A pound of flour saved is a pound of flour stored. To eliminate waste, use a recipe adjuster to adjust the recipes below. Food stays good for years in its dry form, but cook it and you have only days to eat it. If you adjust your recipes to serve only the amount your family will eat, you cut down on waste. So more food stays safely in its dry form and safely in your food storage.
You can get an adjuster for only $5.00 and if you order now you'll get a second free. http://shrinkmyrecipes.com
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Building Your Food Storage
This blog is all about food storage, how to cook with it, how to use it and most especially how to make an easy transition from thinking of food storage as a foreign or strange concept. I'm here to take you on a journey of change. Together we will explore how to make small changes from "normal" cooking to food storage cooking. Your year supply of food does not need to look so different from everyday food. In fact there are many regular foods that can actually be considered food storage items. I'll also provide recipes that contain ingredients that have longer shelf lives (foods that can be part of your food storage).
Lets take that first step:
STEP ONE: Find out how many of the foods you have in your pantry and even your fridge that have a six month to a year or more shelf life?
Do a quick inventory. Those foods can be included in your year supply of food. Think you can't store cheese? Or do you think you have to can it?
--Not true.
Many hard cheeses if packaged well and refrigerated, have a year shelf life.
Butter also can have a long shelf life it can also be canned.
They key for many food storage items is to rotate your REGULAR food. For foods with a six month self life, keep a six month supply. --That will be six months of that year you can eat well:)
Foods with a year shelf life are food storage items.
STEP TWO:
Write a menu of the foods you eat on a regular basis. List the ingredients of those foods. Figure out the shelf life of each ingredient. If there are changes you can make to eliminate ingredients with short shelf lives or substitutions you can make, make those changes.
STEP THREE (building up your food storage):
Now for your food storage items, you will need to provide enough food for breakfast, lunch and dinner for your family for 365 days. The way you can do this is to figure out the foods you would serve your family and how often they would eat it. For example, lets say I decided to serve my family oatmeal twice a week. If I use 3 cups for my family each time we eat it, I enter that amount in the conversion chart at http://www.traditionaloven.com/conversions_of_measures/rolled_oats_measures_converter.html . That turns out to be .6 pounds. I then take that amount an multiply it times 130 (the number of times a year we will have oatmeal for breakfast). I come up with 78 pounds. That is how much oatmeal we need in our food storage for one year. Note: remember to include the things you like in your oatmeal, like brown sugar, butter and milk.
Now you just repeat that with eat meal item, figuring how often you want to eat it and how much you need of each ingredient.
If this all seems to complicated, here is another way to figure what you need. Go online and enter your family size in this food storage calculator. http://lds.about.com/library/bl/faq/blcalculator.htm Go through your pantry and add up how much food you already have i.e. flour, sugar, etc. Figure out how close you are to having a year supply. Then as you shop buy more of those items you already use, adding them to your inventory until you have the amounts suggested for your family. Buying a little extra every time you shop can go a long way toward reaching your goal. Make sure you also include fruits and vegetables in freeze dried or canned forms.
Note: You don't have to have every item or the amounts of specific items the list. You do need to have the total in each category, for example Grains, Fats and Oils, Legumes. But the amounts of specific foods can be altered. For example, my kids aren't fond of rice, but I like it. So I will have some rice in my storage, but the calculator lists way too much for my family. Use this calculator as a guide for the amount of food you'll need, not something forcing you to eat foods you don't like.
Note: Legumes are important because stored meats are expensive and legumes are a cheaper protein source. If you can afford freeze dried or canned meats, those can be a substitute for the legumes.
STEP FOUR:
Keep checking your progress every few months to make sure you are making progress, or if you have already reached a year supply, check to make sure you are not falling behind on items.
Things you may forget to include: spices, holiday items, birthday items, and if you have animals you may not want to see them starve in a crisis, so include dog and cat food.
Lets take that first step:
STEP ONE: Find out how many of the foods you have in your pantry and even your fridge that have a six month to a year or more shelf life?
Do a quick inventory. Those foods can be included in your year supply of food. Think you can't store cheese? Or do you think you have to can it?
--Not true.
Many hard cheeses if packaged well and refrigerated, have a year shelf life.
Butter also can have a long shelf life it can also be canned.
They key for many food storage items is to rotate your REGULAR food. For foods with a six month self life, keep a six month supply. --That will be six months of that year you can eat well:)
Foods with a year shelf life are food storage items.
STEP TWO:
Write a menu of the foods you eat on a regular basis. List the ingredients of those foods. Figure out the shelf life of each ingredient. If there are changes you can make to eliminate ingredients with short shelf lives or substitutions you can make, make those changes.
STEP THREE (building up your food storage):
Now for your food storage items, you will need to provide enough food for breakfast, lunch and dinner for your family for 365 days. The way you can do this is to figure out the foods you would serve your family and how often they would eat it. For example, lets say I decided to serve my family oatmeal twice a week. If I use 3 cups for my family each time we eat it, I enter that amount in the conversion chart at http://www.traditionaloven.com/conversions_of_measures/rolled_oats_measures_converter.html . That turns out to be .6 pounds. I then take that amount an multiply it times 130 (the number of times a year we will have oatmeal for breakfast). I come up with 78 pounds. That is how much oatmeal we need in our food storage for one year. Note: remember to include the things you like in your oatmeal, like brown sugar, butter and milk.
Now you just repeat that with eat meal item, figuring how often you want to eat it and how much you need of each ingredient.
If this all seems to complicated, here is another way to figure what you need. Go online and enter your family size in this food storage calculator. http://lds.about.com/library/bl/faq/blcalculator.htm Go through your pantry and add up how much food you already have i.e. flour, sugar, etc. Figure out how close you are to having a year supply. Then as you shop buy more of those items you already use, adding them to your inventory until you have the amounts suggested for your family. Buying a little extra every time you shop can go a long way toward reaching your goal. Make sure you also include fruits and vegetables in freeze dried or canned forms.
Note: You don't have to have every item or the amounts of specific items the list. You do need to have the total in each category, for example Grains, Fats and Oils, Legumes. But the amounts of specific foods can be altered. For example, my kids aren't fond of rice, but I like it. So I will have some rice in my storage, but the calculator lists way too much for my family. Use this calculator as a guide for the amount of food you'll need, not something forcing you to eat foods you don't like.
Note: Legumes are important because stored meats are expensive and legumes are a cheaper protein source. If you can afford freeze dried or canned meats, those can be a substitute for the legumes.
STEP FOUR:
Keep checking your progress every few months to make sure you are making progress, or if you have already reached a year supply, check to make sure you are not falling behind on items.
Things you may forget to include: spices, holiday items, birthday items, and if you have animals you may not want to see them starve in a crisis, so include dog and cat food.
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