Dry Goods…Good Simple Food

   Beans, grains, herbs, and figs are just a few of the many dried goods that sit on my shelves patiently waiting for the day that they get put to good use. They take up little room for the amount of nutrition that they hold. And they take zero energy to keep in a perpetual fresh and useful state. Dried food is the ultimate simple survival food.
   First of all, you can easily (if not happily) survive on beans and rice alone. When combined they have all of the necessary amino acids required to keep us alive and healthy. Combine them with some good fats and greens and you have yourself a real nutritious meal. If you were lucky enough to have some good dent corn on hand, you could make some tortillas. My mom shared some with me a year ago and I have barely gotten into it. Preparing the corn to be able to grind it to make masa flour is quite a process. I am not about to dare say that making those are easy. One day soon, I hope to make some, but until then the jar will sit on the shelf.
   Whole grains are good indefinitely if kept dry and bug-free. Now most grains that you buy bulk, or even ones that you grow, will have some bug eggs in it. If you just leave it in the bag or bucket that it came in then one day you are sure to open it up to find some moths or maybe little weevils crawling around. One way to stop this is to freeze your grain for a week or so before storing it. Or you can buy smaller quantities to use it up faster, or just sift out the bugs. They are protein after all. Or you can remove the air…apparently, bugs and their larva cannot survive without oxygen.
   There’s a neat little gadget called a vacuum sealer that I ordered online and use it to seal my dried goods jars. It seals them about as tight as canning does. This thing works by sucking out the air and creating a seal with the lid. Unlike canning, the lid remains re-useable and the jar can be sealed right back up again after opening it to get out your desired amount of food. It’s cheap, simple, easily storable, and it works.
   Keeping a full stock of store-bought dried goods is a great way to save money on groceries. You can buy a 12-pound bag of pinto beans at Sam’s for under $10. Or you can buy them on sale at the regular grocery store. Most foods are less expensive per pound when bought in bulk. Do the math to make sure, then buy the biggest one you can. If things go south, prices go up, or someone loses a job, you’ll be just fine for a while.
   Now learning to cook those beans and make them taste good is necessary. Otherwise, all of your work at putting up food will go wasted when no one wants to eat it. Here’s the easiest way I know to cook a good, plain ol’ pot of beans. Soak them for at least eight hours, but preferably overnight. Rinse them just before you’re ready to cook them. You can cook them in a nice heavy pot on the stove or in an Instant Pot or pressure cooker. Since getting my Instant Pot a couple of years ago, I have not cooked even one pot of beans on the stove. You can find them very reasonably priced at yard sales and on Marketplace if you don’t want to pay full price for one.
   Okay…how to cook those beans. In your pot of choice, sauté a slice of bacon (chopped up) or some hog jowl and a diced onion in a couple tablespoons of butter until the meat is mostly cooked and the onion is starting to brown. Add in your rinsed beans and cover with broth or water. Add plenty of garlic powder, onion powder, salt, and some ground chipotle powder. If you’re cooking it on the stove bring to a boil then reduce the heat and simmer it until the beans are tender. In an Instant Pot, pressure cook on high for 20 minutes. That’s it!
   Other things that are great to keep a stock of are wheat berries. They stay good for many years and are a great source of nutrition. A lot of people are trying to stay away from bread these days as they’ve been told for so long how it’s bad for them. But for most folks it’s just not true. Yes, it’s true that store-bought bread is not good for us at all. But bread made from freshly ground, whole wheat berries is one of the most nutritious things we could eat.
   You can buy bulk wheat berries from Azure Standard Co-Op, which delivers to our area monthly. Breadbeckers Co-Op delivers to our area quarterly. The price of the berries is much less than the cost of berries bought at a store and a fraction of the cost of unhealthy white flour. Both companies carry all kinds of storable foods including grains, beans, and rice.
   This year, my fig tree produced basket after basket of beautiful sweet figs. When figs are perfectly ripe they are okay on the counter for about 17 ½ minutes until they start to ooze and go bad. So, I was filling my trays of the dehydrator every chance I could to dry them. They make a delicious sweet and healthy snack. The jars are sitting on my shelves and I will keep an eye on them to make sure that they don't mold. Dehydrating leaves some moisture in the produce, but hopefully, the natural sugar is enough to keep them good.
   Dried roselle is one of my favorite things to make a drink out of. The tart red calyxes make the most beautiful tea that is the base flavor for my kombucha. The calyxes are collected from the garden in the fall when they are plump and ripe. Then dried in the dehydrator and stored in jars. I am still using ones from two years ago. Being able to grow enough in one season to last two or more years means that I have room for other things in the garden in the “off” year.
   Real salt, grits, barley, herbs for medicines and teas, dried tomatoes, and oatmeal also fill the shelves. Food put away when the garden is overflowing or when the price is good. If we plan and prepare now then we won't stress later. There is always something to eat. It just takes a little work to make it into a good meal. I saw something recently and it has stuck with me hard. "I don't want an easy life, I just want a simple life." Ah, isn't it true? This preserving of food isn't easy, but it makes for a simple life. To be able to look at a wall of food and pick a simple meal from it is most definitely rewarding. Until next time, remember that a simple life is a happy life.