Prepared Meals in a Jar

Tonight my wife is teaching some classes in making prepared meals in a jar.  She has quite a selection of different meals prepared to take to the class.  So I grabbed a couple of quart jars and thought I would put them up on the blog.

She takes the ingredients and mixes them together in the jars and then adds a 100cc oxygen absorber and seals the jars with her FoodSaver.  A option is to use mylar bags instead of jars.  You can cut the mylars bags to any size you want and seal them with an iron.

The first meal in a jar I grabbed was mashed potatoes.  Surprisingly this contains more ingredients than just potatoes.  She fills a one-quart canning jar with the following.

• 2 cups potatoes flakes
• 1/3 cup non instant powdered milk
• 2 teaspoons of dried chives
• 3 teaspoons of Mountain House Butter Powder
• ½ salt

To prepare you bring three cups of water to a boil.  You then add the contents of the jar and stir.  As soon as the potatoes flakes are mixed in, it is ready.  This makes 6 serving of good tasting potatoes.

The second jar I grabbed contains creamy potatoes soup.  It is tasty and easy to make.  The jar contains the following

• 1½ cup dried non instant powdered milk
• 2 teaspoons chicken bouillon
• 1 ¾ cup potato flakes
• 2 teaspoons dried mince onion
• 1 teaspoon of dried parsley
• ¼ teaspoon of dried thyme
• 1/8 turmeric
• ¼ teaspoons pepper
• 1 ½ teaspoon salt

The entire jar will make eight servings. To prepare one serving, put ½-cup mix to 1-cup boiling water and let stand two to three minutes.

For the class, she made up several different meals in a jar.  They are easy to make, just be sure that you use all dried ingredients that will store well.  The shelf live will be that of the ingredient with the shortest shelf life.

We will post some more of her recipes in the future.

Howard