Hieronyma Textor – Sending prayers for your daughter. I have had electrolyte problems myself. I know how that can make a person feel extremely weak and can cause their muscles to not work properly or to spasm. Fortunately, it is usually corrected once the electrolytes are back in balance.
OldMtWoman – You’re welcome 🙂 I know that all the details I posted can make the process seem complicated but usually vacuum-sealing dried foods in canning jars goes quickly and smoothly. It’s just that once in a while certain finely powdered foods, or imperfect jar rims or lids/flats, won’t cooperate, lol. (Powdered milk is my personal bane!). Keep in mind that it is also possible to simply place the powdered food in the jar, add an Oxygen absorber (I just use a 300cc size Oxygen absorber for each jar, regardless of whether it’s a quart, pint, or half-pint jar since that size Oxygen absorber is available for such a good price from the LDS church’s online store), carefully wipe off the jar rim, place a lid/flat on the jar, and tightly screw on a jar ring/band. Within 1-2 hours the Oxygen absorber has usually “bound up” all the Oxygen molecules in the jar and caused the lid/flat to “suck down” and become concave. At that point, you can remove the ring/band if you want, or you can leave it on if you prefer. It is not necessary to also vacuum-seal the jar to get out the other gasses that are still inside it since it is the Oxygen that would have caused the food to eventually degrade, and the Oxygen molecules are now chemically bound to the iron filings in the Oxygen absorber packet. With dried foods that are not powdered, I generally vacuum-seal the jar with an Oxygen absorber inside also just to be extra-cautious but it is not absolutely necessary to do so. You can also put powdered dry foods in Mylar bags with an Oxygen absorber or two, gently press out most of the air with your hands, and heat-seal the Mylar bag closed, if you’d rather do that instead of fussing with a cantankerous jar. After an hour or so, the Mylar bag will start to look “sucked in” as the Oxygen absorber(s) chemically bind up the Oxygen molecules.
Yesterday I watched some of the older YouTube videos on the Honeyville channel that showed “Chef Tess” demonstrating how to prepare meals in a jar (Ziti Casserole, Minestrone, and Personal-sized Meals with Freeze-dried Sausage or Ground Beef and either Classic Italian Sauce or Cheeseburger Sauce, are the ones I’ve watched so far). I wrote down the instructions so I can try to do some myself once I’ve accumulated all the ingredients. If anyone else wants to try those, I suggest you get the recipes from the text typed below the video screen because the ingredients as stated in the videos are not quite the same as the typed recipes.
Today, I watched some more preparedness-related videos on the Modern Refugee, Uncle Bumble, and Obsessive Chicks YouTube channels, and have started reading Tammy Gangloff’s book “Quick and Easy Dehydrated Meals in a Bag” that was mentioned earlier by another member of this forum. I was interested to learn that Ms. Gangloff feels stainless steel dehydrator trays can burn the food you’re dehydrating. So, if I ever get a stainless steel dehydrator I guess I’ll have to make sure its trays are plastic, not metal.