Shelf Stable Saturday and a recipe for Chicken and Rice Bake

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This week's recipe comes from the website Southern Plate.

 Ma's Chicken and Rice Bake is made entirely of pantry foods and gives you a complete meal in one dish.  The site has some great pictures of the process.

For this recipe, you will need:
  • 10 ounce Package Yellow Saffron Rice
  • 10-12 ounce can of chicken
  • 10 ounce can Cheddar Soup
  • 4 ounce can evaporated milk 
  • 14 ounce can mixed veggies
  • 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
  • salt and pepper to taste
Click the link above for complete instructions.
 
  As things get a little more unpredictable, I am trying to find more and more ways to make sure my family stays fed.  So I made a list of resources available to me.
  1. Buy at the grocery store in the next town over
  2. Pick up online order from Kroger's in same town (can use to get loss leaders maybe?)
  3. There is a small food pantry in every little town that surrounds us with days and times they're open
  4. SNAP benefits
  5. Family (to borrow or straight up ask for ingredients)
  6. Local library giving out food for kids if you register
  Having a list, even though it is really just common knowledge, makes me feel a little more in control. I find that if I have plans prepared for lots of different kinds of events, it makes me feel less stressed. I have seen some blogs where they talk about assembling a three ring binder that has all kinds of what-if scenarios and the response they plan to use. This is super helpful to me because apparently my first inclination in an emergency is to go blank! 
 
  So I have a spiral notebook, a leftover from my kid's school supplies, and each page is dedicated to some kind of "emergency". For example, I have a page for utility outage. If the electric goes off, here is the number to call. If it is off because of unpaid bill, here is the number of a place that helps with that, etc. Same for water.  I also have a "What if something happens to me" page for both my spouse and I. That way, in the moment, there is no scrambling for what to do. Everyone in our family knows where this notebook is kept, that way anyone who needs to address an emergency has the information they need. I find a lot of comfort in this notebook as the thinking, planning, and organizing has happened when everything is calm and it can be thought through, researched and revised, and it is available in case one of my kids has to deal with a crisis.

  Life is stressful and this is one way I can reduce the "Back of my mind" worries, which reduces my overall stress. Do you have any tricks that help things run more smoothly?
 

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