My computer crashed and I lost everything … I know you told us to back up our computers but I didn’t … Could you please resend my Food Storage Made Easy Binder file?

And that is the part where we say “I told you so!!!”. In our BabyStep Checklist program the VERY first thing we tell people to do is to have some sort of backup plan for their computer. This doesn’t seem like a typical recommendation from a food storage/preparedness site, but it is the MOST common “disaster” that people have and it is absolutely devastating when it happens. To lose all of your work and school files, not to mention family pictures and videos … it has happened to me and it is awful.
 

Well today I had a serious computer emergency myself. I was working on my laptop at a little table in front of my couch and had a nice full glass of ice water sitting beside me. My five year old son wanted a turn to hold my 2 month old baby, so he came and sat down beside me on the couch and tried to situate himself to comfortably take the babe. Well, in the process of doing that … he kicked the entire glass of water right onto my computer keyboard.

Needless to say I FREAKED OUT. I hurriedly put the baby down and tried to salvage the computer. I burst into tears because my MacBook is my other baby and it is only about a year old and it was FULL of WATER. My 2 month old was screaming because I scared him by putting him down so fast. And my five year old started crying because I was so upset and he was worried about the baby. Plus my three year old girl kept saying “What’s wrong, why is everyone crying?” It was quite a scene.

I thought the computer was completely ruined, as it kept doing crazy freak-out things whenever I tried to use the keyboard. But it appears to work ok if I use an external keyboard and mouse plugged into it. So I’m writing this blog post on my poor flooded MacBook and crossing my fingers that it will still function tomorrow.

The funny part about this is that I was not at ALL worried about my data. The very first thing to cross my mind was “Thank goodness I finally transfered my Mozy account to this computer (after procrastinating for almost a year).” I only had to be sad about replacing a $2400 computer, but all my non-replaceable files are safely stored in my Mozy account and were accessible to me all day while MY computer was drying out.

Use coupon code AUGUST for an additional 10% off your subscription!

So don’t let yourself be one of the people who emails us and says “I know you told me to get a Mozy account, and I should have, but I kept putting it off … and now my computer is fried … can you please resend my checklists?” (Have we mentioned that we have to do those manually and it is HARD to keep up with!) Those emails are the saddest because it is so cheap and easy to get an account and the amount of pain it can save is immeasurable.

Can you tell I’m a BIG Mozy fan? (Julie is too, you can read her story here).

• Basement junk making it difficult to reach long term food storage buckets
• Bags of groceries dumped on the floor BESIDE the shelves
• Canning supplies scattered in multiple places
• Shelves for 3 month supply are hard to access, hard to see, and hard to reach

My big excuse is that I had a baby 7 weeks ago. So for probably a good 5-6 months I avoided going down to the storage area like a plague. My sweet hubby would refill my containers upstairs with my long term foods. And my sweet 5 year old son would run down and grab cans of veggies or soup when I needed them for a recipe.

The problem could no longer be ignored when I sent my son down to grab a can of tomato soup for a recipe. He told me there wasn’t any. I didn’t believe him, because I should have at LEAST 10 cans down there. The soup is normally on the left shelf (see above) so I had to navigate around that junk to look for the soup. To my dismay there WASN’T any TOMATO SOUP. UGH! This is not supposed to happen to me.

• A complete reorganization of my storage space
• Elimination of space hogging (and leak-prone) water jugs
• Discarding of multiple foods items that were long past expiration
• Re-inventory of my three month supply spreadsheet

Once I had reorganized and catalogued my foods I realized how much I had depleted my storage over the past months. My “three month supply” was more like a partial 2 week supply plus a billion stewed tomatoes and mandarin oranges.

• Print out my list of “Need to Buy” items
• Use Deals to Meals (LOVE THEM!) over the next few weeks to catch the items when they are on sale
• Put foods straight onto shelves as I purchase them
• Fill up my new water storage boxes
• Buy or build more Can Racks as needed to improve rotation
• Buy better shelves some day (these are second hand and kind of odd-sized)
• Keep stocking up on my long term food storage now that I’m using it so much!

We quite often get asked to see an example of a filled out sheet, but I’ve always been a little embarrassed to share what we eat. I’ve finally overcome my fear and I’m willing to share. Hope it is helpful for you!

Jodi’s Three Month Supply Spreadsheet

p.s. Have you been procrastinating filling out your spreadsheet? Fill it out … RIGHT NOW and submit it to us at info@foodstoragemadeeasy.net. We will do a future post where we share all the reader spreadsheets and maybe we can all get ideas from each other! If you already have yours filled out … YOU ROCK and you can still send it to us too

1. Go through your recipe books, favorite recipes websites, etc. and write down all the meals you are planning for (I looked for easy easy meals or meals that would be good frozen either as whole meals or in components to put a quick meal together. I also used several of the meals from the Deals To Meals weekly meal plan since those items were all on sale that week)
2. Make a grocery list of all the ingredients you will need to purchase.
3. Log in to Deals To Meals and add everything to your “cart” that is on sale that is also on your shopping list. (View Julie’s video tutorial to see how EASY it is to do!)
4. Print out your Deals To Meals shopping cart list and your entire shopping list.

1. Go to Wal-Mart or any other store that does “price-matching”. Grab all of the items from the Deals To Meals list and go to the checkout.
2. Show the cashier your printout from Deals to Meals and you should be able to get ALL of the low prices without even having the actual store ads. (Please note: Check your Walmart for their policie but so far it has worked for 5 different ones that Julie and I have tried).
3. For the rest of your “non-sale” items, you can either purchase them at Wal-Mart too, or go to your favorite discount grocery store. (I have found that Winco is generally cheaper than Wal-Mart so I do the rest of my shopping there).

Just to give you an example of how much money you can save … I was stocking up on freezer meals so I bought ten pounds of ground beef. I like to buy the 93% lean variety but it is normally $3.47 per pound at my Wal-Mart. Well I found on Deals To Meals that it was on sale at a store I NEVER go to for only $1.99 per pound. I saved $15.00 JUST on the hamburger alone! This service is worth every penny. And if you use their weekly meal plans you save even more because then virtually ALL of the items you are buying will be on sale. So cool.

When we first heard of Deals to Meals, they were only in Utah, but now they are in 12 states! We hope they become national, because they are awesome. Even if you don’t live in one of the 12 states, the meal plans can be used wherever you live – so go and check them out FOR A FREE TRIAL, and don’t forget to tell them we sent you –

p.s. We became affiliates for Deals to Meals because we love their service so much and are way excited about promoting it!

• See how Julie is CONSTANTLY re-organizing her food storage [View Post]
• Jodi and Julie “argue” over how to plan a three month supply [View Post]
• Julie discovers that food storage is NOT only for desserts! [View Post]
• Jodi shares her adventures with canning, sprouting, and more. [View Post]
• Julie shares the BEST food storage recipe ever. [View Post]
• Jodi divulges two amazing cornmeal recipes. [View Post]

SURPRISE GIVEAWAY

We are so excited we have ALMOST hit another milestone in our blogging journey as we are approaching having 5000 “fans” on our facebook page. We are going to be announcing a FACEBOOK ONLY giveaway as soon as we hit the magic number of 5000 fans so if you aren’t already a fan make sure you go to our page and click the “like” button. You MUST be a fan in order to get the notification about the giveaway and find out how to enter (it will be easy we promise!)

UPDATE: We already hit 5000 fans so make sure to check out the Facebook Note for details!

Being a facebook fan gives you more of a day-to-day look into what we are doing to learn more about food storage and using it in our daily lives. We also announce special sales and events, ask and answer lots of questions, link to other great food storage information sources, and post our latest blog posts so you can read them right on facebook and never miss a post again. It’s been a great way to get to know our readers better and to learn from all of you as well. Hope to see you over there!

HERB CLASS SALE

Julie attended a “healthy food storage” class over the weekend (her class notes are coming later this week) and had to share this great offer with you (before it’s too late). One of the suggestions for people that are into more whole, natural types of foods and herbs was to make sure to store herbs for medicinal purposes. Dr. Christopher’s School Of Natural Healing was giving a special for conference attendees only, that they said we could pass on to our blog readers. They do a Family Herbalist course that is normally $500 but if you go to this link by TUESDAY (tomorrow), you can get the conference special of $100. If this is something you’re interested in learning more about, click here.

When we first made our Food Storage Calculator, we promised ourselves we wouldn’t store any of the recommended foods unless we knew how we were going to use them. Since I didn’t have a wheat grinder (or even knew what wheat looked like yet) I decided to tackle cornmeal as my first “grain”. I remembered I had some in my cupboard so it seemed like a good item to start with.

Problem – My cornmeal was 3 years past expiration so I had to go buy a new canister before I could even get started. That goes to show you just HOW little I actually used it.

Confession – The first two recipes I tried were really delicious. My kids absolutely LOVED them and I thought they were great and not too hard to cook. However, several months later when I finally bought my WonderMill I made a discovery. You can grind popcorn (yes regular popcorn) into fresh ground cornmeal and OH MY GOODNESS it made all of my cornmeal recipes sooooo much better!

Give these recipes a try either with store-bought cornmeal or fresh ground popcorn and I promise you you will decide to add one or the other into your food storage:

Corn Pancakes
Buttermilk Cornbread

   

Now that I have some good cornmeal recipes on hand I think it will be really helpful if I am living off of my food storage because I can mix it up and not just eat ONLY wheat meals and breads every single day.

If you have been following along with our Extreme Food Storage Makeover you will have already been introduced to my mom, Grandma Lori. I remember growing up we used to eat homemade strawberry jam and bottled peaches and my mom would make alfalfa sprouts on the kitchen counter. As I got older my mom kind of stopped doing those things and when I got married I was so busy I didn’t give it a second thought.

When we started our blog people started to ask us about some of the “food storage swear words” like gardening, canning, dehydrating, and sprouting and we realized we knew nothing about them. I asked my mom why she never taught me how to can and she said “When you can buy canned tomatoes at the grocery store for $0.50 why would you waste the time to can them yourself?” Because I wanted to LEARN HOW, Mom!

I decided it would be good to learn some of these self-reliance skills even if I don’t ever “HAVE” to rely on them. Plus there truly are some legitimate benefits to processing your own foods such as the health factors, you CAN save money, and a lot of it tastes so much better home grown and processed then store-bought. Not to mention it is really fun and satisfying to know you did it yourself. I am still a beginner to much of this stuff, but here are some of the fun projects I’ve attempted so far:
 

	COMING THIS SUMMER! As part of a series I’m going to be doing on self-reliance

I had never tried any of these things before I started blogging about them, so if you have been scared to try, believe me, if I can do it so can you!

Throughout the last two years we have really discovered that there is definitely not a one-style-fits-all approach to food storage. When this first became apparent to us was in our second month of running the blog when we were researching how we were going to get started on our three month supply.

Julie posted her approach first which was to just purchase extras of the foods she normally buys. I left a comment on that post about how the foods she eats are weird and I wouldn’t know what to cook with them. Well a lot of people liked her style AND her foods so I got embarrassed to post my approach later on that week. I made my own little excel spreadsheet with all of my meals planned out and I thought everyone would make fun of me for being SOOOO detail-oriented. Well according to the comments on that page a lot of people liked my approach too!
 

   

By now most of our readers know that Julie is the “excel queen”, so when she realized there were a group of people who really liked my initial 3 month plan she decided to be a wonderful sister-in-law and make me a fancy, auto-calculating version that we ended up posting on the blog. Our deluxe 3 Month Food Supply Excel Worksheet is now one of our most popular and helpful tools and it is fantastic even if you don’t feel the need to plan for specific meals. Check out how lovely my new 3 month plan is using our awesome spreadsheet. To fill out your own blank sheet, and watch some tutorial videos on how to do it, go to the Three Month BabyStep Page. Thanks Julie!

It seems like just yesterday that we came up with this crazy idea to blog about food storage when we had absolutely ZERO food storage and had no clue where to even start. In fact according to our very first blog post, we originally wanted to call this blog “Food Storage For Dummies … and We’re the Dummies”. hehe.

We have come a long way since we started two years ago and we wanted to celebrate this anniversary with you by taking you on a humorous journey of our successes and failures. So let’s get started!

We didn’t fully understand blogs, the blogging community, or blogging software in the beginning. We were both web designers but didn’t catch the blogging vision yet. Needless to say, our first site design left much to be desired

We have to admit that we have a lot more fun with the blog now that it is PINK! (Sorry to our men readers, it’s just the truth)

Check back every day this week as we walk you through some of our hidden archives to highlight what we have learned about food storage over the past two years. There will be some funny stuff you do NOT want to miss!

	January 2009 - We launched our free BabyStep Checklists to make it even EASIER to accomplish our Ten BabySteps. We were so excited to give people tangible lists to follow as they gathered their food storage including what to learn, what to buy, and how to use it.
	Spring 2009 – We started a facebook fan page. We had no idea at the time how much fun it would be. We all get to know each other through status updates, fan pictures, and success stories. One of the biggest perks of the fan page is all our reader experts out there who help answer questions. We learn so much on the fan page through sharing and great discussion.
	April 2009 – As people began completing the individual checklists, we got numerous requests from people wanting to get all the checklists at once so they could move ahead faster or make substitutions depending on what was on sale. We launched our Food Storage Made Easy eBook Binder which includes all the checklists, and the majority of our site content in one printable file.
	September 2009 – The Seven Day Challenge was a mock emergency that we put together in September of 2009 in honor of it being Emergency Preparedness Month. Our readers all participated with us as we went through seven days of different emergency situations and we shared feedback and learning along the way. We’re excited to do it all again this year!
	June 2010 -One of our favorite additions is our Newsletter program that we JUST started this month! We now offer recipes, food storage news/events, blog features, tips, and information about giveaways to people who are in our checklists email lists (whether you’re done, or still in the middle of them). Just in case you only want the newsletter and not the checklists, you can sign up for that here.

We’re so excited for the posts this week. They will be fun for you to go down memory lane, or if you’re a new reader to get to know us better (just don’t laugh at us – we were REALLY just beginners when we started this).

The Good – Irrigation is IN, just need to add in the little drippers. Woo-Hoo!

The Bad – I already had some plants started in there that got a little jostled.

The UGLY – In an attempt to harden off some of my seedlings I killed them all

Square Foot Gardening FAQ

Canning Questions

What are some tips for planning your garden if canning is your end goal?
First, do you have a pressure canner? Because if you don’t you are limited to canning mostly fruits (remember, tomatoes are a fruit!) and pickles. Salsa also works, since there is enough acid to can it safely with the boiling water method. If you are interested in canning, I suggest dedicate most of your garden to canning veggies. To maximize your yield, grow as much vertically as you can. By trellising cucumbers you can plant 8 per square, compared to 4+ squares if you let them sprawl out.

Which type of tomato plant is better for canning?
In general, paste tomatoes (like Roma) are good for canning. The flesh is more firm, so it holds up to all the heat, and it is less watery, so you have more pulp per tomato. But Roma’s are a little smaller, so it’s more peeling compared to other varieties. I grow Roma, Early Girl, Better Boy, and Celebrity. For salsa I use an even mix of tomatoes, but I can whole Roma tomatoes for sauce.

When purchasing tomatoes, ask around. What do your friends and neighbors grow, and why? I don’t usually ask at the nursery or home and garden store, because I’m almost always advised to purchase what they have on the shelf! You can call your local extension office for a list of suggested varieties for your location. At many places the plants have tags on them, indicating if they are good for slicing, salads, canning, etc. Also look for disease resistant varieties.

How many to tomatoes, peppers, etc. should I plant if I want to can?
If this is your first year growing a garden, I suggest you start small and increase with time. Otherwise, you’re likely to take on too much, burn out, and never can a single jar. It’s just impossible to know until you try it, and see how much your garden produces.

Garden Planning

What are some tips on how you should rotate your garden plan each year?
If you SFG and use compost or Mel’s mix, you will need to replenish it with compost every year. As long as you didn’t have any diseases, there is no need to rotate your crops. Unless you get bored, like me, or become obsessed with finding the perfect gardening layout (also like me).

Do you have any detailed info on companion planting?
Companion planting is the practice of growing plants next to each other for mutual benefit. Read all about it in this post.

Miscellaneous

What plants grow best in desert climates?
Everything! You may have a hard time with cool-weather plants like broccoli, spinach, and peas. But if you give them an early start and shade from the hot sun, even these will grow well. Things like tomatoes and peppers do particularly well, since they can tolerate some heat and love the sunshine. I suggest everyone do a little research on their local extension website (www.extension.org) and/or check out a local farming supply store for varieties developed specifically for your climate.

Do I need to fertilize?
I believe in fertilizing. This can be organic or chemical, but I don’t feel Mel’s mix provides sufficient nutrients for my gardens. Now, you have to be careful because if you fertilize with too much nitrogen you will have big, leafy plants and little fruit. I sometimes use an all-purpose fertilizer (20-20-20 or 10-10-10), but I really love one called Blooming and Rooting (9-59-8). I use it when starting seeds (about 4 weeks after germination) and on all my veggies that flower (squash, peas, beans, tomatoes, peppers) every 6 weeks.

Don’t forget to check out Part One of the Square Foot Gardening FAQs and also check out the great Garden Box Tutorial put together by Jodi’s husband.

Family trip to the dump to get compost for my vegetable gardens – PRICELESS

A BIG pile of … dirt

Gotta love a beater truck that’s not afraid to get dirty (my husband loves classic cars)

Hubby forgot his gloves … I’ll let you chew on that thought for a bit

The kids thought it was a grand adventure!

And my gardens are beeeeeautiful!!!!!!

And now if the weather would just cooperate I could actually start getting something DONE in my beautifully filled garden beds. If you need help with your vegetable gardens this year check out my cousin Emily’s eBooks and website on Square Foot Gardening. Tons of great info that I use all the time!

p.s. Once we recover from the weekend we will be sharing a lot of great stuff about the Food Storage Fair we attended on Saturday. You won’t believe some of the great products and companies we learned about, amazing authors we met, etc. Make sure to subscribe to the blog or follow us on facebook so you don’t miss a thing!

My husband (the handyman who helped us make our first rotating can racks) has come up with a fabulous new storage solution for our house. He was working as an airline pilot for a while and was based in Houston, Texas — the land of no basements. The apartment that he lived in during his “on days” made use of their ATTIC for storage space. Ever since he stayed in that apartment he dreamed of converting our attic into a functional storage area.

After a long time of deliberating, several Home Depot trips, and a gaping hole cut into the bedroom ceiling … we finally got a solution that works!

The magical ladder (pre-install)	Ladder installed, so cool!
The kids loved helping	Beautiful new storage space!

While it doesn’t necessarily work to store food (due to extreme heat and cold) … it’s a fabulous way to store everything else thus making room for more food in the other areas of our home. Isn’t my husband the greatest? And the best part about having the attic stairway is that I can actually climb up there myself and access our storage!

If you’ve been following us for awhile, you know at the beginning of the year we had some New Years Resolutions. Well now is the time we TELL ALL about how we did. We’re excited about how this year went, and can’t wait to share our goals for 2010 in a few weeks!

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• I want to save up enough money to buy a wheat grinder so I don’t have to borrow Julie’s any more


Yay! This one was easy for me! When I wrote my resolutions last year my husband was out of a job so a wheat grinder purchase seemed far off. However, he was able to become employed in January and we got a little bit of money for Christmas and we decided that a wheat grinder would be a good investment since we used our food storage so much when he was out of work. The electric mills are on sale this month, so if you have extra Christmas money this year, now is a great time to get your own!



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• I want to plan my summer garden specifically with canning in mind


This one SHOULD have been an A+ as I started with a great plan and the best of intentions, but I had some setbacks along the way. You can read about my failures on my “lessons learned from gardening” post. However, I WAS still able to can some delicious applesauce and strawberry jam this year. Yay!


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• I want to create a recipe binder full of meals that use my long term food storage items and cook from it frequently


While I haven’t completed my recipe binder yet, I HAVE accumulated a TON of recipes and I use my food storage almost every day. I am still constantly pulling my laptop into the kitchen to follow recipes so I definitely still have room for improvement here. Next year it will be complete … I SWEAR!

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• I want to cook more with dry beans and quit being so afraid of the soaking concept


I have to admit, I put this goal as a way to FORCE me to get into beans. I was SO scared of them. I can’t believe how much I have learned this year about them. I learned to use them to make hummus, cream of chicken soup, and to replace my canned beans.


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• I want to plan dinners ahead of time to use more of my long term foods


I have done pretty well on this goal, but have to be honest there is room for improvement. I use my long term food storage ALL the time in my meals now, but I admit, I don’t meal plan that much. I have a bunch of recipes I love and use often, but I think I’m giving up on the dream of being a meal planner – it’s just not my style.


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• I want to find a way to help people who hate excel do an effective 3 month food supply plan even though the current excel file ROCKS! But I know, I know you don’t all love excel


I was able to make a pdf for people to make their 3 month plan, and I think it’s worked out well… What I’d really love to do now is make a cooler simpler online way, but I’m not that tech savvy so… sorry about that!

Stay tuned as we unveil next years goals in the next couple of weeks. We’re gonna have some fun ones, and Julie is giving herself another one to FORCE her into something she’s scared of.

Corndog Muffin Recipe:

Ingredients:
1 1/2 c. cornmeal (about 1 c. fresh ground popcorn)
2 1/2 c. flour (about 2 c. fresh ground wheat)
1/2 c. white sugar
1/4 c. brown sugar
4 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
2 eggs (can use powdered eggs)
2 c. milk (can use powdered milk)
8 oz shredded cheddar cheese
6 hot dogs cut in thirds

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix dry ingredients in large bowl. Beat eggs and milk in a separate bowl. Add to dry mix and add cheese just until moistened. Spoon mixture into muffin tins until 2/3 full. Add 1 hot dog chunk to each muffin. Bake for 14-18 minutes or until golden brown.
 
 

I cut my hotdogs into smaller chunks and it wasn’t as good that way. I also think next time I might try it with my buttermilk cornbread recipe and just stick the hotdogs and cheese into that batter. I LOVE that cornbread recipe better than any other. The kids LOVED this recipe and it is very filling so we had tons of leftovers.

For other food storage recipes check out:

Our Food Storage Recipes Page
Our sister site EverydayFoodStorage.NET
I Can’t Believe It’s Food Storage book
Country Beans book

You can grab a copy of our binder ebook to help you get a start on some recipes. But like I said, there are a LOT of other resources online such as our sister site http://everydayfoodstorage.net that may have recipes that you are using on a regular basis. So get on the computer and get printing!

Ok we gotta stop giving hints or this is going to be too easy

So you can use me as an example, just because I wasn’t able to do what I had hoped I could do, I was still able to have somewhat of a success with my garden, and I will have more than NOTHING. You just can’t give up. If everything feels overwhelming take BabySteps and do it at your own pace. As long as you are progressing you are achieving success! I won’t have lots of tomatoes and cucumbers to can this year, but I am still planning to buy some peaches and apples so at least I can get a little of my canning itch to be satisfied

How is your garden coming along this year? Share your successes and failures in the comments below! And don’t be ashamed, at least your garden can’t look worse than MINE!

p.s. If you can’t get ANY sort of garden this year, all is not lost. You can still achieve success by getting some fresh veggies from friends or family, or even buying it from the corner stands or a farmer’s market. Julie has a story and recipe to share about that that she will be posting soon as well!

Chow Mein Casserole

Ingredients:
1 lb hamburger, browned with 1/2 an onion chopped
(can replace with 2 cans of chicken chunks and throw in some onion flakes)
1/2 c. brown rice (white rice is great too)
2 cans cream of chicken soup (try the low-fat bean flour variety!)
1 ½ c. hot water (if using homemade cream of chicken, skip the water)
1/8 c. soy sauce
¼ tsp. ground pepper
½ can chow mein noodles (about 3 oz)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350º. Mix all ingredients together (except chow mein noodles). Bake in serving bowl covered with foil for 45 minutes. Take off cover. Pour 3 oz. (1/2 can) of chow mein noodles over top. Cook uncovered for 15 more minutes. Let set for 5-10 minutes after cooking.

As we have grown and expanded our food storage knowledge, we have continually added to our site. While the site has expanded with so much information, we still want to make sure that it’s still easy for beginners to navigate. Since we are about halfway through our Summer Crash Course we decided to give you a little break and announce some changes we made to our site recently to help you get the most out of our site.

You will see that the top navigation buttons have changed slightly. Here is a run-down of the new things to look for:

• The Start Here tab now contains helpful tips for how to best use our site and where to find the information you are looking for.
• The Checklists page now offers you a choice of how you would like to receive your checklists based off of what your preferred “learning style” is.
• We added an Emergency Preparedness tab as we have found that this is something people are looking for quite a bit, and we feel it is a prerequisite to getting started with your food storage. Check back on Friday as we will be adding some new sub-pages to this section which will include even more detailed information
• Tools and Products remain the same. We consistently put a lot of work into those sections so make sure to check them often.
• We added a tab for Recipes so that you can easily navigate to any of the food storage recipes we have tried and posted about.
• Links and About remain the same, although we will be revamping the links section soon to make it an even better resource for you.

Take a look around at the new sections and let us know what you think of the changes. We are trying hard to keep more experienced readers interested while still being able to help the brand new beginner. Believe us, we know how it feels to be getting started and get so overwhelmed with the abundance of information out there.

Homemade Rice-A-Roni Recipe

from The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczy

Ingredients:
2 c. rice
1 c. angel hair, vermicelli or spaghettini pasta, broken into very small pieces
¼ c. parsley
6 Tbsp. chicken bullion powder
2 tsp. onion powder
½ tsp. garlic powder
¼ tsp. thyme

Directions:
Combine all ingredients and mix well. To prepare: Melt 2 Tbsp. butter in a skillet. Add 1 c. of the mix and stir. Add 2 ¼ c. water. Bring to a boil. Reduce to low, cover and simmer for 15 minutes.

For other ideas for homemade mixes check out the AWESOME Make-A-Mix book.

Well on the way home I had quite an adventure. We were traveling in our minivan which has over 150,000 miles on it but we had just had it checked out and were feeling confident that it would make the trip. On the way home on Friday things were running just fine and then all of a sudden the van completely overheated and started shaking until we stopped running it and let it cool down. We were about 20 miles from the nearest town and 60 miles from a major city in an area that had zero cell phone service and with our two little kids in tow. NOT a fun experience.

We stopped and ate at the town while we let the van cool down. Then we headed out again hoping to get to the city and pray that some kind of mechanic or auto parts store might HAPPEN to be open on Fourth of July weekend. We were able to get some new hoses which we thought were the problem but then on our way out of town it overheated again. Each time we tried to let it rest and cool down it ended up sucking the battery down to the point we would need a jump start to get going again. We were hot, miserable, and tired … just wanting to get HOME.

We finally gave up on fixing the car around 2 pm on Saturday after spending the night in Helena, Montana and ended up renting a u-haul to tow the van home. The only problem was it only had three seats so our kids had to share the middle seat and squish into the front of the u-haul cab with us and no car seats … EEEK. We made it home around midnight at the end of July 4th and missed all of the festivities. It was kind of sad but at least we made it home safely.

Emergency Preparedness Lessons Learned

What we were glad we had:

• Treats, drinks, and entertainment for the kids
• A spare jug of coolant and bottles of water to help us limp into town
• A map of Montana so we would know how far the next town was (we normally don’t carry maps with us but we had already gotten lost on this trip once so we happened to grab one)
• A small tool box my husband insisted we bring
• Cell phones and iPhone when we got to Helena (helped find the auto parts store and arrange the u-haul when we needed it)

What we wished we had:

• Jumper cables (we ended up buying another set after the 3rd jump we needed, and this is maddening because we have about 5 sets at home we had just forgotten to stick in)
• The repair manual for our van
• Spare cell phone chargers (my car charger stopped working)
• Printed directions/maps for the whole trip instead of depending on an iPhone that did not get service a lot of the time
• Hand fans to use when we couldn’t run our air conditioner
• Stuck with the caravan plan we had originally intended
• Taken the larger highway route instead of the “backroads” shortcut

Does anyone else have any advice for what could make a breakdown less traumatic? I’m SURE this has happened to more people than just my family!

Rice Pudding Recipe

Ingredients:
2 eggs, beaten (can use powdered eggs)
½ c. sugar
¼ tsp. salt
2 c. milk (can use powdered milk)
1 ¼ c. cooked white rice, cooled (leftovers work great)
½ c. raisins (optional but oh so delicious!)
Cinnamon and Nutmeg to taste

Directions:
Preheat oven to 325o F. Mix all the ingredients together and pour into a greased 1 qt. bowl. Set the bowl in a shallow pan. Pour hot water into the pan about 1 inch deep. Put pan into the oven and bake for 1 ½ hours.

How to Make Your Own Plant Pots – Video

How to Make Your Own Plant Pots – Instructions

1. Take a single full sheet of black and white newspaper (color paper can have chemicals that may leach into your soil so it’s best to avoid it).
2. Fold the paper on its seam. Fold in half one more time. If your paper is larger in size you may have to fold it once more. Make a good crease on folds.
3. Take a glass and place it on its edge halfway onto the newspaper. Wrap the newspaper tightly around the glass and then shove all the edges down inside the glass.
4. Pull the newspaper off of the glass. Take the inside edges that you had previously folded into the glass and unfold them a bit to make the base of the pot. Press them down hard (you can use the base of your glass to really get it sealed down in there.
5. Transplant (or plant) your seeding into the newspaper pot with some good potting soil and place it in a tray and put it into direct sunlight. I use a little indoor greenhouse I found online.
6. When ready to move the plants into your garden simply remove the newspaper and place the plant in your garden.

p.s. The author of our sister site EverydayFoodStorage.NET just announced an awesome giveaway for her new book “I Can’t Believe It’s Food Storage”. Who doesn’t like more free stuff? We are so excited for her new book and think it’s a great companion to our Food Storage Made Easy Binders as she can give you even more ways to use your food storage once you start actually going through our BabySteps.
CHECK OUT HER GIVEAWAY TODAY!!!

So what side dish is a necessity with chili? Cornbread of course! I have always purchased boxes of Jiffy cornbread mixes in the past. But when I got my WonderMill Grain Mill I decided to take a crack at grinding up some popcorn to make fresh ground cornmeal for homemade cornbread. Oh boy, I will NEVER go back to boxed cornbread again. Now that I have you salivating over my family dinner tonight … I have to go ahead and share the recipes with you

Marilyn’s Real Chili Bean Recipe:

Ingredients:

Directions: Soak beans overnight. Drain and cover with fresh water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 2 hours. Drain and add to crock-pot. Sauté the chopped onion and garlic in oil until limp. Stir in all seasonings. Add tomatoes and sauce and simmer for 20 minutes. Brown beef in small fry pan. Drain and add to crock-pot. Add chili sauce and 5 cups of hot water to crock-pot. Simmer in crock-pot at least 7 hours.

Better Than Jiffy Cornbread Recipe:

Grind: ½ cup of popcorn kernels to make ¾ cup cornmeal
Combine: ¾ c. cornmeal, 1 ¼ c. flour (I used whole wheat), ¼ c. sugar, 2 tsp. baking powder, ½ tsp. salt
Add: 1 c. milk, ¼ c. veg. oil, 1 large egg, beaten; stir until dry ingredients are moist
Bake: At 400 degrees F for 20 to 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean

I really wanted to start using our new Food Storage Calculator, but as I tried to catalog what food I already had it was a disaster. I couldn’t even GET to all my food, let alone figure out what the heck I had bought. So yesterday during my kids naps I went on a rampage and reorganized the entire area, brought in a new shelf, and reconfigured my upstairs pantry to include more of the foods I’ve been using on a regular basis. I even got REALLY ambitious and made cute little labels for all my buckets. That’s when you know you are truly a food storage nerd

Here are the results of my afternoon of agony. I just had to share because I’m so proud of myself. AND as per our latest BabySteps Checklist I can now check off the to-do item of filling out my inventory sheet. YAY! (If you haven’t signed up yet, stop reading and go sign up now!)

Ingredients:
1 1/2 lb lean ground beef
1/2 c. crushed Ritz crackers
3/4 c. shredded cheddar cheese
1 oz. pkg. dry onion soup mix
1/2 qt. of lentil sprouts, pureed
2 eggs, beaten (or 2 T. powdered eggs 1/4 C. Water)
1/4 c. ketchup
2 T. Worcestershire sauce

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place the ground beef, crushed Ritz, cheddar cheese, and onion soup mix in a large bowl and mix until well combined. Puree the lentil sprouts (I put them in my food processor with the eggs to try to get them extra smooth). Whisk the pureed sprouts, eggs, ketchup, and Worcestershire sauce in a separate bowl until smooth. Add to the meat mixture and mix until evenly combined. Put in a 9×9 pan, cover with foil, and bake for 45 minutes to an hour. When top/edges look nice and crispy check the middle to make sure it’s cooked all the way.

My husband couldn’t even taste a difference in this recipe. He was surprised and impressed with it. My kids ate it just fine and I can guarantee you they would not eat plain sprouts. I really enjoyed it and I didn’t like the plain sprouts either (as I mentioned in my confession at the bottom of the sprouting post) So overall I’d have to say this recipe was a SUCCESS!

A few weeks ago, I was talking to my mom (affectionately known as GrandmaLori around here) about sprouting as I can remember doing alfalfa sprouts with her when I was little. She just happened to have an old sprouting container that she inherited from her grandmother that she doesn’t ever use and she let me “borrow” it for my adventures.

This sprouting container is pretty neat but the holes are too big to do tiny seeds like alfalfa, so I decided to start with lentils which I have on hand from my long term food storage legumes supply.

Day 1

First I rinsed the lentils and picked out any gross looking pieces, discolored ones, or things that did NOT look like lentils (see picture). Then I soaked the lentils overnight as that is what my sprouting book recommended. There are a few types of items you would NOT need to soak so just make sure you follow the directions for whatever you are sprouting.

Day 2

In the morning, I poured my soaked lentils into the sprouting container and rinsed them off again. I set them on the counter beside my stove as it seemed to be one of the warmer spots in my kitchen but out of direct sunlight. I also set a paper towel over the container because it seemed weird to just leave them sitting out with no covering. That evening I rinsed the lentils again. Each time I rinsed I made sure to really let all the excess water drain out before setting it back in the little tray.

Day 3

When I took the paper towel off on day three I had a pleasant surprise. SPROUTS!!! I was so excited. All I did on day 3 was rinse and repeat the instructions from day 2.

Days 4-7

Each day from 4-7 I rinsed the lentils at morning and at night and took a photo of the progress if I remembered to. It’s really so easy, just takes about 30 seconds each time and they just grow on their own!

Day 8

After rinsing on the morning of day 8, I lifted off the paper towel and let the sprouts sit in the sunlight all day. They turned a very nice green and grew even longer!

Day 9

I think I let my sprouts get a little bit too long but I was really busy the last few days of my experiment and didn’t pay very close attention to them. So on the final day I pulled them all out of the sprouting container and put them into a large canning jar and stuck them in the fridge.

And now for my confession. I tasted the lentil sprouts and they tasted like fresh peas. I don’t really like fresh peas all that much so I’m afraid I don’t really want to eat these just plain. I’ll have to try making a yummy salad and sprinkling a few on top. Or I might try them in a meatloaf to use as filler. I have to say my first experiment was a success in that they GREW, but kind of a failure in that I didn’t really grow something that my family will use on a regular basis. Back to the drawing board

Since Julie didn’t “inherit” a sprouter she recently bought this Sprout Master Sprouter at Kitchen Kneads. She hasn’t tried it out yet but it looks like it would work about the same as mine.

How To Build Your Own Can Rotating Rack

Step 1
Print out the shelf diagram (this great diagram comes from the Pantry Panel blog). Decide which size you want to make. I opted for the soup can size to start out.

Step 2

Take a large cardboard box (either 1-ply or 2-ply) and measure out the pieces you are going to need. We decided to combine the sides and back into one long piece to make it sturdier and have less pieces to glue. We used a carpenter’s square to measure and make straight lines, but any ruler will be just fine. Here’s what our pieces measured as per the diagram:

• Sides/back combined – 28 3/8″ long x 10 1/2″ high
• Upper and middle shelves – 9 1/8″ x 4 1/8″ each
• Bottom shelf 12 1/8″ x 4 1/8″
• Top front piece 3 1/4″ x 6 1/2″
• Bottom front piece 1 1/4″ x 6 1/2″

My husband decided to make the two front pieces a little bit taller because he wanted them to wrap underneath the shelves to make them sturdier. So our pieces actually measured 4 1/4″ x 6 1/2″ and 2 1/4″ x 6 1/2″.  He also recommends adding an extra 1/8″ to each shelf width (so they’d be 4 3/8″) as ours ended up a tiny bit too tight for the can to roll smoothly.

Step 3

Cut out all of your pieces using an exacto-knife or other sharp blade. We couldn’t find our exacto-knife so that’s why we used this pocket knife. It didn’t make perfect smooth edges but it worked just fine.  You could actually even use scissors if you want.  If you used a long piece for the side/back pieces then you’ll need to bend the side pieces in to the right shape.  We used our carpenter’s square (ruler) to help bend a straight line.

My husband wanted to note here that the bandaid on his thumb is NOT from cutting THIS project.  So don’t worry!

Step 4

Take your side and back pieces (either glued together or folded in) and make sure that your can will fit inside properly.  Then measure 2 3/4″ in from each edge of one side and draw a vertical line on the side pieces. This is how far in the shelves need to be glued so that the can is able to roll through them. The measurement will vary depending on which size of unit you are building. 

Step 5

Glue the pieces together. Supposedly you can use Elmer’s glue but my husband was getting irritated that it was taking too long to dry. So he found a tube of caulk (yes we’re the kind of family that has caulk on hand most of the time) and that was faster but still not a great or sturdy long term solution. He highly recommends purchasing a quick-drying tacky or gel type of glue.  Here is the order that we glued the pieces in:

• Top and bottom shelves glued to one side and to the back piece
• Middle shelf glued to that same side
• All three shelves glued to the opposite side
• Front pieces attached with extra tabs adhering to sides and bottom of shelves

If you didn’t cut the sides and back as one long piece you would need to glue those together first.

Step 6

Cut some little notches out of the side pieces near the bottom to enable you to pull the cans out more easily (we forgot to do that step before I took these pictures). Put your new unit in your pantry or on a shelf and load it up with cans! YAY!!!

In the instructions it says you can paint all of the cardboard pieces but we didn’t feel like taking the extra time and I don’t really care if they look ugly. Plus every time I look at my WonderMill box I can think about how much I love my wheat grinder. Hehe. However, we have heard that they will be stronger if you do go ahead and paint them, so I guess it can’t hurt.

My New Can Rotating Rack In Action!!!

And If This Looks To Hard …

Check out this other very cost-effective solution!

Remember our All We Want for Christmas Post? Our families must have been spying on our blog because we received several items from the list!

Julie STRUCK GOLD this year! She got a WONDERMILL GRAIN MILL! Her mom got her and 2 of her sisters the best present ever. Needless to say she’s been going to town (remember her all about wheat post). She loves it so much, we became Authorized Dealers for WonderMill to help people buy them at the Minimum Advertised Price allowed (click here for details). By the way, aren’t Julie’s sisters cute?

Jodi received a few books that will definitely help her with her food storage goals this year, Cookin’ with Dried Eggs and the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving. She also got some food from The Ready Project which she’s excited to try out!

So now for our “NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS”:

• I want to save up enough money to buy a wheat grinder so I don’t have to borrow Julie’s any more
• I want to plan my summer garden specifically with canning in mind
• I want to create a recipe binder full of meals that use my long term food storage items and cook from it frequently

• I want to cook more with dry beans and quit being so afraid of the soaking concept
• I want to plan dinners ahead of time to use more of my long term foods
• I want to find a way to help people who hate excel do an effective 3 month food supply plan even though the current excel file ROCKS! But I know, I know you don’t all love excel

5 lbs C&H sugar
3 Stouffers frozen dinners
1 tube colgate toothpaste
2 lbs Land O Lakes butter
1 bottle Krogers syrup
2 cans evaporative milk

The regular prices of these items would have been $27.94 … BUT … using the fresh values sales prices I saved $9.44 and I printed some coupons and clipped old coupons I’ve been saving and saved another $8.85. Including tax, the total I paid was only $10.26! That is WAY cheaper than it would have been even at Walmart with all generic brands.

I am only beginning to skim the surface on how great this system is. Within a few months I hope to have a lot of food stockpiled, do most of my monthly “shopping” from my pantry, and only hit Walmart for things I’ve run out of before I have a chance to restock. View the video below for tips on how to use this great resource.

How to Use GrocerySmarts.com

For more tips on saving money on your groceries and food storage items visit The Obsessive Shopper. She also includes some general couponing tips for people outside of Utah.

Homemade Applesauce Recipe and Canning Instructions

Step 1: Get your pot ready

I used my biggest pot and put a little water in the bottom to keep the apples from sticking. As I peeled the apples I just started throwing them in to start cooking.

Step 2: Peel a TON of apples

I used my handy dandy apple peeler which the kids thought was WAY fun to help with. If you don’t have one of these peelers, you can always try the method which Kaila’s husband came up with. Check out this video, it’s hilarious. Just as a reference, I used about 14 pounds of apples (before coring/peeling) and it netted 5 quarts of applesauce.

Step 3: Cook up those apples

By the time we were done peeling all the apples the first ones were really well cooked. I just let the whole thing cook for about 10 more minutes to make sure they were all soft.

Step 4: Prepare your canner and jars

While the apples were cooking I ran my bottles in the dishwasher to sterilize them. I also filled up my canner and started to boil the water. Lastly, I started some small pots of water boiling to sterilize my lids and rings. If you are new to canning, I would HIGHLY recommend getting a Home-Canning Kit to get all the tools you need to do proper canning. If you don’t have a canner or jars yet you can buy an all-in-one kit which will include EVERYTHING you need to get started!

Step 5: Make the applesauce!

Once the apples were all soft, I used my hand-me-down 1970’s-style baymix to puree them. I’m not sure why I call it a baymix but that is what my mom always called it when I was growing up. I couldn’t find the exact one online to show you, but I absolutely LOVE mine. Some of these hand blenders look similar but I can’t vouch for them. You could also use a food processor or even a blender to do the pureeing. But the baymix was SO easy because I could do it straight in the pan. At this point you can add any seasonings you want. I added 2 cups of sugar but could have gotten away with just one. Ours turned out really sweet and delicious. Some people like to add cinnamon or other things but I prefer to just add those when we eat it.

Step 6: Pour the applesauce into jars and seal ‘em up

Use a funnel as this can get really messy. I ladled the applesauce in leaving about 1/2 an inch of space at the top of the jars. Then I used my tongs to pull out a lid and ring for each jar. Try not to touch these things with bare hands as you don’t want them to get unsterilized. Screw the ring on tight once the lid is on.

Step 7: Put your jars into your canner and boil (make sure the water goes ABOVE the jars. I added more after this picture.

As I filled each jar I would put it into the canner. As you put more jars in the water level rises, so you don’t need to start with the canner all the way full. Once I had all 5 jars in I filled up to the neck level of my jars with hot water. You have to wait until the water is boiling before you start timing. Let it boil for 20 minutes and then remove the jars. Way easy huh?

Step 8: ENJOY! (my kids sure did)

For more canning recipes and ideas we recommend the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving. I got it from my mother-in-law for a gift and I use it a TON!

Step 1 – Wrote out my meal plan for the month and wrote down all the ingredients I needed to buy plus anything that was on the “To Buy” list on my fridge

Step 2 – Went to the GrocerySmarts.com website and following the Obsessive Shopper’s instructions I highlighted only the 4 and 5 star deals and printed out the list. (I figure anything less than a 4 star is probably safe to assume is cheaper at Walmart.)

Step 3 – Circled any items I planned to buy including:
a. Items on my current shopping list
b. Items that end up being FREE
c. Items that are on my 3-month food supply plan or long-term food storage list

Step 4 – Clipped my coupons for the items that listed coupons on my GrocerySmarts.com print-out. This included printing out the “printable coupons” (there were a few really good ones!) and also clipping coupons from my newspaper. I was so happy I had read the post about organizing your coupons on The Obsessive Shopper’s website. It was so easy to find exactly what I was looking for.

Step 5 – Headed to Smiths and was pleasantly surprised at just how little money I spent. I spent $37.04 and saved $21.60 in manufacturer’s coupons and $33.28 in fresh value’s savings. If that doesn’t blow your mind wait until you hear about all the food I got!!!

• 5 lbs of ground hamburger (85% lean)
• 2 boxes of Eggo waffles
• 8 bags of Malt-o-Meal cereal
• 4 boxes of granola bars (Fiber 1, ChexMix, Nature’s Valley)
• 4 boxes of Pop Tarts
• 2 boxes of Cheezit crackers
• 2 boxes of Keebler graham crackers
• 5 packages Hamburger Helper
• 5 packages of Tuna Helper
• 1 box of Pilsbury brownie mix
• 1 can of Pilsbury cake frosting

For $37.04 can you even believe it! Thank you thank you thank you to the Obsessive Shopper and her amazing GrocerySmarts website. If you haven’t used it yet, you are really missing out. I’d recommend subscribing to her blog because she summarizes the best of the deals each week in case you don’t have time to go through the whole process on your own. I obviously will still need to go to Walmart to fill in the gaps in my monthly shopping, but I can handle one quick trip to Smiths per month to get such great deals and to build up my Food Storage. This was a great way to really kick-start my 3-month inventory.

While preparing the blog post “How to Make a 72 Hour Kit” I pulled out my own kits to take some pictures. I realized the date on them was July 2006 so I decided I better rotate the food out since the recommendation is typically to rotate it every 6 months to a year. I opened the kits up and discovered that if we truly would have had an emergency these would not have been very pleasant to eat.

Top Ten Reasons I Needed to Rotate My 72 Hour Kit Foods:

10. Didn’t even have a kit for my youngest daughter (and she’s almost two!)
9. Stew expired July 2007.
8. Tang powder turned into crystallized lumps.
7. Beanie Weanies tasted rancid (yes I sampled them) and expired in 2007 as well.
6. Expired oatmeal although it didn’t taste too bad.
5. Raisins as hard as rock. Even my kids wouldn’t eat them.
4. Fruit roll-ups were smashed flat and REALLY sticky and gooey. I should NOT have let my kids attempt to eat them!
3. Expired noodle soup which also didn’t have any directions on the envelopes … hmmm.
2. Beef jerky was so hard that it killed my jaw to try to chew it and also had white powder on it that I am suspicious was mold. I hope I don’t get sick from tasting it!
1. The jolly ranchers melted all over the entire kit! Must have gotten overheated when we moved.

So not only would it have been gross in an emergency but now as I’m rotating it, the food is going to waste because it is so nasty and old.

Solution

Today I decided enough was enough. I took my kids to Walmart with my Printable Shopping List in hand. I bought enough stuff to make 6 kits (Julie likes me to get hers at the same time I’m doing mine) and it cost $49.50, so approximately $8.25 per kit. We didn’t need to purchase the stove, fuel pellets, matches, or spoons so to make a brand new kit would cost a few dollars extra. It took me about 30 minutes to empty out the old kits and put in the new food items. So I procrastinated for a whole year on something that took me less than 2 hours and about $30. I make myself mad sometimes.

Bonus

While I was redoing my kits I was finally able to make the “video instructions” I have been meaning to put together since I did the original 72 hour kit post. Hopefully this will help you out if you are working on your kits for the first time!

Do you have your 72 hour kits prepared yet? When is the last time YOU rotated your 72 hour kits? What is your goal for when to get them replaced (if you have been a slacker like us)?

So I know Julie will mock me for this, but I like to be organized with my cooking and I stink at making up meals out of random ingredients. I also tend to be somewhat of an excel junkie … thus my 3 month plan is quite detailed. I started by jotting down in a notebook 7 breakfasts, 7 lunches, 14 dinners, and a few snacks that could be made if no fresh meat/produce was available. Then I multiplied those meals out to get 12 weeks worth of food planned. I pulled out my recipe book and marked down exactly what ingredients I’d need to make those meals the specified number of times. I compiled all of that into an inventory list that I will print and update as I accumulate the items on my list. If you would like to see my spreadsheets in detail you can click on the sample image to view the excel file. I know this strategy might seem overwhelming to some of you, but for me it makes me feel empowered and confident that I will be able to utilize the items should the need arise.

Please note that since this posting we have developed a great customizable 3 month plan spreadsheet that you can use for your own plan. Go to the BabyStep 3 page for more details.

]]> http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/2008/07/08/jodi-three-month-plan/feed/ 17 http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/2008/06/24/water-water-everywhere/ http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/2008/06/24/water-water-everywhere/#comments Tue, 24 Jun 2008 22:14:17 +0000 Jodi -- Food Storage Made Easy http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/?p=56

4 people in my family X 1 gallon of water per day X 14 days = 56 gallons
I bought 10 jugs (6 gallons each) just to be on the safe side.

Confession: I went to fill them and realized I only had SCENTED bleach (see Step 2 page) so I couldn’t do it. They are still empty Don’t tell Julie though, she thinks I’m all on the ball since I bought them first!

• Water – 6 two-liter bottles
• 72 Hour Kits – 3 complete kits (over 2 years old)
• Baking Goods – 10 lbs flour, 1 can salt, 2 lbs each brown and powdered sugar
• Baby Items – 1 can formula
• Grains, Cereals, Rice, Pasta, etc. – 1 lb white rice, 13 lbs dried beans, 3 boxes instant oatmeal, 2 boxes cream of wheat, 2 boxes of cold cereal, 2 boxes kraft dinner, multiple sprouting seeds, several spares of common spices
• Commercial Soups – 2 chunky campbell’s, 5 tomato, 4 chicken noodle, 1 cream of chicken
• Canned Fruits and Veggies – 6 qts. peaches, 1 can fruit cocktail, 1 can mandarin oranges, 5 qts. tomatoes
• Psychological Foods – 3 qts. pickles, 3 jars tomato sauce, 2 pts. salsa, 1 small jar mayonnaise
• Non-Food – contact solution, shampoo, toothbrushes, washclothes

Hopefully by next month I will have added a LOT more to these shelves. I’m definitely going to have to rearrange them and better utilize the space. I also need to compile some sort of spreadsheet to keep track of what I have and what I still need. All in good time.