Prepare Today Homemade- Dry Ranch Dressing Mix

A great way to save money and to eat healthier is to make your own mixes at home.  Many premade mixes and boxed food at the grocery store are filled with chemicals. Making the same mixes at  home is healthier but it also helps to use some of those food storage ingredients.  

My kids love ranch flavored wheat thin crackers, but they are pricey and seem to disappear so fast.  I decided to try and recreate ranch wheat thins and it worked.  I had the cracker recipe, but now I needed a ranch dressing mix that tasted good. I have tried to make ranch dressing mixes before but they seemed to be missing something.  I searched online and the recipe that I found uses dried mushrooms, of all things, as added flavor, in place of the MSG found in the commercially packaged ranch dressing mixes.  I thought I would try it out, and I'm glad I did.  It tastes great!  But the true test was going to be if the crackers tasted like ranch flavored wheat thins, and I am pretty sure they passed the test!  They were by far my kids favorite cracker that I have made. 

 {click HERE to view my wheat thin cracker recipe} I added 2 T of the ranch dressing mix to my cracker dough and continued baking according to the recipe. 

For the ranch mix, I used Honeyville's freeze-dried mushrooms.  You'll only need a tiny amount for the recipe,  but I find them useful in so many other recipes. Soups, quiches, and casseroles are easy to throw together with freeze-dried mushrooms on hand. They look just like mushrooms and reconstitute so easily.  I highly recommend them!

The other main ingredient that you'll need for this recipe is buttermilk powder.  I bought mine at Honeyville, but it is also sold in most grocery stores in the baking aisle.  I have used the grocery store brand and it is also a great product.  Stored in the fridge, the buttermilk powder lasts a long time.

Dry Ranch Dressing Mix

adapted from HERE

1/2 C buttermilk powder

1 T dried parsley

1/2 t dry dill weed

1 t onion powder

1t dehydrated onion

1 t salt

1/4 t pepper

1 t garlic powder & 1 t garlic salt

2 T finely chopped freeze-dried mushrooms 

(dehydrated will also work)

 1/2 t sugar

Pulse the mushrooms in a blender once or twice, just to break the bigger pieces up.  Add in the remaining ingredients and pulse until smooth and blended. It should only take a few seconds. Pour the mix into a mason jar and stir in 1 t parsley and 1/2 t dill.  This will add a little color to your final product. Cover and store in mason jar in the pantry for 2-3 months, or in the freezer for up to 6 months. 2 T of mix = 1 envelope of store bought ranch dressing mix.

This mix can be used for dips, salad dressings, and any other recipe that a dry ranch dressing mix is called for.  This would be delicious in mashed potatoes.  

To make ranch dip:

2 T of ranch mix + 1 C sour cream (mix and chill)

To make ranch salad dressing:

3 T mix + 1 C mayo + 2/3 C buttermilk (mix all and shake well)

Prepare Today Homemade: Oatmeal Pancake Mix

I have been on a mix making kick lately and this recipe for Oatmeal Pancake Mix has been on my pinterest food board for a little while now.  My two oldest children get up for school and leave before I get up and one of them will "forget" to eat breakfast many mornings.  She claims milk makes her stomach hurt, so I have been trying to think of things she will eat instead of cereal.  This may sound easy, but this child is incredibly picky.  I don't usually give in to a picky eater, you eat what I prepare, but I feel so guilty when they go to school without having eaten anything!!

I found this recipe for Oatmeal Pancake Mix from Mel's Kitchen Cafe and I couldn't wait to try it out.  It has had rave reviews from so many people that I decided to give them a try.  

I followed Mel's directions exactly as she explained, but I used powdered eggs and buttermilk powder instead of the fresh variety.  And I may, or may not have, switched the powdered buttermilk measurements and added 1 C of powdered and 1/4 C water instead of the other way around.  Sheesh, it's always something with me and cooking!! I think I salvaged the mistake and cooked up 38 pancakes.  I was going to just make the mix and 1 batch of pancakes, but I figured, since I had everything out already I may as well cook up the whole batch.  The pancakes are light yet hardy!  They will keep you feeling full until lunch for sure!! Next time I make them I will add ground flax seed and maybe some chia.  They will be delicious with some peanut butter slathered on top and hopefully make it easier for a certain daughter to grab her breakfast and go.

Click HERE to get the recipe.

Using My Food Storage: Making Mixes

My goal when grocery shopping is to stock up when an item is at its lowest price point.  This way I am getting the most bang for my buck.  I usually can keep my pantry stocked using this method but lately I haven't been able to find brownie mixes for under $1.00.  I  know it isn't that difficult to make brownies from scratch, but my children usually want them after dinner and I don't want to mess up the kitchen again getting all the baking ingredients out.  So my goal for today was to mix up a big batch of brownie mix and only make the big mess one time.  Now we have a container of brownie mix that will make at least 7 batches of 8x8 size pans.  

I am not a huge user of  homemade mixes, but there are a few that make my life a little easier.  I use the book "Make-A-Mix" for most of my recipes and mixes. The brownie mix has always sounded so good, and....

...the brownie mix can be used for more than brownies too!!!  How about chocolate chewy cookies, Texas sheet cake or Brownie Alaska. These all sound so good, can you tell I really love dessert!!!  (Click HERE to view a previous post I wrote on making mixes.)

The original recipe calls for melted butter and eggs when you mix up the brownies, but I food storagized the recipe and used powdered butter and powdered eggs.  If I was a math whiz I would've figured out how much to add to the dry mix, but I freely admit math isn't one of my talents, so I just added it in when we mixed up the batch of brownies.   It worked great and the brownies cooked up fluffy and looked just as brownies should.  Although as I type this I remembered that I totally forgot to add the vanilla in.  I had "help" making this (my 5 year old was mixing) so I can blame it on that :)


My other new find that I am using all the time is chalkboard contact paper.  This may be too crafty for some of you but stay with me.  I bought the chalkboard contact paper, chalk paint pen, and a cute punch out stamp on amazon.com and I have been labeling everything.  It started with my flour and sugar canisters and now I am labeling my food storage containers.  What is so wonderful about the contact paper is it is removable and the chalk pen ink is erasable!!!!  

 All the items in the picture (not the container) were purchased on Amazon, but I assume craft stores would carry these supplies as well.  When the brownie mix is all gone I may want to fill the container with corn meal, and all I have to do is rub the chalk ink with a damp paper towel and rewrite the label.  I am in love with this stuff!  I even made labels for my dehydrated food...

My dehydrated food jars will always be changing depending on what I am dehydrating and the labels are so easy to change.  Plus I can peel off the contact paper label so easily if I need to water bath or pressure can with these jars.  Maybe I am a little to excited but this has been so fun to do!  And I am not usually a crafty person, but I like to be really organized and this system really makes the pantry look put together. 

Here are our brownies made from a mix using butter and egg powder.  They are definitely more of a cake-like brownie, but we did add chocolate chips to our batch and that helped to make them more fudge-like.  (and I had no idea how to reconstitute the butter powder.  I probably did it wrong and so the brownies aren't that fudgy )And I don't know if it is me or the butter powder but I can totally taste it, even when it is cooked.  I have heard great things about Thrive's butter powder so I may look into trying that brand.  For the next batch I will make them with real melted butter and see if I can taste the difference. And as I was putting this in the oven I mentally smacked myself because I could've made this in the sun oven today, it was so sunny outside.  Next time....

I'm sorry that there is no mix recipe in this post, but I highly recommend buying the Make-A-Mix book for all of the recipes in it. I just wanted to give you all an example of what I do daily to use my food storage.  This may inspire you to do something today with your storage!!  If you would like a brownie mix recipe, I found this one on pinterest and it seems to be really popular.  CLICK HERE  to view it. 

Make-A-Mix Cookbook

Do you know what I love about taking a preparedness class??  I get so motivated to do something!!  Yesterday I took a Mix A Meal class at Honeyville Grain and I felt inspired to make a few of these mixes for my family.  I feel that preparedness is personal and is different for everyone, and you need to pray for guidance and inspiration for your family.  I have felt promptings during classes, at the store, at a garage sale and when I follow those promptings I find the items I purchased were meant for me to use in making preparedness that much easier. 

After the class I returned home to find a delivery from Amazon.com and it was my new Make-A-Mix cookbook.  Don't get it confused with the Mix-A-Meal cookbook and class that I attended at Honeyville.  Both books have the same idea, making mixes in bulk to save time and money.  I have an original copy (1978) of the Make-A-Mix book and I wanted the updated version, so when it showed up on my doorstep yesterday it was confirmation that I needed to make some mixes. Click HERE to see a previous post on the old book.

The updated Make-A-Mix cookbook.

 This is what I did today and I can't wait to save time making dinner this week!!

I am not going to publish the recipes because that would infringe on the rights of the authors, but I suggest you either look this book up at your local library or order one from Amazon.  It will save you time and money!!  The book starts off with how to put the mixes together and then gives you recipes for using the mixes. (the mixes last about 12 weeks)  This is what I plan on making with my mixes above.


Hot Roll Mix
-French bread
-Crescent rolls
-Hamburger Buns
-Pizza Crust
-Bagels
-English Muffins
There are many more but those are the ones I want to try first!


Quick Mix
-Crispy Breadsticks
-Biscuits
-English griddle scones
-Morning Muffins
-Quick pancakes
Many, many more recipes in the book!


Corn Bread Mix
-Corn Bread (I have several meals that I need corn bread for)
-Corn Dogs


There are 328 pages of recipes and ideas and I can't wait to implement them into my daily cooking.  I'll do almost anything to make dinner time easier and I hope these mixes are the way to go!!

Hot Rolls from the Hot Roll Mix

 Here are my rolls for dinner tonight using the Hot Roll Mix. They were delicious!!  

Rice cooked with onion soup mix.

I also made some of the "best rice ever", according to my daughter, using the Onion Soup Mix from the Mix-A-Meal book.  The owners of the book allowed me to share this recipe.

Onion Soup Mix
2/3 C dehydrated onions
1/2 C beef bouillon (I used Shirley J's)
1/2 C dehydrated butter or margarine (I used Honeyville's powdered butter)
2 T cornstarch
2 t onion powder
2 t parsley flakes
Mix well and store in an airtight container.  Use in any dry onion soup recipe.  About 1/3 C equals one packet of Lipton soup mix.

Onion Steamed Rice
Combine:
1 C rice to 3 C water
2 t onion soup mix
Cover and steam 20 minutes or  until rice is tender.  (I used my rice cooker and did 2 C rice, 3 1/4 C water, and 4 t onion soup mix)

(click HERE to view a  previous  post on the Mix-A-Meal cookbook)

Prepare Today Homemade- Muffin Mix

A great way to save time and money when making meals is to use mixes.  If you purchase ingredients in bulk and use them to cook your meals you are saving money.  If you make mixes with your bulk ingredients you are saving time.  I use mixes for pancakes, waffles, white cream sauce, cakes, and now muffins.  

I like to make muffins with my dinners because I can sneak in whole wheat flour, ground flax seed, chia, fruits, and even pureed or dehydrated veggies.  Plus I know my kids will eat at least the muffin for dinner.  Our dinner rule is you get what you get and you don't throw a fit.  They get to eat what I make for dinner, nothing else. They have to try at least one bite of everything.  They usually always will eat a muffin, or two.  

This is the old cover, it has since been revamped.

I found a cookbook from 1978 called "Make-A-Mix Cookery" and have really liked the recipes in it.  My family really loves the pancake mix from this book.  They cook up so fluffy and thick.  So I thought I would try the muffin mix and it turned out pretty good.  I still need to tweak it with filler ingredients but it is a good base for adding on.  

Shortening powder is the way to go with mixes!!

Freeze-dried fruits are perfect for muffins!!

 Muffin Mix
8 C flour (I need to experiment more with whole wheat)
2/3 C sugar
1/3 C baking powder
1 T salt
1 C shortening powder

In a large bowl combine the ingredients and mix well.  I use a whisk to get it all mixed up.  Makes about 10 cups of mix.  I keep mine in a #10 can in the fridge because of the shortening powder and it should last at least 12 weeks. (see comments below if you want to add powdered milk and egg to your mix)


Use the mix to make many kinds of muffins.  I made the Melt-In-Your-Mouth Muffins from the cookbook. 


2 1/3 C muffin mix above
1 C milk (1 C water + 3 T powdered milk)
1 egg (1 T powdered eggs + 2 T water)
Combine the above ingredients and stir.  Add in 1/2-1 C dried or fresh fruit.  Fill muffin pans 2/3 full and bake in 400 degrees oven for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown. 

"Muffins" in my thermal cooker using the muffin mix.

The possibilities are endless with what you could add to these muffins.  Apples, bananas, cheese, apricots, pineapple, jelly, etc.  I used this mix to make muffins in my Saratoga Jacks thermal cooker. Click here to see that post.

Provident Pantry-Homemade Mixes

One of the biggest tips when you are trying to save money is to make your own mixes from scratch instead of buying the prepackaged ones from the store.  Just the other night I needed a white sauce for a cream of broccoli soup I was making and I remembered a book that I have called "MixA-Meal" by Deanna Bean & Lorna Shute.  This book is full of mixes like the white sauce mix, a roll mix, banana bread, biscuits mixes, etc.  Having these on hand will save you time and money.  You can find the book at amazon.com, Honeyville (SLC store), and other retailers.  I think it is really worth the little extra time to buy flour, sugar, powdered milk, etc. in bulk and put a few mixes together. 

This is the white sauce mix that I made the other night.

This is all you need to make a white sauce mix.

White Sauce Mix
4 C powdered milk (non-instant from the cannery, if you use the instant from the grocery store you need double the amount of non-instant so 8 C in this recipe)
4 C flour
4 C dehydrated butter or margarine powder
2 t salt

Mix all and store in an airtight container.  To use:  1/2 C of white sauce mix and 1 C hot water and whisk over medium heat until thick.  Stir constantly to prevent scorching.  

Use this mix for soups, chowders, scalloped potatoes, white gravy, creamed veggies, chicken a la king, etc.  

I found a great blog that has many recipes for making mixes.  Everything from seasonings and soup mixes to pancake mixes.  Click HERE to see it! Find which ones work for you and try one out.  I recommend you try a half batch first in case you don't care for it.  I made a tortilla mix once and it didn't turn out so well and I had made a whole #10 can of it!  What a waste of money!  So definitely try it out in a small batch first. 

Mix-A-Meal Cookbook

Do you want to spend less time in the kitchen and still make delicious meals for your family?  I know I do, especially in this July heat.  I attended another great class at Honeyville Grain today that was taught by the Mix-A-Meal ladies.  If you haven't heard of Mix-A-Meal, it is a cookbook with recipes for mixes that you make in bulk and then incorporate them into your daily cooking.

With Mix-A-Meal you will:

• Save up to 90% of the cost of commercial mixes by making your own delicious and tasty mixes! 
• Spend less time in the kitchen and enjoy that good old-fashioned taste.
• Lower the preservative content in your foods.
• Adjust mixes as necessary to fit special dietary needs.
• Make a shelf-stable mix for traveling, camping trips or unexpected company.
• Enjoy no-nonsense cleanup.  Just add water or a few simple ingredients.
• Give fun and useful gifts for any occasion (Baby & Wedding showers, Christmas, Neighbor gifts,etc)

The Mix-A-Meal Ladies

I know I wouldn't use a mix for everything I make, but there are several mixes I feel would be handy to have on hand.  The ladies showed us the onion soup mix and then they made a dip and Swedish meatballs with a white sauce with the onion soup mix.  I am not an onion dip fan, but this tasted really good! It didn't have that processed, fake food taste to it.  
Onion Soup Mix 
Combine:
2/3 C dehydrated chopped onions
1/2 C beef bouillon
1/2 C dehydrated butter or margarine
2 T cornstarch
2 t onion powder
2 t parsley flakes
Mix well and store in a quart jar.  Use in any dry onion soup recipe. 1/3-1/4 C of the mix equals one package dry onion soup mix.

These are the mixes that I am going to put together:

• Banana bread mix (I just canned 20 pints of bananas and this will make banana bread a snap to make!!!) 
• Onion Soup Mix
• Waffle Mix (my kids use this all the time by themselves to make breakfast)
• Tortilla Mix (again, don't ask about the first time :) 
• Hot Roll Mix

There are many more in the book, but these are the mixes I feel I would use. You can purchase the book on amazon.com  OR support your local business' and buy it at Honeyville Grain!!  

Honeyville does not compensate me for saying all the good things I do, I just honestly feel they are a wonderful company and they offer amazing products.  Honeyville is having the most incredible Prepare Your Ark Preparedness Fair on August 5th & 6th!!  They will have classes, giveaways (a Sun Oven, Volcano Stove, just to name a few!!), demonstrations, food & more!!  On Saturday there will be a free breakfast that includes, eggs, pancakes, hashbrowns, & drinks-all using food storage items!!

Honeyville Classes are taught by the experts in home storage and emergency preparedness.  I encourage you all the attend those that interest you!  They are FREE and so informative (plus we have fun and eat yummy food)!!  I have met some amazing friends in these classes along with learning useful information. 

Tuesday, July 19, 11 AM – “I Dare You to Eat It!” by Liesa Card.  You love her Wheat Fiesta Salad and now come and find out how easy it is to understand food storage and how it works best for your family.

Tuesday, July 26, 11 AM – “Pressure Cooking – Perfect Under Pressure!” with Lisa Barker.  Wouldn’t we all love to have a little more time in our day?  With an electric pressure cooker you can cut down on the time spent in the kitchen so that you can spend more time OUT of the kitchen.

Upcoming class during August - "Replacing the Five White Deaths", "All About Oats", "Dehydrating", "Coconut Oil-It's A Must", "Canning Basics"

Watch for our Preparedness Fair August 5 – 6th - Classes, Demo’s, Fabulous Prizes - You really shouldn’t miss this event!  Some of the Teachers are: Chef Tess, professional chef and nationally known blogger, Debbie Kent, presenter at BYU-Idaho Education Week, Glen Weeks, Leisa Card & Michelle Snow among others.

Call the store for more information about the classes & fair  801-972-2168
Honeyville Grain
635 No. Billy Mitchell Rd.
Salt Lake City

Check out the goals for July and get your water storage!!

Enjoy the journey!
Enjoy the blessings!
Feel the PEACE!!