Weekly Challenge and Assignment (Week of June 26th)

Dear Carson Ward, Family and Friends,

Congratulations to Donna Skelton! We won our June FREE Monthly Giveaway Drawing. She won a 5-in-one tool to put in her 72 Family Emergency Bag. It contains a shovel, hammer, hatchet, saw and crowbar.

Quote:

"Yea, blessed are they whose feet stand upon the land of Zion, who have obeyed my gospel; for they shall receive for the reward the good things of the earth, and it shall bring forth in its strength." (Doctrine & Covenants 59:3)

I love this scripture! What a wonderful promise we are given if we will just obey the gospel of Jesus Christ, keep the commandments, follow our Church leaders and strive to do the best we can, we will be richly blessed of the things we need.

I love Aesop's Fable, "The Ant and the Grasshopper".

"In a field one summer's day a Grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. An Ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the next.
'Why not come and chat with me,' said the Grasshopper, 'instead of toiling and moiling in that way?'
'I am helping to lay up food for the winter,' said the Ant, 'and recommend you to do the same thing.'
'Why bother about winter?' said the Grasshopper; we have got plenty of food at present.' But the Ant went on its way and continued its toil.
When the winter came the Grasshopper found itself dying of hunger, while it saw the ants distributing, every day, corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the summer."

The Grasshopper quickly learned...it is best to prepare for the days of necessity!

The "Golden Rule" of Food Storage is Rotation!

Weekly Assignments

Temporal Assignment:

Add the following to your Family Emergency Preparedness Medical supplies:

1) Latex gloves (several pairs)
2) bandage scissors (EMT scissors)--I bought mine at CVS for about $5.

Spiritual Assignment:

1) Go to the Temple on a regular basis. When you go, take your teenage children with you to do Baptisms for the Dead.

2) Go as a family to visit the Temple Visitors Center and take a non-member family or friend with you. Take a blanket and have FHE on the grass by the Temple. Talk about eternal families and setting a goal to go to the Temple someday.

3) If your Temple Recommend has expired, see the Bishop to renew it. And then go to the Temple often.

4) If you do not have a Temple Recommend and have not gone to the Temple yet, talk to the Bishop about preparing yourself to go.

Weekly Hint--What to do with Powdered Milk:

I know when many of us think about drinking or using powdered milk, we think huk! And storing it can be diffifult since it has a short shelf life if stored in the containers from a regular grocery store, only 6 months. But if stored properly in the #10 cans from the Dry Pack Cannery or other emergency supply companies, it has a shelf life of 15-20 years. It is an important part of our food storage.

Did you know you can make sweetended condensed milk and evaportated milk from powdered milk? And you can make it drinkable?

Powdered milk is non-fat. If you have young children, who need the fat from milk to help them grow propertly, you should consider storing cans of evaporated milk. It does not store as long as powdered milk but important to have if you have children, watch the expiration date and rotate. Evaporated milk was ceated as a cheaper, more storabgle version of cream, and it is made from whole milk. Another option is to store other high-fat food items like peanut butter to supplement their fat intake during an emergency.

Making Sweetened Condensed Milk from Powdered Milk

1/2 cup hot water
1 cup non-instant dry powdered milk
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon butter

Combine ingredients and mix thoroughly in blender. Use immediately or store in refrigerator or freezer. Use as you would use in any receipe calling for sweetened condensed milk.

Go to www.everydayfoodstorage.net/videos to watch a video that demonstrates how to make sweetened condensed milk using powdered milk.

Making Evaporated Milk

1 1/2 cups water
1/2 cups + 1 tablespoon dry non-instant powdered milk

Combine ingredients and mix well before using in your receipe. Yields: 1 1/2 cups--the quivalent of a 12 oz. can.

Making Butter Milk

Add 1 teaspoon of white vinegar or lemon juice to 1 cup mixed powdered milk and let stand for 5 minutes before adding to your receipe. My mother use to do this all the time with regular milk when she needed butter milk for a receipe.

Tips for ways to make powdered milk drinkable

1. Slowing introduce it to your family if they will not drink powdered milk. Mix equal parts of whole or 2% fresh milk with powdered milk. Mixing with whole milk will make it 2% milk, mixing it with 2% milk will make it 1% milk. Chill the mixtures before serving to your family. After awhile of drinking the mixture, change to just chilled powdered milk. Before you know it you will have them drinking powdered milk.

2. For better flavor, add 1/2 teaspoon vanilla and 1 1/2 teaspoons of sugar to 1 gallon of powdered milk and chill before serving.

Drinkable Powdered Milk (makes 1 gallon)

3 cups powdered milk
1 gallon of water
1/2 teaspoon vanilla (optional)
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar (optional)

Put half of the water into a gallon container. Add the dry powdered milk and mix with a whisk. Add the vanilla and sugar and mix. Slowly add the rest of the dry powdered milk and mix well. If becomes frothy and you cannot get the rest of the water in the container, wait awhile and then add the rest of the water.

3. Use it in something where there are other flavors, like chocolate milk, hot chocolate, milk shakes, or on cereal. Use in receipes like mashed potates.

Cooking with powdered milk

If you are using dry ingredients like cake mix, biscuit mix, ect., calling for milk, add the dry powdered milk and mix with the other dry package ingredients. Then add the amount of water necessary to the dry ingredients for the powdered milk being used.

Conversion Chart

Milk needed Water Powdered Milk

1 cup 1 cup 3 tablespoons
3/4 cup 3/4 cup 2 1/4 tablespoons
2/3 cup 2/3 cup 2 tablespoons
1/2 cup 1/2 cup 1 1/2 tablespoons
1/3 cup 1/3 cup 1 tablespoon
1/4 cup 1/4 cup 3/4 tablespoon

Check out the website mentioned above for more ideas on using powdered milk.

Remember: This Sunday, June 26th is our June FREE Monthly Giveaway Drawing. Put your name and comment in by 9am Sunday morning for the drawing.