Now, don't get me wrong, I think having a ample food storage is critical, especially when you have a family. I have a pretty good food storage myself. It is a work in progress, but it is coming along nicely. The problem I have is we almost never actually eat from our food storage. It just sits there until it expires and I toss it. Here are the hiccups in my situation:
- We hardly ever eat canned food.
Now I could pop open a can of green beans and warm them up. Nothing wrong with that. Of course, it would be wasteful with my little family. An open can of green beans is basically a can of green beans in the garbage. We just don't like the taste of most canned food. Now give me a plate of fresh green beans sauteed in olive oil and garlic...now we're talking. The gist? We are spoiled rotten in the dinner department.
- What do I use in my food storage? Canned tomatoes, different sorts of beans, pasta, oats, cereal, honey and sometimes canned fruit, but only if there is no other fruit in the house. Sometimes Lydia gets mac & cheese or chicken noodle soup, but usually we have dinner leftovers for lunch. The rest of my supply - just sits. Sad little mashed potato pellets. I just can't bring myself to make you when I have the real thing.
- I have "Recipe A.D.D".
The night before I grocery shop I grab a stack of cookbooks and start a list of things I want to make (based on the food that is already in the fridge and any great grocery deals advertised in the paper). This usually takes about an hour. Sometimes the meals are crazy easy like - Store bought rotisserie chicken with fresh veggies and bread. Sometimes they are a little more complex.
The pros with this current cooking technique-
- I find it very soothing. Chopping, grating and sauteing are great decompression techniques. Something about picking fresh basil out of my herb garden...total Zen.
- I am learning a new skill. - I have never been the person who had "a thing". You know, some people are known for their sewing, some for their singing, some for their PowerPoint presentations...whatever. I don't really have "a thing". 15 years down the road I would love for people to say.."Oh Natalie. Yeah, she is a really great cook". - Of course I am still deciding on what "my thing" should be. I would also like to be great at a dozen other things. Developing my cooking just fits nicely in my full-time mom career at the moment.
- It is a very healthy way to eat. - Even when I get little else done besides coloring with Lydia on the floor, I feel successful when I am feeding my family and myself a healthy dinner.
- It is expensive. All food is expensive now, but constantly buying new spices and ingredients can really put a dent in the wallet. We can't even buy store brands for the most part because it is only the expensive brands that seem to be peanut allergy friendly. Store brands- don't bother. (Not even store brand fruit snacks. Nope. Only the crazy pricey ones.)
- It is time consuming. This part I don't mind so much. I save 30 minutes of Lydia's TV time for cooking dinner. When that is over, usually she comes and helps me. However, I am about to have baby number two. Things are going to change.
- Food storage is really hard to plan. - Our church recommends at least a three month supply of food and basic necessities. (A year is the ideal). How do you plan that when you hardly ever make the same meal twice? More so, how do you do that when you don't cook from a pantry?
I really want to move towards cooking more efficiently without sacrificing taste or nutrition. I will post some updates as I get good ideas. I would LOVE suggestions, recipes and thoughts on how I can make this a win-win situation. By the way, I do have about a years worth of chocolate chips stock piled, so that is something.
Now I'm off to figure out what to make for dinner.....wish me luck!
21 PEOPLE HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY:
- Baby steps. Try a recipe that would contain maybe one food storage item, the whole dish doesn't have to be from storage. Dried beans are ideal, I know, "the bean", musical fruit, all that jazz, well some really yummy dishes can utilize beans and fresh ingredients. Give it a whirl. I have a similar predicament, except mine is the overwhelming amount of food we would have to store for a family with 7 children. How do you store a year supply of breakfast items when we go though at least 3 boxes of cereal a week! Nothing important ever comes easily. Good luck!
- Good luck. We, also, hardly eat anything canned. We use beans, tomatoes, pineapple, and my kids love mandarin oranges.
- I just started a blog that offerers step by step recipes with pictures. http://fourheutonscook.blogspot.com My Husband and I are big on food storage so I am a part pantry cook part fresh food cook. Kinda like Sandra Lee on Semi-Homemade..lol (yeah right not even close wish I could change the decor in my Kitchen every week!) I hope my recipes can at least give you a few extra things to make=)
- Thanks! I can't wait to check that out.
- I have a friend who LOVES her food storage plan. She uses the "brown bag" method and cooks a meal once a week from her food storage. She pre-bags each meal and then once a week, she heads to her food storage and just grabs a bag (the bag has everything from the spices to the toppings, already measured and the recipe is stapled on the bag) and she takes it upstairs and cooks it. Obviously some of the meals require meat which she gets from her extra freezer but everything else is in the bag. She loves this method because she actually uses the food and it gets rotated in a very organized manner. I don't think this will help you in your "fresh food" dilema but it's still a cool way to use your food storage. It definetly won't be the most delicious meal of the week but it helps to eliminate certain "food storage" meals that your family won't eat. Just thought I would pass it along because I thought it was a great idea.
- My husband & I actually eat from canned food all the time. Since it's cheaper than buying fresh produce all the time that may go bad before it gets used, it really works well for us. And I, like you, totally have recipe ADD. I'm constantly looking for new recipes, and while we have a few yummy staples we cook often, I'm always changing it up. one thing I do, though, is look for recipes that involved a lot of canned items. I find that making yummy casserole dishes or hearty soups in the slow cooker or delicious sauted/fried/simmered meals on the stove top (Indian food is my fave) with canned food really cooks out any of that metallicy "flavor". Or maybe I'm just not as sensitive to it, who knows! But that's what I find works for us. I guess my struggle is trying to use fresh veggies when I cook. The problem is that I often plan for a few weeks ahead of time, so I'll buy the fresh greens or peppers or whatever to use, but I usually have little idea when I'm actually going to cook it, so there's a chance it might go bad before I make it. Sorry - This is long. But I wish you luck! I also found that I absolutely loved cooking once I got married. :)
- Great post! I totally agree! I have been thinking about this "food storage' thing alot lately and how to get myself there with stuff that is actually beneficial to MY family. If I get any great ideas, I will drop you an email...and I will keep checking in to see if you have solved this great mystery!
- Hi Natalie! I follow your blog and I just recently found this site A Year of CrockPotting. It's not really food storage, but this lady used her crock pot everyday for a year. She has some pretty interesting dishes and I thought this could help you out a lot with time since the new baby is coming soon. I hope this helps you. God Bless, Monique
- No suggestions for me because this is NOT my area of expertise! I think you're already a fabulous chef, baker, pastry chef...you name it...you can do it. Me! Ha! Not so much!
- I have to teach a similar class at our Enrichment - but not until June - maybe I should get in touch with the person who taught yours. In answer to your predicament though - if your income was to change drastically, you'd eat canned veggies and fruit. So stocking up on those when they're on sale is not a bad thing to do and can be very affordable. I don't know how in depth your class got about couponing (I get only 30 minutes to share everything I know - NOT) You can use couponing to make those expensive items that you don't have coupons for free or close to it. Case in point: a store I shop at frequently is running a ConAgra catalina promotion right now. ConAgra makes things like Hunts canned tomatoes, Healthy Choice soup, Act II popcorn etc. A catalina (those coupons that print at the end of your order) promotion is where you spend $X and get a coupon for $Y on your next order. The numbers for this promotion are spend $25 get $10 back. The promotion works off of the regular price of the products but the products are on sale. The Act II popcorn is normally $3.28 but on sale for $1. So buying 8 of them gets you over the $25 requirement (but you've only spent $8) and then you get $10 back - you can then use that $10 coupon to go buy another 8 boxes and $2 worth of ANYTHING else, like fresh lemons, zucchini, spices, etc. And on and on. It does take time, I won't deny that and what did I do with the over 100 boxes of popcorn I bought? Kept what I think we will use before the expiration date (5 kids at home), shared them with friends and then donated them to the food pantry. We also found a deal (the coupon stars were aligned magically for this one) where for the mere cost of $.03 for 3 boxes of Jello, you were able to get a $2 coupon. We took FULL advantage of that and purchased over 1000 boxes of Jell-O (yes most of it went to food pantries) but we had over $500 in coupons (for about $12.00 out of our pockets) to spend on whatever we wanted - the store even has a gas station and we filled our cars 3 times. Deals like this last one come around very infrequently but types like the popcorn one happen every few months - so take advantage of them if you can. Sorry this is so long . . . .
- ♥ Luckily the cans last so long or we'd have a lot of waste too. I do better with frozen veggies and stuff during winter than the canned ones... I wished I "LOVED" to cook. I seriously hate it and only do it cause I have too. That's not to say that I want to cook nasty food though so it does have to be a good recipe or I won't even go there. If I didn't have to feel my kids and husband I'd have cereal every night! :)
- I am a couponer. Last week I bought 4 bottles of olive oil for $9 with coupons. I got 6 bottles of Olay ribbons bath wash for $6 dollars- with coupons. I bought 6 packages of pampers diapers for $3.00 a package with coupons I agree with the whole canned food thing- I don't personally like green beans from a can- but I just learn to incoroporate them slowly into recipes and not every day- because I feel in the end it is more important to have a 3 month supply- canned green beans is better than no green beans-...plus you should ask Emily for her green bean recipe- with swiss, ranch and cream cheese- oh so good. plus last stake conference- the seventy who spoke said we should never store something we don't normally eat- so there you go. I have a produce budget separate from my food budget. I am super healthy and I eat fresh vegetables all the time- so I usually spend $60 bucks a month on Costco produce- Last night I went to the cannery and it was amazing- I really got the spirit of food storage last night- and the church is really really serious about it- so I figure I should too. It is a struggle though- I totally know what you mean. Do you make your speghetti sauce homemade too?
- You would probably have a heart attack if you saw my pantry. Its stocked to the gills! I could probably go 6-9 months without major grocery shopping if I had to. I love it!!! We stock up on deals...when boneless skinless chicken breast is on sale we will buy 50 pounds of it. Crazy huh!But now when I go shopping I spend an average about 150-200 a month on a family of 5!
- So, on the couponing tip, have you checked out thegrocerygame.com? We've seriously cut our grocery bill in half. I'm a fan.
- Instead of stocking the pantry with canned goods, can you make meals with fresh ingredients and then freeze them? You could stock your freezer (perfect if you have a deep freeze). Instead of buying canned fruit, buy extra fresh fruit when it's in season/on sale and then freeze it. When you make a meal, make double and freeze half for a future meal. Good luck!
- Our family eats mostly fresh as well. The thing that I have found that works for me, is only getting the food storage I use. I buy organic wheat in bulk, honey, evaporated cane sugar, and beans. Other than that, I keep a 3 month supply of any boxed or canned items, so that if I need them I have them. I am following the counsel of the prophets, but making it work for my family.
- Great Post! I love everyone's idea's including yours. I cook with everything so I guess I don't have those problems but I love the idea of cooking a big meal and freezing half of it. We do that a lot with Spaghetti Sauce. I just think we would be in a lot of trouble if the electricity went out for a long period of time. Do you do any canning of your own? I know it is a lost art and one that I haven't attempted much, but just a thought.
- Wow! I just discovered your blog and I feel like I'm in heaven (with a long lost twin!)! Your sidebar with all the things you're "currently" doing is like a snapshot of my life! We also make the marshmallow pops (for nearly every holiay), LOVE 30 Rock and my KitchenAid mixer, and the list just goes on and on! Thanks for taking such time with your blog- I'll be back!
- Sounds like the counsel we get to have a garden is more suited to your family's eating style...My family won't eat canned veggies or fruits either. We need to get a generator to keep our freezer going without power. I use a lot of frozen foods. By the way, your blog is so fun and creative!
- Count me in as a fellow sufferer of Recipe ADD. I also can't seem to eat leftovers -- I think that just makes me a snob. Anyway, one thing I've found that helps is to make two batches and freeze one. This year, we're getting a share of community supported agriculture (CSA) so we can have our own basket of produce delivered each week. It'll bring a new challenge to my weekly recipe hunt as I have to figure out how to use the things in that week's basket!
- so how's the couponing going? Have you tried out thegrocerygame.com?
21 comments:
Baby steps. Try a recipe that would contain maybe one food storage item, the whole dish doesn't have to be from storage. Dried beans are ideal, I know, "the bean", musical fruit, all that jazz, well some really yummy dishes can utilize beans and fresh ingredients. Give it a whirl.
I have a similar predicament, except mine is the overwhelming amount of food we would have to store for a family with 7 children. How do you store a year supply of breakfast items when we go though at least 3 boxes of cereal a week! Nothing important ever comes easily. Good luck!
Good luck. We, also, hardly eat anything canned. We use beans, tomatoes, pineapple, and my kids love mandarin oranges.
I just started a blog that offerers step by step recipes with pictures.
http://fourheutonscook.blogspot.com
My Husband and I are big on food storage so I am a part pantry cook part fresh food cook. Kinda like Sandra Lee on Semi-Homemade..lol (yeah right not even close wish I could change the decor in my Kitchen every week!)
I hope my recipes can at least give you a few extra things to make=)
Thanks! I can't wait to check that out.
I have a friend who LOVES her food storage plan. She uses the "brown bag" method and cooks a meal once a week from her food storage. She pre-bags each meal and then once a week, she heads to her food storage and just grabs a bag (the bag has everything from the spices to the toppings, already measured and the recipe is stapled on the bag) and she takes it upstairs and cooks it. Obviously some of the meals require meat which she gets from her extra freezer but everything else is in the bag. She loves this method because she actually uses the food and it gets rotated in a very organized manner. I don't think this will help you in your "fresh food" dilema but it's still a cool way to use your food storage. It definetly won't be the most delicious meal of the week but it helps to eliminate certain "food storage" meals that your family won't eat. Just thought I would pass it along because I thought it was a great idea.
My husband & I actually eat from canned food all the time. Since it's cheaper than buying fresh produce all the time that may go bad before it gets used, it really works well for us. And I, like you, totally have recipe ADD. I'm constantly looking for new recipes, and while we have a few yummy staples we cook often, I'm always changing it up.
one thing I do, though, is look for recipes that involved a lot of canned items. I find that making yummy casserole dishes or hearty soups in the slow cooker or delicious sauted/fried/simmered meals on the stove top (Indian food is my fave) with canned food really cooks out any of that metallicy "flavor". Or maybe I'm just not as sensitive to it, who knows! But that's what I find works for us.
I guess my struggle is trying to use fresh veggies when I cook. The problem is that I often plan for a few weeks ahead of time, so I'll buy the fresh greens or peppers or whatever to use, but I usually have little idea when I'm actually going to cook it, so there's a chance it might go bad before I make it.
Sorry - This is long. But I wish you luck! I also found that I absolutely loved cooking once I got married. :)
Great post! I totally agree! I have been thinking about this "food storage' thing alot lately and how to get myself there with stuff that is actually beneficial to MY family. If I get any great ideas, I will drop you an email...and I will keep checking in to see if you have solved this great mystery!
Hi Natalie! I follow your blog and I just recently found this site A Year of CrockPotting. It's not really food storage, but this lady used her crock pot everyday for a year. She has some pretty interesting dishes and I thought this could help you out a lot with time since the new baby is coming soon. I hope this helps you.
God Bless,
Monique
No suggestions for me because this is NOT my area of expertise! I think you're already a fabulous chef, baker, pastry chef...you name it...you can do it. Me! Ha! Not so much!
I have to teach a similar class at our Enrichment - but not until June - maybe I should get in touch with the person who taught yours. In answer to your predicament though - if your income was to change drastically, you'd eat canned veggies and fruit. So stocking up on those when they're on sale is not a bad thing to do and can be very affordable. I don't know how in depth your class got about couponing (I get only 30 minutes to share everything I know - NOT) You can use couponing to make those expensive items that you don't have coupons for free or close to it. Case in point: a store I shop at frequently is running a ConAgra catalina promotion right now. ConAgra makes things like Hunts canned tomatoes, Healthy Choice soup, Act II popcorn etc. A catalina (those coupons that print at the end of your order) promotion is where you spend $X and get a coupon for $Y on your next order. The numbers for this promotion are spend $25 get $10 back. The promotion works off of the regular price of the products but the products are on sale. The Act II popcorn is normally $3.28 but on sale for $1. So buying 8 of them gets you over the $25 requirement (but you've only spent $8) and then you get $10 back - you can then use that $10 coupon to go buy another 8 boxes and $2 worth of ANYTHING else, like fresh lemons, zucchini, spices, etc. And on and on. It does take time, I won't deny that and what did I do with the over 100 boxes of popcorn I bought? Kept what I think we will use before the expiration date (5 kids at home), shared them with friends and then donated them to the food pantry. We also found a deal (the coupon stars were aligned magically for this one) where for the mere cost of $.03 for 3 boxes of Jello, you were able to get a $2 coupon. We took FULL advantage of that and purchased over 1000 boxes of Jell-O (yes most of it went to food pantries) but we had over $500 in coupons (for about $12.00 out of our pockets) to spend on whatever we wanted - the store even has a gas station and we filled our cars 3 times. Deals like this last one come around very infrequently but types like the popcorn one happen every few months - so take advantage of them if you can. Sorry this is so long . . . .
♥ Luckily the cans last so long or we'd have a lot of waste too. I do better with frozen veggies and stuff during winter than the canned ones... I wished I "LOVED" to cook. I seriously hate it and only do it cause I have too. That's not to say that I want to cook nasty food though so it does have to be a good recipe or I won't even go there. If I didn't have to feel my kids and husband I'd have cereal every night! :)
I am a couponer.
Last week I bought 4 bottles of olive oil for $9 with coupons.
I got 6 bottles of Olay ribbons bath wash for $6 dollars- with coupons.
I bought 6 packages of pampers diapers for $3.00 a package with coupons
I agree with the whole canned food thing- I don't personally like green beans from a can- but I just learn to incoroporate them slowly into recipes and not every day- because I feel in the end it is more important to have a 3 month supply- canned green beans is better than no green beans-...plus you should ask Emily for her green bean recipe- with swiss, ranch and cream cheese- oh so good.
plus last stake conference- the seventy who spoke said we should never store something we don't normally eat- so there you go.
I have a produce budget separate from my food budget. I am super healthy and I eat fresh vegetables all the time- so I usually spend $60 bucks a month on Costco produce-
Last night I went to the cannery and it was amazing- I really got the spirit of food storage last night- and the church is really really serious about it- so I figure I should too.
It is a struggle though- I totally know what you mean.
Do you make your speghetti sauce homemade too?
You would probably have a heart attack if you saw my pantry. Its stocked to the gills! I could probably go 6-9 months without major grocery shopping if I had to. I love it!!! We stock up on deals...when boneless skinless chicken breast is on sale we will buy 50 pounds of it. Crazy huh!But now when I go shopping I spend an average about 150-200 a month on a family of 5!
So, on the couponing tip, have you checked out thegrocerygame.com? We've seriously cut our grocery bill in half. I'm a fan.
Instead of stocking the pantry with canned goods, can you make meals with fresh ingredients and then freeze them? You could stock your freezer (perfect if you have a deep freeze). Instead of buying canned fruit, buy extra fresh fruit when it's in season/on sale and then freeze it. When you make a meal, make double and freeze half for a future meal. Good luck!
Our family eats mostly fresh as well. The thing that I have found that works for me, is only getting the food storage I use. I buy organic wheat in bulk, honey, evaporated cane sugar, and beans. Other than that, I keep a 3 month supply of any boxed or canned items, so that if I need them I have them. I am following the counsel of the prophets, but making it work for my family.
Great Post! I love everyone's idea's including yours. I cook with everything so I guess I don't have those problems but I love the idea of cooking a big meal and freezing half of it. We do that a lot with Spaghetti Sauce. I just think we would be in a lot of trouble if the electricity went out for a long period of time.
Do you do any canning of your own? I know it is a lost art and one that I haven't attempted much, but just a thought.
Wow! I just discovered your blog and I feel like I'm in heaven (with a long lost twin!)! Your sidebar with all the things you're "currently" doing is like a snapshot of my life! We also make the marshmallow pops (for nearly every holiay), LOVE 30 Rock and my KitchenAid mixer, and the list just goes on and on! Thanks for taking such time with your blog- I'll be back!
Sounds like the counsel we get to have a garden is more suited to your family's eating style...My family won't eat canned veggies or fruits either. We need to get a generator to keep our freezer going without power. I use a lot of frozen foods. By the way, your blog is so fun and creative!
Count me in as a fellow sufferer of Recipe ADD. I also can't seem to eat leftovers -- I think that just makes me a snob. Anyway, one thing I've found that helps is to make two batches and freeze one. This year, we're getting a share of community supported agriculture (CSA) so we can have our own basket of produce delivered each week. It'll bring a new challenge to my weekly recipe hunt as I have to figure out how to use the things in that week's basket!
so how's the couponing going? Have you tried out thegrocerygame.com?
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