Water, WATER, WATER!! Did you remember water??

I don't think many of us think about water. I live in the high Arizona desert, and live in a rural area. Because of this, we have had to maintain our own well. There have been a time or two that we have woken up to no water. Even so, growing up, I remember a time when we had to not drink the city water because it was contaminated with E-Coli. For those old enough to remember September 11, 2001... The first thing people bought after the attacks were water. Why?? Because your body has to have it. You can go weeks with little to no food. Simply put; we need to make water as much a priority as food on our emergency preparedness and long term storage.

So HOW much do I need??

You should store at least one gallon of water per person for three days. A normally active person needs about three quarters of a gallon of fluid daily, from water and other beverages. However, individual needs vary, depending on age, health, physical condition, activity, diet and climate.
To determine your water needs, take the following into account:*

• One gallon of water per person per day, for drinking and sanitation.(Medical emergencies, nursing mothers, children and sick people may require more)
• If you live in a warm weather, you may need more water . In very hot temperatures, water needs can be doubled.
• If using dehydrated/freezer dried food, water needs to be increased

How do I STORE water??

It is recommended that you buy commercial water and keep it unopened until ready to use. Store water containers in a cool, dark place.

Preparing YOUR own containers of WATER!

It is recommended you purchase food grade water storage containers:
http://www.thrivelife.com/all-products/emergency-kits-supplies/food-and-water.html
Before filling with water, clean the containers with dishwashing soap and water and rinse thoroughly.

It is important to not use plastic jugs or cardboard containers that have had milk or fruit juice in them. The protein's in the milk and fruit sugars can't be removed from these containers and is a breading environment for bacterial growth when water is stored in them. Cardboard containers leak and are not designed for long term storage.

Happy New Years! Happy Thrive Tools!!

Happy 2015! After a long stint off, I am back and running!! I am not sure about everyone else, but with a new year comes new "to do's". Some are easier than others, especially with the help of tax returns.. And some are just more fun! As I sat down and tried to look back on 2014, I didn't want to set New Year resolutions. I wanted to set weekly (heck, with how things have started out, DAILY) goals to help further my family and myself along. I am not perfect, and I know that I am not going to magically have everything put together in a day, week,  month or even year. I am a girl in progress.

So one of my mission's was to count and keep track of my food storage. I am not sure why I have never done this before, because I have the tool on my Q. So I set out and I counted everything that I had, and put the data into the computer system. By ALL means, DO NOT feel bad that you are only at 10% of your year supply for 5 adults! The pyramids weren't built in a day. (I would like to add that I do not have 5 adults in my home, but I will at some point, and so I am just preparing for that day!).You may want to also take advantage of the calculator. I always ask myself, how much do I need of flour? Sugar? Oil? It can be overwhelming, and many don't know where to start! 

You can access all of these tools for free by visiting:  http://www.thrivelife.com/tools 

 

 

OK. Food Storing 101: There are two types of shelf stable foods:

• Short-term foods - these foods on average have a 3 month to 10 year shelf life. For example, boxed breakfast cereal has about a 1 year shelf life. But a can of corn has a 2 -5 year shelf life.
• Long-term foods - these foods have a 20 - 30 year shelf life because they sometimes have been carefully sealed (usually) with an oxygen absorber packet.

Your first goal should be to get to 3 months supply. Most of the food you store for your 3 month supply will be "short-term", but you will want to be adding "long-term" as you go. My only advice is to cook with your long term food, so that when and if an emergency does come, you know how to use it and your family will eat it without complaining!

Chicken salad

One of the things that I love about my Thrive parties is the chicken salad! I, personally, LOVE chicken salad. My husband spoils me, by cooking the chicken with seasoning salt, and pepper. Then he mixes it with avocado, and fresh cilantro. I. Love. Chicken. Salad. Before going gluten-free, I'd put it on a torta roll from Costco, and I'd broil it, and it would be just right!! But even without the roll, this is still one of my favorite things to eat. But it is also time consuming, as you can imagine (defrosting chicken, cutting, cooking...). Thrive has worked it all out so I can have it at least once a week. Heaven I tell you. Pure heaven!

I recently discovered this wonderful stuff at Costco. I highly recommend it, especially for those who have food allergies! I now make my salads with this, and my jar has gone pretty quick! But it's great stuff! The best part of chicken salad, is that you can make your own creation. With Thrive's Seasoned chicken, it's easy, quick and good for you!

Ingredients:
1 cup Thrive seasoned chicken rehydrated - lightly cooked with seasoning salt (use a little oil to keep from sticking, we use cast iron and it doesn't stick) found here
2 T Thrive onion, not rehydrated Found here
mayo, mustard to taste
2 T fresh cilantro
1 avocado cut into pieces
Salt and pepper to taste

Mix well. Allow to sit in fridge until cooled off. Serve with crackers, on green salad, roll, or all by itself!

Ziplock bag omelets

My husband's Uncle Dean had come up with this idea of cooking omelets in a Ziplock bag. A few years ago while camping with my own family, we did this as our turn for breakfast one morning. We bought 5 dozen eggs, and we used all but a dozen! Mark and I spent almost an hour cutting and cooking bacon, onions, sausage, and cheese. But it was a hit! And everyone over estimated how much they had put in their bag, so really we only needed about 2 dozen eggs (2 per person, 3 or 4 for the big guys).

 When I had hosted my first Thrive party, someone asked me about the scrambled eggs. I hadn't tried them, nor given much thought to them. But here we are, Labor day approaching, and we are getting ready for a family campout. The thought came to me, I wonder if I could do the same thing, but using all Thrive products... I LOVED IT!! It took me about 5 minutes, from start to end, and I had an amazing omelet!! No time cooking and cutting everything to go in it. So needless to say, we are taking these babies with us camping (and my husband will love being able to make such an awesome breakfast for himself in less than 10 minutes in the morning).

 Ingredients:
4 T Thrive scrambled Egg powder - equals 2 eggs
7 T water
1 T Thrive sausage
1 teas Thrive onion
Salt and pepper to taste
Optional:
Thrive mushrooms
Thrive tomato's
Thrive bacon
Thrive cheese

Directions:

1. Bring to boil a 2 quart pan (or bigger). Have enough water in pan to full submerge bag. Be careful to not let the bag touch the sides of the pan, as it can melt it.
2. Mix Thrive egg powder and water in Ziplock back and mix well.
3. Add additional ingredients (if using optional items, add an extra  teaspoon of water). Mix
4. Seal bag and add to boiling water for 3-5 minutes. Pull out of water and it will slide right out!

My 3 year old approved! This is going to be a favorite at our house!

Strawberry Scone Bread

What is Thrive? As you look at my recipes, I’m sure you realize that I’m using a lot of it, and I talk a lot about it. Thrive is a food storage, and emergency preparedness company. The reason I looked into Thrive, was because they had corn meal that was, well, just corn meal. Everything that I could find in the stores had additives. Being gluten-free, I loved this fact about it! So I ordered it, and just that (there is no minimum amount that you have to order). After receiving that, I decided I would try the Q club and build up my food storage… After getting my first shipment, I couldn’t wait to open those mushrooms and zucchini! Of course they didn’t disappoint, and I’ve been in love ever since!

So for those reading my recipes, and thinking, maybe I should look into Thrive, contact me! My advice is getting something that you use, and try it. For us, we love a lot. But I bought “safe” foods my first time. And if you love peaches, TRY THE PEACHES. They are amazing. Like me on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/ThrivenwithRachel, this is a great way to communicate with me, and to see what specials are going on.

With that said, yesterday we made strawberry scone bread! It was so yummy!! Needless to say, we will probably be making it again here in the near future. It was gone within the hour!

Strawberry Scone Bread

Ingredients:

·         ¼ cup Thrive banana put in food processor, then add enough water to make moist

·         2 Thrive whole Eggs

·         2 tsp baking powder

·         1¼ cup white rice flour

·         ¼ tsp baking soda

·         ½ cup Thrive strawberries rehydrated

·         ¼ cup coconut oil or butter (+ some for oiling pan)

·         ¼ tsp cinnamon

·         ¼ cup honey

(Eggs & banana's)

Instructions

1.    Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease loaf pan (I used 2 small loaf pans) with coconut oil

2.    Mix the banana’s, eggs, honey, strawberry and oil mix well. Set aside.

3.    Combine baking powder, rice flour, baking soda, cinnamon and mix well. Add wet mixture and mix well. If it is a little dry, add water, a small amount at a time.

4.    Pour into the loaf pan.

5.    Bake for 30 min or until toothpick comes out dry

6.    Serve with butter and Enjoy!

Following me on Facebook!

Have you liked me on Facebook?? If not, this is where I post the monthly specials!! On top of it, I LOVE doing raffles!

So go now, and LIKE my page!

https://www.facebook.com/ThrivenwithRachel

Thriven's Shepard's Pie

I wanted to get one of my recipes on here. I cook every night with Thrive. It may not be the WHOLE meal, but something on my table is made up from there. Tonight was a success. My 7 year old is picky. Not really, but lately he won't eat something if it has this or that in it. One in which is onions. We love onions at our house! So many times, he ends up not eating something because he can see the onion. My poor, poor kids! We do have the rule that they have to try it. More times than not, Grant will end up liking it, and eating everything on his plate. Today did not disappoint! I started browning the onions, mushrooms and garlic, and he came out wanting to know what that great smell was!!

 
If you couldn't tell, we love cooking with the mushrooms and the onions! We opened the onions at the beginning of this month, and we are already a quarter through a number ten can! And mushrooms... Well, I need get some, like now!

 Ingredients:

• ·         1 pound of ground beef
• ·         4T Thrive onion - rehydrated
• ·         2T Thrive mushrooms - rehydrated
• ·         Fresh minced garlic
• ·         1-2 T Olive oil
• ·         Seasoning (2 T of Thrive tomato powder, 1 t beef bouillon, salt & pepper & garlic powder to taste)
• ·         ¼ cup Thrive corn
• ·         ¼ cup Thrive Pea’s
• ·         Handful of Thrive carrot
• ·         Thrive potato beads – make 4 cups
• ·         Cheese

 1.       Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a large skillet warm up olive oil, and add rehydrated onions, mushrooms and garlic. Around here, we like garlic, and so I ended up adding 1 tablespoon on minced garlic. Start browning for a minute or two, and added ground beef . You want to stir this really well, because the onion mix can burn easily! Meanwhile, put veggies in water to rehydrate.

2.       Add seasonings. Just add the tomato and bouillon to the meat as you would any seasoning, and stir in.

3.       Add vegetables; stir

4.       Prepare potato beads – make up 4 cups

5.       Pour the meat contents in a 2qt casserole dish, followed with the potato’s on top. Add cheese to top.

6.       Cook for 20 minutes

One of the things I was always curious about was the cheese! How could someone freeze-dry cheese?!?! But this is one thing my family goes through A LOT of. Not because we are always using it, but because my 3 years old will take it out of the fridge, take a bite, and I'll find it a day later :( So this is a great way to save the cheese!!