Summer's Over - Are you ready for Winter??

After a summer of play, cooler temperatures and evenings filled with homework rather than family activities turns my thoughts to preperation for the cold winter months. Most years I toss a few things into the freezer and buy a few more canned goods at the store, without much thought to their use.

This year, not only have I been reading a few preparedness websites and blogs, but I've also noticed some of the things I tossed in the freezer last year are still in there. Things are looking a little freezer burned and unappetizing. I realize that stocking up without a plan only results in loss - lost food and lost money.

My goal for this year is to create my food storage and stockpile plan to get the maximum use out of it - not wasted efforts. I'm starting by cleaning out and inventorying my freezer. That way I can work the items that have been hiding in the back into my weekly meal plans before they go to waste as well. This will keep me from duplicate buying at the store as well.

After I inventory the fridge freezer and the chest freezer, I'll clear out and organize the pantry, keeping a close eye on expiration dates and using things when they are still fresh and tasty. Then adding items to round out our storage should help us keep our grocery budget steady and our family prepared.

Some blogs I've relied on for stockpile info have been:

Food Storage Made Easy: great info on getting your storage started - they also are a part of a blog network with more great information on cooking with food storage and buying food storage.

Safely Gathered In: great recipes from food storage as well as basic cooking skills

iPrepared: great posts on storage details

Why Stockpile?

Food storage can be a marvelous asset when money is short, especially if the money that is available needs to be spent on other things. When a shortfall in your budget keeps your grocery list short, a healthy food stockpile in your home rounds out the meal plan nicely. Hardships are much easier to bear knowing that food will continue to be on the table.

Sharon at Casaubon's Book has recently started an online course on beginning food storage. The article "Eating out of your pantry" details what would be stored for a three month supply for 4 people, and is a great place to start. So far, I've been purchasing an extra can or box of a few things on my grocery list as a haphazard beginning food stockpile, but Sharon gives me an idea of quantities to shoot for, additional foods I should be stockpiling and suggesting recipes for those foods.

This weekend we cleaned out half of our garage, throwing out some useless junk that's been cluttering up our lives. We used the extra room to set up some metal shelves that will be the basis for our bulk food storage. Our small stockpile is being kept in our pantry, but with this extra room we can store bulky items like buckets of grains and beans. This keeps our pantry from becoming too cluttered to use effectively.

I plan on visiting our neighborhood food coop to see what they have available and if larger quantities can be ordered. Sharon plans on posting weekly on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, so I encourage you to check it out.

Grocery List - Part 2

So if I have all the items off my $10 Grocery List in my pantry or refrigerator, what would I buy withy $10? Instead of doing another $10 list, I'll just list a few things, in order of preference, that might make the cut.

Milk - 1/2 gal $2.24 - Milk didn't make my original list because it cut out too many other things at the price and milk by itself isn't going to fill our tummies. Also, I didn't figure a week's worth of calcium deprivation would affect us too much. But having it would expand our options to include more breads, gravies, and a variety of cooked foods. I also tend to have a box of dry milk in my pantry to use in cooking but we wouldn't drink it unless straights were dire.

Tuna - 52 cents a 6 oz. can - Great source of protein in a cheap package. Strangely enough, I was looking at some of the larger cans (12 oz) and wondered if they'd be a better deal -- they weren't ($1.12). Always check unit pricing to make sure you're getting a good deal.

Veggies - 50 cents - I noticed cans of green beans and frozen packages of broccoli at the store for 50 cents each. If I had some extra room in the budget, I'd definitely add more veggies to the basic menu.

Fruit - varies approx $1.00 - either bananas at 44 cents/pound or canned pineapple at 99 cents/can, I'd add fruit for the sweetness and the variety of baked goods that could be made.

Hamburger - $2.08/pound - This price fluctuates on a weekly basis it seems, but that's about average for my area (this is not the leanest hamburger). There is also something called 'skillet mix' sold in chubs like hamburger for $1.38/pound, but I would not recommend it after reading the ingredient list. ICK!

Yeast - 89 cents for 3 pack - I normally buy yeast in bulk at Costco, but if I were out and times were tight, this would provide us with good, healthy bread at cheaper than grocery store prices.

Pasta - varies - Don't forget to check out other areas in the store when buying staples such as pasta. I noticed pasta in the pasta aisle averaged 6 cents per ounce while pasta being sold in the ethnic section averaged 4 cents per ounce. It might be worth it to do a taste comparison if your family eats a lot of pasta.

Bacon - $2.50/pound - I'd like to add bacon to my menu for flavoring bean dishes, adding it to gravies, and rounding out a breakfast of eggs.

Almost everything in today's list and my original list keeps well, with the exception of fresh fruits and veggies. I like to keep a list of my basic ingredients I cook with and when something on that list goes on sale, I stock up. This is also where a price book comes in handy, to keep track of when a sale price is an exceptionally good deal, or merely an average one.

What's in your pantry or must have list that would be good to stockpile?