Monthly Focus: Family Home Storage

This month we are looking at Family Home Storage, a.k.a Food Storage. The reason I use the newer moniker for this is, that Food Storage is misleading. Your Family Home Storage needs to include much more than just food.

Currently the advice is to have at least 3 MONTHS of storage in your home, but it is recommended that you have a year's supply. That sounds like a lot, especially if you have even a medium sized family.

There are ways to help you get started. There are a variety of plans and programs that will guide you on what to buy and when to buy it. Below are links to a few of these plans.

Noah's Ark Program

Storage Calendar

Project Noah

It wasn't raining when Noah built the ark booklet

Monthly Food Storage Plan - The Ark Project

You can also create your own plan. Base your plan on resources available in your area and your shopping habits. Here are some other suggestions on how to build up your food storage.

• Make use of bulk sales at your local store, or consider buying in bulk from a warehouse store in your area.
• Take advantage of good sales and deals at your local store. Check ads and the shelves to find some bargains. Tuna 10 cans for a $1.00, stock up!
• Add an extra item to your normal list. Need to get a can of peaches this week for dinner? Add an extra one to the cart.
• Consider setting aside a portion of your grocery budget every week to go to family home storage. Then you can get items you need without worrying too much about the extra cost.
• Use coupons. This will help defray the cost. Also if you have coupon that is money off two or more items (say a $1.00 off 2 boxes of cereal), consider putting that second item in your storage.
  

While you will need a plan or approach to family home storage, it is important to know what you should be including in it. Here are some of the basic groups that you should include. This is by no means definitive. Be sure that you have considered any special needs in your family, special conditions in your area, or availability. Also be sure to be storing items that you will USE! I've tried to include a variety of options for categories, but know what your family will eat. We don't want this stuff to go to waste.

Food

• Fruits- Canned fruit, dehydrated fruit (raisins, berries, etc), fruit leather (I personally recommend Stretch Island Fruit Leather), applesauce, fruit juices.
• Vegetables- Canned vegetables, dehydrated vegetables, possibly frozen vegetables
• Protein- canned meat (tuna, chicken, ham), dehydrated meat (beef jerkey), package meat (bacon bits, luncheon meats), nuts, peanut butter, beans (pinto, black, red, lima, kidney), dehydrated eggs
• Dairy- Shelf milk (boxed liquid milk with a long shelf life), powdered milk, canned milk, dried/dehydrated cheese
  
• Starches- crackers, pasta, bread mixes, pancake mix
• Sugars- granulated sugar, powdered sugar, brown sugar (be careful on how you store this), corn syrup
• Grains- flour, wheat, rice, barley
• Oils and Fats- shortening, cooking oil, mayonnaise, olive oil
• Baking supplies- baking soda, salt, baking powder, baking mixes (consider ones that only require water)
• Liquids- WATER!!!!, juice, soda
• Other- condiments (ketsup, etc), drink mix, high energy foods (nutritional substitutes, granola bars), spices
  
• "luxuries"- candies, marshmallows, alcohol, chocolate
• VITAMINS! - You should have a multivitamin available (or individual vitamins if you cannot consume a multivitamin) which is appropriate for each age group. Sustained use of "life sustaining" supplies may not be providing all of your nutritional needs. Having a multivitamin will help to ensure that you stay healthy.
  

Water - This is a difficult one to store in large enough quantities. You should have at least 72 hours worth of water (that is one gallon PER PERSON PER DAY!).

Paper Goods- In the event of an emergency, you may not have adequate facilities to wash and sanitize eating utensils. Consider having some paper bowls, plates, disposable cups, plastic cutlery, paper towels, paper napkins, and disposable pots/pans.

Hygiene Items- Shampoo, conditioner, soap, deodorant

Personal Care- Tampons, maxi pads

Medical- bandages, rubbing alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, antibiotic ointment, tylenol (or other anti-inflamatory drug), antacids, decongestant

Baby- diapers, wipes, formula, canned baby food (can be eaten by adults and children as well)


It is important to store these items well, but it doesn't mean you have to store them in a little room. Be creative with your storage. Here are some of the places people told me that they stored items:

• under couches
• under beds
• closet shelves
• basements
• storage rooms
• storage sheds
• kitchen cabinets
• books shelves
• under misc. furniture

Another suggestion for Family Home storage is to know how to use it. It may be useful to practice making meals with the items you have in storage. There is nothing worse than having food and not knowing what to do with it. Also consider storing a book of recipes that include ingredients you have. You can buy recipe books, or you can make your own using a 3-ring binder and recipes you find.

It is also important to have a way to cook items in an emergency (assuming you are either on the go or the electricity is out). Consider having a small camping or backpacking stove available (remember to use them only in well ventilate areas), or if you have a barbeque grill, have fuel supplies stored for it. If you have a fireplace or wood burning stove, you can also consider storing cast iron cook ware.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints offers recipe books and a Family Home Storage Starter Kit through their distribution services. There are also many other sites that offer a variety of preserved, freeze dried, canned, or bagged food items for this purpose (just Google food storage to find some of them).

If you add a little at a time, it really will build up. This isn't a "quick" fix, so don't get discouraged if you cannot get your food storage all ready to go in one day. Keep trying!

Also remember to rotate items, first in, first out. You don't want items to go to waste. Also remember the "expiration dates" on most items are merely a recommendation. Do what you are comfortable with, but keep in mind if that can of green beans expired last week, they are probably still okay.

Please review the resources available, talk to friends and family, make your plan, and get started today!