A Tale of Two Cities

Lessons from the Lion, The Ox and Their Little Friends (Illustrated)

Pride and Prejudice

Les Miserables (English language)

Doomsday Preppers: A Practical Guide for the Beginner

Healing Foods

How to Make Cake Pops

You can find me here on the blog, our main site, on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Examiner.com (Product Reviews and Family Preparedness), in Prepare magazine and on PRN for my radio show, Get Real – Get Prepared.

For these reviews and recommendations, I do want to state this very clearly — I am not an affiliate, consultant or representative for ANY of these resources that I am giving you and I am recommending them based on my experience with them and my experience as a Product Reviewer. I don’t sell any products of any kind.

Last week, I did some gluten-free, sugar free baking from the book, The Joy of Gluten-Free, Sugar-Free Baking written by Chef Peter Reinhart and Denene Wallace. I did a review of the book and shared one of my favorite recipes from it. You can see that review and the recipe here on the website, realfoodliving.com.

I recorded an interview with both Chef Reinhart and Denene Wallace and that show airs February 9th at 6 PM Central time (or anytime afterwards using the same link). I’ll be giving away a FREE copy of the book, The Joy of Gluten-Free, Sugar-Free Baking, so be sure to tune in to the show to hear the fantastic interview and get the instructions on how to enter the free book giveaway! The giveaway is open for 7 days! You can listen here (below!)

Those of us who stock our real food pantry with gluten-free foods and ingredients, my favorite resources are buying raw nuts, such as almonds, vacuum sealing them and using them to make my homemade almond milk, and also making almond flour. The Wonder Junior Deluxe is an excellent mill to make fine almond flour. I can also make almond butter *like peanut butter, using the same Wonder Junior Deluxe. I also use a VitaMix to make fine almond flour. I use the dry grind container.

Truly raw (unpasteurized and organic) almonds - Bremner Farms Roadside Stand,  their wholesale prices are here.

Buying almond flour – Honeyville Grain, choose from blanched or natural, 5 pounds or 25 pounds (best savingsl.

SodaStream – carbonation
The different models to choose from

Make your own syrups: (check back often for more syrup recipes!)

Here’s my simple instructions for healthier homemade soda pop: Pick your flavor. If you are using sweetener, make a simple syrup of 1 cup of water to ½ cup natural sweetener of choice. Bring the water to a boil, dissolve the sweetener, add your flavor ingredients, such as fresh citrus juice and zest, or fresh ginger, or organic teas and simmer until the liquid is reduced by half. It should be thick and syrup-y. Strain out the solids so all you have left is liquid. Chill the syrup before using. You can make an ice bath or chill it overnight in the fridge.

Then, carbonate your pure water and add the syrup to taste.

If you are using no sweetener, simply omit the sweetener and boil and simmer your ingredients in plain water and still reduce, but you wont have the same syrupy consistency. Chill and add to carbonated water, then add stevia to taste.

One word though, do not, do not, do not use their syrups! They are nothing but chemicals and are not any better than the stuff that you can buy as soda pop. We tossed the syrup that came with the SodaStream and only use our homemade syrups and flavors.

The SodaMod adapter for Soda Stream

Here is a video there showing how it’s used.

Old-fashioned and non-electric products

Home Education

Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA)

Free Home School Deals

 Home School Buyers Co-op

Easy Peasy free homeschool curriculum

Health

Where There is No Doctor

Doom and Bloom Survival Medicine Handbook

One of the best resources I have used personally, is Shonda Parker and Naturally Healthy. You can find her books and material at http://www.naturallyhealthy.org/

Shonda and I wrote a book together that, I personally believe is awesome and one of the best resources for natural health through real food and you can find it there on Shonda’s website, Naturally Healthy and our book is called Naturally Healthy Cuisine, Real Food for Real Families.

In addition, Shonda has JUST started a new series on her blog, http://www.naturallyhealthy.org/blog/ where she is giving out her acclaimed herbalist course for FREE in blog posts and we can all take her course in small doses for free. I recommend this HIGHLY! Of course, if you want to take the whole course at once and have the teacher support and interaction, you can find her course on her website and there is a charge for the course, but it is worth it if you can afford it, you get all the materials at once and intensive supervision. OR, take the free course little by little – again, you can print it off and place it in the binder for future reference.

Pure herbs and essential oils are a big part of natural health and you can grow them at home and make extracts, tinctures, teas, infusions, salves and more. A great resource for that information is my friend and fellow PRN hostess, Sylvia Britton and her website is www.christianhomekeeper.org there she has tutorials on making herbal preparations.

Blog post on essential oils by Shonda Parker

Mountain Rose Herbs

Real Food Resources

PRN Radio Shows

Get Real – Get Prepared – Vickilynn Haycraft
Know Your Food with Wardee 
The Living Kitchen with Jeff and KerryAnn Foster
21st Century Homekeeper – Sylvia Britton
Your Preparation Station – Donna Miller
Family Garden Doctor – Jim Kennard
Pantry Paratus
Wisconsin Vegetable Garden

Buying Food in Bulk / Products 

One excellent resource that I use quite a bit is our own Donna Miller, her shop, Miller’s Grain House and her show Your Preparation Station. Miller’s Grain House sells, grain mills, dehydrators, solar ovens, bulk foods, herbs, and all sorts of products for preparation.

Azure Standard

Miller’s Grain House

Something Better Natural Foods

Amazon.com 

Grain Mills
The WonderMill / Wonder Junior Deluxe

My favorite grain mills are made by WonderMill. I use the WonderMill electric almost every day and I love using the manual, non-electric Wonder Junior Deluxe. Compared against the NutriMill and the Country Living Mill.

Dehydrating FoodMirro pressure canner
Excalibur dehydrator, compared to Nesco / American Harvest

Solar Oven
Global Sun Oven, compared to Solar Sport oven

Canning
All-American pressure canner
Mirro pressure Canner  – usually found locally at Wally World
Presto pressure canner - usually found locally at Wally World

Dehydrated and Freeze-dried foods

Shelf Reliance – Thrive foods  – find local consultant, get on “Q” program for extra savings
Honeyville Grain

 Prepare Magazine 

One excellent resource that I highly recommend the Prepare Magazine. You can find out more about it at http://www.preparemag.com/ and I believe they are still offering the FREE digitial versions, but time is running out as they go to print. You can go to http://www.preparemag.com/subscribe/ and send your name in. This magazine is beautiful as well as stocked with pertinent content no matter where you are on your preparedness journey.

I’ve given you just some of my favorites and I hope you’ll write in and tell me yours and I may feature your comment on an upcoming show! So, please click on the CONTACT link to send me an email.

Vickilynn Haycraft