My Food Storage Organization

Posted June 20th, 2011 by admin and filed in Uncategorized
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2 Comments

I’ve tried a lot of different ways to organize my pantry and now that I store large amounts of food, I’ve found that I had to reorganize.  A long time ago, when I was exercising a ton, I organized my pantry by Protein vs Carbohydrates vs Fats vs Treats and then separated the essential sundries.  Then for a while I was eating junk and I shoved all my essential long term food way in the back of the pantry and restocked all the crap I was eating in the front of the pantry.

What I’ve now settled on is that I’m best off if I stock the items based on their expiration date.  So I have one shelf that has items that are expiring this month and they are regularly worked into my meal plan.  Then the shelf below that is for all other items that will expire this year.  Then a shelf below I have all items that will expire next year…and so on and so forth.  This helps me not waste food that will go bad soon.

I have also started keeping track of exactly how much food I should have to live on for a year and what I purchase those items for.  Then I watch the sales and if I see someone selling for very cheap prices I will stock up for the full year.  This also helps me keep track of how much I need to plant in the garden.

Also, I shop at local thrift shops and pick up very large tins.  Basically the ones that people sell popped popcorn in.  In these tins I store bulk items like dry beans, canned meat, flour, sugar, tea and coffee.  When I do restock these items, I empty out the tin and place the items with the longest storage dates in the bottom so when I’m in a hurry I’ll just grab ones that are sitting on the top.  This has three practical effects:

  1. This helps me organize, inventory and store items that I buy in large quantities
  2. It keeps these essentials away from mice who can wreak havoc on long term supplies before I notice.
  3. Finally, it makes these food items easy to load into the car if I decide it’s time to head for the hills.

As a side note, but on the same topic, check out PREPAREDNESS MATTER’s recent post about Black Beans and Rice(http://preparednessmatters.blogspot.com/2011/06/cooking-with-basic-food-storage-black.html) from dry storage items.  It’s a simple recipe that I plan to try out soon.

  • http://www.mystoragecabinets.com Steve L

    I love your idea of getting food tins, I am currently expanding my food storage area by removing clutter and once that mess is gone, I’ll purchase a few cheaper storage cabinets and other shelving for storage.

  • http://deathtozombies.com admin

    Yeah, food tins are nice and cheap for short to mid term storage. They’re no good for long term storage as apparently grains and beans almost always have some critters alive in them that will hatch eventually and spoil the food. For long term storage you have to use these fancy packets that remove all oxygen from the can and then you seal them up in a can just like you would coffee in a tin that you open with a can opener.