Food Storage Christmas
This Christmas our family gift is a years’ supply of food storage –and I’m thrilled to have it.
I decided I’ll also be giving the gift of food storage to my family and friends. No I’m not buying it (although I think a box or a bucket of wheat makes a tremendous gift idea), but I do offer my time as a resource in food planning and food packing. (For anyone who has canned their own food, you know this has potential to be a major time commitment.) The offer is good until next Christmas, but please give me a call right away so we can get you started today.
For those of you who are not my family and friends, I’d still like to help you with your food storage planning; basically determining what food items you’ll need and where you can buy them. I’ll point to a few resources in case you want to do it yourself, but please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or just need help getting started. I was relieved to have a great friend who talked me through it, and I’d like to pass the favor along.
For anyone who wants to get started on there own emergency food storage, you should check out he following resources:
StockUpFood.com is a free food storage calculator that helps you determine your emergency food planning needs based on family size and how much food storage you would like, whether you want enough for just 1-month or 2 years. StockUpFood.com also helps you track what food storage items you buy (and use) so you can keep a running total of what you need to purchase –plus it gives you a “percentage completed” to help you track progress toward your goal. Very cool –especially for people that want to ease their way into emergency food storage.
The LDS church also has some great resources their provident living website. By far the most useful resource there (for me) was an order form for the dry-packed food products, which are purchasable in bulk sized bags or by the can. It’s easy to fill out out (using the food storage calculator I linked to above), and you can just bring it along to at any Family Home Food Storage location. There you can buy the vast majority of your food storage in large bags, and you can get them at a pretty great price. And if you want your emergency food canned (for longer storage and easy rotation) you can dry-pack can it right on location and just take home the items you need. This is a lot of work, but if you’re doing canned food (instead of bags or buckets) it’s by far the most convenient way to go. You can also buy it pre-canned, (which is even more convenient) but you’ll end up paying more.
The Lindon LDS Family Home Food Storage is only open on Tuesdays and Thursday, but you’ll want to call to check availability in your location. They also lend dry-pack canning equipment out, in case you’ve already purchased food in bags but want it canned.
I should mention that many grocery stores (at least in Utah) have foods like dry wheat and beans by the bucket and the bag. Selection is fairly sparse, and buying a full years’ worth of food would take up several grocery carts; but it can be done. I bought a lot of bulk food stuff at Macey’s, a local grocery chain which has pretty good prices. I wish I’d held off on some of the bagged food I got there since I still want to dry-pack can most of it anyway, but the buckets are a great way to get a little at a time if you need to stretch out your food storage purchases over several paychecks. You can also get large water basins, wheat grinders, empty buckets, and other equipment there as well.
Lastly, if you live in Utah and are (or would like to become) an emergency preparedness junkie, check out UtahPreppers. It’s new, but judging by the people who run it, I think it will probably be a pretty great resource.
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Tags: Christmas, Dry-Pack Canning, Emergency Preparedness, Food Storage, LDS Church, Not For Profits, Provident Living, StockUpFood.com, Temporal Salvation, Utah, UtahPreppers
December 1st, 2008 at 7:25 am
If you’re interested, there are canned meats, canned cheese and canned butter available at http://www.internet-grocer.net/product.html
December 1st, 2008 at 10:39 am
I have recently become very interested in preparing for emergencies, so please continue sharing information on this topic. I am researching the best ways to get started with food storage.
December 1st, 2008 at 10:59 pm
This is a great idea. I’m passing the idea along.
Are you just going to focus on the staples, or going to help people sort through their three-month needs (what they actually eat) plus the longer-term needs?
For what it’s worth, I’ve shared some of my own three-month supply ideas (shopping and cooking ideas) here. I think sometimes people are so overwhelmed with the notion of having basics they rarely use (wheat, beans, powdered milk) that it’s good to start with the three-month supply and help them see that food storage doesn’t have to equal food that tastes (or that they think tastes) like cardboard. :)
December 1st, 2008 at 11:42 pm
Great idea. I’ve been toying with a few gift ideas like ingredients for food storage meals in a jar, or homemade jam with whole wheat bread, etc. But your idea teaches them to fish instead of just giving them some fish.
December 2nd, 2008 at 8:46 am
@ m&m
“Are you just going to focus on the staples, or going to help people sort through their three-month needs (what they actually eat) plus the longer-term needs?”
I’ll be focusing primarily on longer-term storage, but I also have an upcoming post on ideas for acquiring a 3-month supply as cheaply as possible.
December 2nd, 2008 at 12:58 pm
Hey! Great post. I work for http://www.shelfreliance.com and would be happy to work with you on group orders and pricing. I also have some great coupon codes that I could pass along. If you have not tried our food and are interested in a sample, send me an email with your address to rebeccasusannepickett@gmail.com
December 5th, 2008 at 1:31 pm
Rebecca,
I would love to try the food and use a coupon code. Please email me with more information.
tristan@witenko.com
Tristan
December 17th, 2008 at 5:05 pm
Hey Jordan,
Thanks for giving StockUpFood.com a shout out! I built it for my wife and I since trying to get 1 years supply of food seemed pretty overwhelming. I have noticed a very positive response since I launched it. Feel free to email me any suggestions you might have.
Thanks again!