Making a food storage has been difficult for me for two reasons:
1. We move a lot and I don't want to have to carry any more boxes.
2. I like clearing things out. Making sure we always have food does not allow me the satisfaction of looking in the pantry and seeing I have actually cooked something because it is empty.
This has been so frustrating to me and has left me many times with my head down on the desk, fighting tears, as I tried to figure out how to budget, what we wanted to eat, and how to rotate it. To me, a food storage has to consist of foods that do not need to be refrigerated or frozen. While researching, I learned that this was not true. But the last thing I want to do it buy a lot of food that we never eat. Also, because of the frequent moves, most of the things should not have to be refrigerated/frozen.
So here is the plan I came up with. A year supply was too much for me to fathom so right now I am doing a one-month supply. We will have ten basic dinners, six lunches, and three different breakfast meals. So that means that in the one month, we will be eating the same dinner three times, the same lunch five times, and the same breakfast 10 times. This could get boring. But at least we won't be starving. And we can mix up vegetables and sauces so it won't be exactly the same each time. It is a work in progress, but I finally started and that's more than I had done a few months ago.
Dinner:
1. Pasta - Spaghetti/Fettuccine, sauce, corn
2. Chicken Curry - Chicken, rice, curry
3. Soup - Dry soup, cans, rice
4. Canned chicken
5. Stir Fry - broccoli, water chestnuts, bell peppers, carrots
6. Baked Chicken and Spaghetti (Provident Living)
7. Sloppy joes, Pork and beans, canned fruit
8. Green bean casserole - Green beans, cream of mushroom soup, French fried onions
9. Black bean soup
10. Tuna casserole
Lunch:
1. Macaroni and cheese, using white sauce Magic Mix (Provident Living)
2. Sandwiches - bread (frozen), peanut butter, jelly, honey. Carrots and Ranch dressing.
3. Sandwiches - bread (frozen), tuna fish, pickles, mayonnaise
4. Chicken tacos
5. Ham and potato soup
6. Burritos - tortillas, refried beans, shredded cheese (frozen), salsa. Jello/pudding. Mexican rice.
Breakfast:
1. Muffins
2. Oatmeal with bacon
3. Granola
The fact that you are even organizing such a detailed food supply is incredible! You are good at being a grown up. I'm not sure if I'm ready for all that responsibility. I think I'm suddenly quite satisfied with only having to deal with the stress of school and work. I can't imagine having to feed two people in addition to all that.
ReplyDeleteYikes! Thanks for being so inspiring. Your organizational skills are commendable.
You are AWESOME, and this is such a good idea!! It's also hard for me to get together a year supply, mostly because I'm afraid that I'll have it, and then never use it, it'll go bad and then it's a waste of money. But good job with your monthly food supply, it's definitely a start. Thanks for sharing! (oh, and I noticed you could probably switch up some of the lunches with dinner and vice versa...not that there will be any real difference, other than the time of day, haha)
ReplyDeletegood job emily! this looks like a great plan. my food storage consists of buying a couple extra cans of veggies or box dinners when i go grocery shopping. i havent actually sat down and figured out a real menu, so this is inspiring!
ReplyDeleteBravo! Mine turn to get my food supply organized.
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