Why Do We Store Food and How Do We Start?
President Spencer W. Kimball gave us this counsel regarding home storage:
“We reaffirm the previous counsel the Church has always given, to acquire and maintain a year’s supply—a year’s supply of the basic commodities for us. …
“We encourage families to have on hand this year’s supply; and we say it over and over and over and repeat over and over the scripture of the Lord where He says, ‘Why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?’ [Luke 6:46]” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1976, 171; or Ensign, May 1976, 125).
Elder Ezra Taft Benson said:
“The Lord has warned us of famines, but the righteous will have listened to prophets and stored at least a year’s supply of survival food. …
“The revelation to store food may be as essential to our temporal salvation today as boarding the ark was to the people in the days of Noah. …
“I know that this welfare program is inspired of God. I have witnessed with my own eyes the ravages of hunger and destitution as, under the direction of the president of the Church, I spent a year in war-torn Europe at the close of World War II, without my family, distributing food, clothing, and bedding to our needy members. I have looked into the sunken eyes of Saints, in almost the last stages of starvation. I have seen faithful mothers carrying their children, three and four years of age, who were unable to walk because of malnutrition. … I have seen grown men weep as they ran their hands through the wheat and beans sent to them from … [the Saints in] America” (in Conference Report, Oct. 1973, 90–91, 93; or Ensign, Jan. 1974, 69, 81–82).
From “All Is Safely Gathered In-Food Storage”:
“Dear Brothers and Sisters:
Our Heavenly Father created this beautiful earth, with all its abundance, for our benefit and use. His purpose is to provide for our needs as we walk in faith and obedience. He has lovingly commanded us to "prepare every needful thing" (see D&C 109:8) so that, should adversity come, we may care for ourselves and our neighbors and support bishops as they care for others.
We encourage Church members worldwide to prepare for adversity in life by having a basic supply of food and water and some money in savings.
We ask that you be wise as you store food and water and build your savings. Do not go to extremes; it is not prudent, for example, to go into debt to establish your food storage all at once. With careful planning, you can, over time, establish a home storage supply and a financial reserve.
We realize that some of you may not have financial resources or space for such storage. Some of you may be prohibited by law from storing large amounts of food. We encourage you to store as much as circumstances allow.
May the Lord bless you in your home storage efforts.
The First Presidency” (Written 2007)
OK. We have had years and years of counsel on food storage and there is often a wondering of why we need to do it. I hope the above quotes help to show—it’s because we are commanded. That should be enough, but in my reading I found this paragraph from the Young Women’s Teaching Manual:
The counsel to have a year’s supply of food, clothing, and other necessary items is wise counsel for several reasons. A disaster such as a flood, an earthquake, or a snowstorm could hit a city or an entire region, cutting off roads and making it impossible for food and other items to be transported to the markets. Political unrest or strikes by truckers, shippers, or rail workers could interfere with the transport of foods. Other types of disasters, such as famine resulting from drought, hurricanes, floods, and even wars, have occurred in many countries and could occur again. When such disasters affect the entire community, food and other supplies often cannot be obtained, even if money is available. A family can also experience an emergency in the form of illness or unemployment that results in a lack of income, making it necessary to rely on home storage.
A lot of my reading pointed to modern examples of simply surviving a cut in pay or lay off. When the H1N1 virus came out I wondered if we would see pandemic protocols come into place where people are required (by law) to stay home for several weeks to avoid spread of illness.
All of these concerns should be enough reason to begin a food storage program.
My RS President I spoke of in my last blog gave some fun challenges. We always worried when she would call because who knew what we would be reporting on. Most often people were given a week’s challenge and this was it: We had to immediately stop going to the store and live off of what was in our homes. If we had to buy anything, we had to report it. The reports that came in were sometimes sobering, as people realized they had very little to make it through a week. Some were funny as families tried to make TP go as long as they could. It was all in a good spirit and we never judged and just tried to help each other recognize where the shortages were. Interestingly, the shortages were in the most basic places and easily fixed with the inspired plan the church has put in place for our benefit—“All Is Safely Gathered In” See: http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=fe813ba9c4fa1110VgnVCM100000176f620a____&vgnextoid=e1fa5f74db46c010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD
If you want to try…Go ahead and take one week (say when you read this blog) and begin your challenge week and see where your shortages are. Don’t go to the store unless it is necessary and then write down every item you had to go for in that time frame. This will help you see where the deficiencies are occurring and then you can make some plans to remedy the problem. The solutions are often simple. Most people ran out of milk and bread and other commodities such a TP and baby supplies. If any of the above mentioned scenarios were to hit, you would not want to be out of TP nor baby supplies and you will want to be able to utilize your peanut butter in the cupboard, so let’s have bread making ingredients on hand and some powdered milk.
How Do We Start?
Food storage becomes a daunting process when we take it on all at once. It’s not meant to be an all at once program. If you read the pamphlet, “All Is Safely Gathered In”, you find that the program is broken down into bite sized pieces (no pun intended, but if you laughed, then good, this is a happy program and something that should bring you peace of mind and some happiness as you work on it). The first step is an easy one:
Three Month Supply-
“Build a small supply of food that is part of your normal, daily diet. One way to do this is to purchase a few extra items each week to build a one-week supply of food. Then you can gradually increase your supply until it is sufficient for three months. These items should be rotated regularly to avoid spoilage.”
It’s been my experience that September is case lot time at our local and close by Utah stores. Check weekly ads to find out or call to find out the store’s next case lot sale date. Why case lots? This is the beauty of the 3 month plan: If you are normally paying $.80 a can for corn, then when it comes down to $.50 or less in the case goods, you can use your normal food budget and get more!
The first question is what do you eat? Our 80+ year old Grandma told us emphatically one time that she wanted her food supply full of Chef Boyardee Spaghetti and Meatballs! She meant it! Between that and her beloved Tropicana Twisters and Fiddle Faddle popcorn, she felt she could survive. I had a light bulb moment when she discussed her pantry ideas with all of us. She wanted what she loved to eat. I remembered the confession of one woman during her weekly challenge that they had survived the week with enough food, but they cheated and went out for a drive in burger because they couldn’t “take it anymore”.
Notice the counsel from the prophets—“…that is part of your normal daily diet…” So, when you do planning, don’t forget the things you eat for snack and delight too. Store in appropriate proportions those things that round out the 3 month supply as well. I knew a family that thought they would die without mini candy bars, so they took a 5 gallon bucket and bought up Halloween mini candy bars and stored this until Easter, when they stocked up again. I thought it was pretty funny!
So, what should a 3 month supply look like? Let me share what mine looked like in 2007:
Dry storage:
12 spaghetti sauces
**Italian seasoning
12 boxes spaghetti noodles
3 parmesan cheese bottles
24 cans of green beans (1 case of 24)
24 cans of tuna
3 jars of sweet pickle relish
3 jars of fat free miracle whip
24 cans of applesauce (1 case of 24)
24 cans of premium baked beans
12 bags of real bacon bits
**dehydrated onion
24 cans of spinach
12 boxes raspberry gelatin
24 boxes macaroni and cheese
12 boxes of macaroni noodles
12 large cans of diced tomatoes
12 cans of tomato paste
**basil
**salt
**pepper
48 cans of white chicken
24 cans of cream of chicken soup
**curry powder
3 large bags of rice
12 small bags of cranberries
12 small bags of slivered almonds
24 cans of black beans
12 cans of tomato sauce
36 cans of corn
6 taco seasoning packets
12 small bags of Fritos corn chips
24 canned hams
12 boxes of stuffing mix
12 large cans of yams
36 cans of chili
12 boxes lime gelatin
12 cans of pears
2 boxes pancake mix
2 bottles of syrup
24 cans fruit cocktail
24 boxes Spanish rice mix
12 cans of kidney beans
12 cans of sliced olives
**dehydrated peppers
3 large jars of peanut butter
3 large jars of jelly
12 large family sized cans of tomato soup
24 cans of cream of mushroom soup
4 boxes of Bisquick mix
12 cans peas and carrots
24 cans of mushrooms
**dehydrated onion
**parsley
24 boxes of Rice a Roni
**dehydrated eggs
12 boxes of crackers
3 boxes of brownie mix
3 boxes of yellow cake mix
24 jars of peaches
24 boxes of chocolate instant pudding
24 boxes of vanilla instant pudding
24 boxes corn bread mix
6 bottles of honey
12 boxes cream of wheat cereal
12 big boxes of whole rolled oats
**sugar
This is based off of saved menu plans from that time. We had each week:
Monday:
Hot cereal, milk and fresh fruit
Tuna salad sandwiches and carrot sticks
Spaghetti with meat sauce and green beans
Tuesday:
Oatmeal, milk and fresh fruit
Baked beans with spinach and berry fruited Jello
Fish filets, macaroni and cheese and frozen peas
Wednesday:
Hot cereal, milk and fresh fruit
Tomato noodle soup with grated cheese and stuffed celery sticks
Curry chicken over rice with toppings (cranberries, nuts, green onions, etc.)
Thursday:
Oatmeal, milk, fresh fruit
Taco Laco over corn chips with cheese, sour cream, cut tomatoes, lettuce, salsa
Sliced fried ham with stuffing, yams and frozen Brussels sprouts
Friday:
Hot cereal, milk and fresh fruit
Chili with fresh green onions (tops from the curry night) and cheese, lime Jello and pears
Pancakes, eggs, sausage and frozen berries and yogurt
Saturday:
Oatmeal, milk and fresh fruit
Spanish rice skillet topped with sour cream and cheddar cheese with corn bread
Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with leftover carrots and celery from other meals (date night)
Sunday:
Hot cereal, milk and fresh fruit
Chicken and biscuit casserole
Ham and egg fried rice with frozen Asian veggies stirred in
Sunday dessert (pick one of the 3: layered chocolate/vanilla parfaits, peach cobbler or brownies)
That was 2007’s menu and it’s a fairly decent one. It was one where I tried to come up with recipes where the main components were dry storage (meaning without refrigeration/freezing/fresh).
To this menu I would have had in the fridge, frozen or fresh (I have put the dry storage alternative there to consider if power outage was an issue):
Fresh milk (weekly bought) (put some dehydrated in the storage to compensate)
Sandwich bread (weekly bought) (put some ingredients in to make bread homemade)
Frozen hamburger (monthly--bought and cooked and frozen in 1 pound amounts) (bottle it instead or use dry TVP)
Garlic bread (weekly bought) (make from scratch dry ingredients)
Fresh fruit (compensate by storing extra canned fruits)
Frozen berries (compensate by storing some canned)
Frozen fish filets (consider more tuna)
Frozen mixed vegetables (can look for canned or bottled alternatives or freeze dried)
Carrot sticks (consider putting dehydrated and reconstituted in the tuna salad mix)
Celery sticks (consider putting dehydrated in the tomato noodle soup)
Green onions (consider using dehydrated white onions)
Frozen Brussels sprouts (consider using freeze dried broccoli instead)
Sausage patties (consider just omitting and going with dehydrated eggs or using sausage TVP)
Frozen Asian veggie mix (consider making a freeze dried alternative)
Butter (consider butter powder)
Sour cream (consider sour cream powder)
Cheddar cheese (consider cheese powder, parmesan, or canned cheese—yes they have this)
There is more, but you get the idea….
Have meals where most of the items can come from a dry storage. Get 12 week’s worth. If you say you don’t have room, read the blog on this site on storing in small spaces. I like to get a little more than 12 weeks in my rotational supply because it makes it so I have a month’s buffer to find sales. I like to store 16 weeks personally.
It’s perfectly fine and recommended to have the fresh, frozen and refrigerated augmentations to your meals. I am just trying to suggest alternatives that might be part of the long term storage that you could use if power were an issue. This was a basic “family of 4-6” menu plan based off of our 2007 menu. I share this 3 year old plan as it shows our starting point. It worked and while the meals repeated weekly, we did not skip out on dinners out for a date or making special fresh meals when we wanted. We just kept to the plan most of the time and if we wanted to, we put in something fresh and different for dinner. The whole plan is to have the food in storage and a plan should you need it. How much peace would it bring to know you have 3 months of food and a menu plan in place? Also, you can see that by having a plan, I could easily put together shopping lists and also go to case lot sales and buy exactly what I needed on a budget.
These ideas are meant to spur your own!!! (smile) They are representations of real life plans that we have used.
We have been commanded to store food. This is where we start—The Three Month Supply. It should be based on what you need for 3 months to make each of your meals. Make sure when you eat something up to replace it so you always have 12 weeks on hand.
Start making your menu plans, counting up cans, bottles, mixes, etc. and when the fall case lots arrive, go out and see what you can do! Remember to check dates and rotate. That’s the easy part—just shop, store, eat and repeat!
DJW
