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From The Survival Mom™

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One of the easiest and survival-friendly of all recipes is the classic casserole.  Why?  It’s a one-dish meal that usually combines everything you would want in a well-rounded meal: veggies, grains, protein, and, often, a dairy product or two.  In tough times, it would be even tougher to beat a hot and hearty casserole after a stressful day of fighting zombies or clearing out the back 40.

This week’s Action Step may take some work: collect at least 10 casserole recipes that meet these criteria:

1. your family will eat them
2. every ingredient can be stored long-term
3. preparation is quick and easy

This collection of recipes should then be printed out and stored in either your Survival Mom binder or another collection of recipes that can be easily accessed.  It’s very important that these recipes are easy to make because in a worst case scenario, it’s possible that fuel and/or energy may be hard to come by or very expensive.

If you are either growing or raising food, that’s all well and good, but as you know, all it takes is a freeze, a flood, a pack of really determined snails or deer, and an entire crop can be wiped out.  That’s why having stored ingredients is so important, even if some of them are used as a back-up if the chickens go on a laying strike or a late freeze kills off all your veggies.

To get you started, check out these recipes that I found online.

• Sausage Casserole – Everything can be either home dehydrated (potatoes and onions) or purchased (sausage, either freeze-dried or TVP).  Butter can either be canned or you can combine butter powder with a small amount of water.
• Mexican Casserole – Only the corn tortillas can’t be stored without being refrigerated, and you can learn how to make them from scratch.  The beef can either be home or commercially canned or you can use freeze-dried ground beef.
• Beef and Macaroni Bake – Again, everything can be stored on the shelf, long-term, in one form or another.
• Chicken Asparagus Casserole – Honeyville carries freeze-dried asparagus.  Rehydrate it, pat dry, and continue with the recipe!

Here’s an extra tip.  If you need to stretch your casserole dish to serve more people or you want to make it more filling, add 1/2 or more or rice, cooked wheat berries, or even small pasta, such as macaroni.

Post your food storage-friendly casserole recipes here or provide a link to what you find online.  Add a loaf of bread and maybe some salad greens, and you’ve got a filling, comforting and nutritious meal. Best of all, you can do all the planning and buying now and be ready to serve it years down the road!

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