Stocking the Larder

My freezers and pantry are overflowing!  Pierce outdid himself with the garden this past summer.  The pantry (and basement) shelves are stocked with green beans, corn, carrots, tomatoes in every imaginable form, etc. - not to mention zucchini relish, pickle relish, etc.  He also dutifully helped me picked what seemed like a ton of berries, apples, and peaches.  These were canned, frozen or made in jellies and jams.

We also purchase one half of a beef with our neighbors each year.  Saturday was pick up day - 298 lbs of roasts, steaks, hamburger, stew meat, ribs, soup bones, etc. are happily nestled in the chest freezer.  And we are lucky enough to live close to an organic chicken farm so I purchase whole chickens throughout the year when they go on sale and add them to the freezer.  Our farmer's market has a meat supplier and I take advantage of their "pork package" - bacon, ham, chops and loin twice a year.

I have stocked up on baking essentials such as flour and sugar as well as the non-essential essentials: cocoa, baking chocolate, powdered milk, oats, cornmeal, etc.  With the generator at the ready, we are not frightened about the upcoming winter months here at the farm.  I love the feeling of preparedness and the knowledge that I can feed my family nutritious, delicious meals by "shopping" my pantry when the weather becomes too frightful to be out on the roads.