One aspect of Emergency Preparedness that is becoming more widespread lately is the concept of building up a food storage.Some people feel like it is necessary to store an entire year supply of food, while others feel comfortable just having a few weeks of food on hand!Getting an entire year supply of feel can feel so overwhelming. What do you store? How much of it? How the heck do you use wheat? Where are these things available for sale? And how do you find room to store it all? When you are just getting started some or all of these questions may come to mind. I split the process into ten simple BabySteps which you can attack one at a time, thus making it feel less overwhelming.
Getting Started: Put together Disaster Kits (including 72 hour kit food kits) for your whole family, have an emergency plan in place, make sure your computer is backed up, and organize your space to ensure you have a large, clean storage area.
Step 1: Determine which type of shelf system you want to use and purchase one shelf to get started. There are many food storage shelf options randing from building your own, buying some cheap shelves at Walmart, or splurging for a fancy can rotation system.
Step 2: Store a 2 week’s supply of water (1 gallon per person per day). You can buy 55 gallon barrels, get several 5-6 gallon jugs, or fill up empty soda/juice bottles. You just need to double-check that the containers are made of food grade plastic, and just a little hint, milk jugs don’t work!
Step 3: Purchase a three month supply of foods you normally eat. Some people like to stock up on things they use frequently, but others are more detail oriented and make meal plans for the full three months. Some people recommend storing more than 90 days worth of food so that as you use your foods you aren’t depleting your three month supply.
Step 4: Educate yourself on long term food storage and determine the types of foods, recipes, etc. your family will want to eat. Online calculators or spreadsheets can be helpful when trying to figure out the amount of food you should store for a one year food supply. (You can start with as little as a one month supply of everything, and gradually move up to one year). Start compiling food storage recipes to use in your everyday cooking.
Step 5: Purchase your grains and learn how to use them: wheat, corn, barley, rice, pasta, etc. You may want to consider getting a wheat grinder to help use your grains in more foods.
Step 6: Purchase your legumes and learn how to use them: dried beans, bean soup mixes, lentils, soy beans, etc.
Step 7: Purchase items necessary for baking such as oil, sugar, powdered milk, salt, etc.
Step 8: Purchase or preserve fruits and vegetables to supplement your core foods.
Step 9: Purchase any comfort foods that would be pleasant to have should you be forced to live off your food storage for a long time. This could be anything that makes you feel good or flavors your food such as jello, salsa, spices, etc.
Step 10: Purchase non-food item necessities such as toothpaste, deodorant, female products, diapers, etc. Also, disposable dishes, utensils, etc. can really help to conserve your water for drinking purposely only.
Beyond the BabySteps: Once you have finished these steps you can move on to more complex survival issues such as heat/cooking sources, long term water solutions, growing and canning your own foods, etc.
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