them in the fridge. (I am always looking to free-up fridge space, and come up with preps.)
@tonette6592 Both my Grans always kept the pork and beef fat in covered basins in their pantries. Chicken fat was less common as chickens were expensive and only for special occasions. I'm in my sixties, so this would have been the wars.
Just out of curiosity...you seem to use a lot of electricity. How is that saving money? I can slice meat myself using a sharp knife or a mandolin slicer, and I don't use a percolator. Also the few veggies in the dehydrator...is it really worth it? I'm not criticising, just genuinely interested.
It’s certainly not “a lot” of electricity to use a meat slicer - it takes literally a few minutes to slice up a joint, and far thinner than you could ever do with a knife which means it goes so much further. I’ve been slicing my own meats for years rather than buying vacuum packs, and I wouldn’t be without my slicer now (I could never get away with the mandolin for meats.) Same with a dehydrator, which even though it’s running for several hours uses less electricity in doing so than the average light bulb, so really negligible amounts for the benefit you obtain from it. I do agree that I personally wouldn’t have bothered putting that amount of veggies in to dehydrate - if you’re going to do it, do it to the max - but I suppose people do have their own ways of doing things which generally suit them.
I have managed to keep my electricity bills the same for more than 10 years by making changes such as removing uneconomic central heating, changing to led light bulbs, air fryer instead of oven and batch cooking.
A slicer is quick and easy. It makes for nice thin uniform slices without much waste. I couldn't imagine using a mandolin on meat. A knuckle buster for sure. I've heard dehydrators use pennies to run. An entire batch of food will cost well under $2.00 to run. Percolators...I have no idea.
