Natural and Thrifty in 365: #179 Jarred Homemade Baking Mixes

by Beth K on February 26, 2012

in Home and Garden, Organic and Green Living

bread jar mix homemade 300x206 Natural and Thrifty in 365: #179 Jarred Homemade Baking Mixes

Skip the store-bought mixes for muffins and cornbread and make your own.  Jar your baking recipes in advance and just add the wet ingredients.  Spend less time in the kitchen, save money in your budget and create peace of mind knowing exactly what you are feeding your family.

This is a wonderful option for quick breads, brownies, cookies, muffins, and many cookie recipes.  What recipes would you jar?

Photo courtesy of Rachel Meeks.

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{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }

Carmen @ Natural and Nourished Family February 26, 2012 at 9:06 pm

I LOVE this idea! We are gluten free in our house and I spend a lot of time mixing up various GF flours each time we bake. This will be a real time saver and make it easier for my daughter to bake without my help. =-) Thanks for sharing.

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Celena February 26, 2012 at 9:20 pm

I LOVE this idea, however, I grind my own wheat and since it doesn’t maintain all the nutrients for long after being ground I haven’t tried this. I suppose I could use smaller jars and add everything but the wheat and wet ingredients. Hmm… maybe I should give it a shot. We make bread around here at least 2x a week, as well as granola, granola bars, cornbread, etc. I think I will give this a shot! Thanks for the reminder… I just needed to work all that out in my head. :)

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Carmen @ Natural and Nourished Family February 26, 2012 at 10:13 pm

How about keeping them in the freezer? Before we were gluten free, I used to grind all our wheat in big batches and store it in the freezer. That way I would only have to pull out my grain mill a few times a month rather than every day. Keeping fresh ground wheat in the freezer greatly slows the oxidation process.

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Celena February 27, 2012 at 7:45 pm

I do make my own bisquick type mix and keep that in the freezer, but I’m somewhat limited in my freezer capacity (I’m living with my MIL at the moment and there’s not much room for my stuff). When we move out here in a few months and I actually can have it organized the way I want, then I might just try it. I have a feeling though that it would probably work best for me to just avoid putting the flour in it and just add everything else. It would still be a huge timesaver!

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Warner W. Johnston February 27, 2012 at 6:46 am

Happy to find you, will check back often. Note that Ball makes at least one size of jar larger than a liter. I’ve seen 1.5 liter and I think I’ve seen 2 liter. I’ve no use for them so I didn’t look closer, but this could a handy place.

I do the same thing with meat curing and preserving mixtures.

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Dena February 27, 2012 at 9:50 am

this is a FANTASITC idea, but what about the recipes… for a novice like me, I wouldn’t know where to start… any suggestions of where to get the recipes to work with this idea

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Celena February 27, 2012 at 7:42 pm

Hi Dena, we all start somewhere! :) Any recipe would work. You would just add all the dry ingredients to the jar, label, and store. Then when you were ready to use it, just dump it in a bowl, add the wet ingredients, mix, and bake.

For me, personally, I would probably print a label from the computer that would look something like this:
CORNBREAD MIX
Add: xx c buttermilk
xx c butter
Bake at 350* for 40 minutes.

Something like that. Then I’d save the jar to refill with more cornbread mix. If you are actually looking for recipes, I’d suggest Allrecipes.com. The reviews are super helpful. Happy baking!

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