Stocking up cont'd--how much space does a year's worth of food take up??

[hisenthlay]

Just curious. I probably keep 2-3 months of food on hand for the 2 of us, and 6 weeks of food on hand for the dogs (80 lbs), but that takes very little space, and happens naturally because we buy mostly in bulk (we play games, like, how long will it take 2 people to get through 5 lbs of walnuts, 10 lbs of raisins, 10 lbs sugar, 10 lbs coffee beans, 10 lbs oats, 20 lbs pasta, 20 lbs flour, 20 lbs rice, etc., etc. ). All of that fills our kitchen cupboards and a small pantry, a big fridge/freezer, and an extra 7.2 cu.ft. freezer in the basement. I don't know how to estimate the footage of those, but it might fill about three 5' tall bookshelves. Maybe 70 cu. ft.??

We could make more use of our big basement, but it gets pretty damp in wet weather, even with a dehumidifier running, so I'd have to really seal everything I wanted to keep down there very well.

Anyway, it seems like stocking up for a year for a family of 4 or more would take up a ton of space. I know you don't all have enormous houses, so where are you putting it all??

[Fire-Man]

Originally Posted by hisenthlay

Just curious. I probably keep 2-3 months of food on hand for the 2 of us, and 6 weeks of food on hand for the dogs (80 lbs), but that takes very little space, and happens naturally because we buy mostly in bulk (we play games, like, how long will it take 2 people to get through 5 lbs of walnuts, 10 lbs of raisins, 10 lbs sugar, 10 lbs coffee beans, 10 lbs oats, 20 lbs pasta, 20 lbs flour, 20 lbs rice, etc., etc. ). All of that fills our kitchen cupboards and a small pantry, a big fridge/freezer, and an extra 7.2 cu.ft. freezer in the basement. I don't know how to estimate the footage of those, but it might fill about three 5' tall bookshelves. Maybe 70 cu. ft.??

We could make more use of our big basement, but it gets pretty damp in wet weather, even with a dehumidifier running, so I'd have to really seal everything I wanted to keep down there very well.

Anyway, it seems like stocking up for a year for a family of 4 or more would take up a ton of space. I know you don't all have enormous houses, so where are you putting it all??

I wouldn't store anything in the basement if it is damp alot of the time----Maybe someone here has a way to get around the dampness. I don't know if you can---or have thought of this-------But you can store app 450 15 to 16 oz cans under one standard size bed---Even 1 gallon can's fit under most beds. In the bottom of the closets you can put alot of things--------You can stack Alot of things that are in can's beside a wall/in a corner and hang a drape over the front of them so you can't see the can's, if you will stack a layer of can's then put a thin board on top of them---then stack another layer and another board----then you could ease a can out of the stack as you need them, then restack the can's as needed. You can use alot of large decorated tins to put flour, sugar, etc in and sit them right in the living room or where ever. So it does not take alot of room-----just look---around and you will find a lot of places to put things, But having everything in one room----would ne nice!!. Randy

[norris]

You could also get some mylar bags, the kind you seal with an iron, and put an oxygen absorber in it before you seal it, them put it in a 6 gallon pail with a sealing lid. You can buy the pails for $2 used, get food grade buckets.

For short term (under one year) you could simply put the food in the pails with a dessicant pack and they should be OK. Rats CAN chew through those buckets though.

There is much information about food storage on the Waltons Feed site.

[mamakatinmd]

We have a utility room that the oil tank and central air conditioner are in. It is a basement room and is about 13' x 9'. The temperature stays somewhat cool and pretty steady all year round. We have shelves completely lining one 13' wall. Canned goods, personal care items, paper goods, salt, dry milk, well sealed items go on shelves.I keep plastic storage bins in there stacked also to hold sugar, flour, rice, beans, and such. These items I bought in bulk, filled smaller gallon size bags, then stack in the bins. The bins that do not seal as well I use bungee cords on. The mice cannot get under the lids with the bungees on. (so far anyway) . I have a pantry that is in my kitchen that I stock with stuff from my basement "store". If I was not lucky enough to have this storage space, under the beds is a great idea.

[Bluecreekrog]

Grandma stored (home) canned goods under the upstairs beds. Meat in the smokehouse or springhouse. She also had a pantry in the kitchen. She had to store a lot of food with 4 kids.

[kitaye]

I haven't been able to find the photo again but Permapak showed the amount of food required for 1 yr, 4 adults, to take up about as much space as one of the double size home refrigerators. Mind you that is using their supplies which are packaged to save space.

[cpeyus]

We're the family of 4 you asked about. Granted, right now we don't have the full year supply that we like (because we made a serious dent in it this year), but we've found ways to organize it so it works. Ours is spread out, just a little, tho. Like mamakatinmd, we "shop from the basement" or the garage. I have my kitchen cupboards & one of those "build your own" type cupboards stocked; when that gets low, we go to the basement. We haven't yet had to store anything in closets or under beds. We have 2-30 gal plastic "drums" of water in the corner of the garage; as well as the large upright freezer. MANY bleach bottles of water, and a couple cases of STOREBOUGHT water (generally against my better judgment, but for emergencies...) in the basement. I'm picking up 6-55 gal drums (food grade) this weekend & we'll probably use 3 of them for catching rainwater, then they'll stay in the garage. The other 3 will be for my HEAVY USE ITEMS...wheat, rice, sugar. When I get more, I'll use 'em for water & whatever else. I know people who have a large trash can full of stuff in their living room - with a piece of wood on top & a table cloth & a lamp, it becomes a functional decoration.
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Have you guys seen the movie "Blast from the Past"? I would love to have my basement storage look like theirs in the bomb shelter!!!!

[Quint]

I don't use it for my bed anymore but I have a bed frame that I built from wood that is designed for storage. It is a solid wooden storage cabinet made of 4x4s and plywood and is extremely strong. It was quite tall and I could slide a 5 gallon bucket under the bed. I could store all sorts of cans and bagged products. It stored enough stuff that it's contents made up almost 1 full pick-up load when I moved. Mine wasn't really designed for beauty. It was made of plywood and covered with black counter top laminate material. If one desired it could be made of fancy wood and be quite attractive. One of the nice things was that it eliminated that annoying problem of mattresses shifting and sliding around as there was a lip that kept them located.

[hisenthlay]

Can I ask where you all are getting these food grade drums, how much they cost, and if they are pest/moisture proof? I'd love to have some of those for the basement. If I could put dog food, flour, pasta, oats, rice, etc. in them, that would free up a ton of space. You reminded me, too--I really need to start storing more water. At least that can go in the basement.

Kitaye--that's some pretty impressive storage compression! Did they use vacuum sealers, or what?

Sounds like some of you have been creative with storage. We're already jam-packed under the beds and in closets, but I think that just means it's time for us to get rid of some of our junk and make more room for the important things! Sometimes it seems to me like homesteading lends itself to pack-ratism.... You never know when that _____(rusty nail, egg carton, plastic bag, scrap of fabric...) is going to come in handy, so better not throw it away! Waste not, want not!

[mamakatinmd]

In Frederick MD McCutchin's Food products sells jams, jellies, etc. They get all the fruit juices in 55 gal plastic food drums. They sell the empty drums for around 10.00. I have bought a few to turn into rain barrels. I was going to buy some more to store food in but realized how inconvenient it would be to try and get into these barrels on a weekly basis. The barrels are quite deep and the opening is narrow. It would be difficult to reach items in the barrel after you get halfway down. If you were going to store items for long term with dessicant they would be useful. Water storage is also a good use for them. I use my food storage and it is rotated enough that I like to use plastic storage bins with lids for easy access and do not fool with oxygen absorbers. With six of us that's a good bit of food a week. I have lots of water stored in 2 liter bottles. Which is swapped out with fresh every six months. (speaking of need to put on my to do list!)

I know what you mean about wanting to save everything. I'm always weighing the usefulness of an object before throwing it away!

[JAK]

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu...logy/kcal.html
http://www.simetric.co.uk/si_materials.htm

Dry Larder Goods:
VegetabOil: 9.00 kcal/g x 910 kg/m3 = 8190 kcal/litre
EngWalnut: 7.85 kcal/g x 609 kg/m3 = 4781 kcal/litre
BeeHoney: 3.19 kcal/g x 1500 kg/m3 = 4785 kcal/litre
GranSugar: 3.94 kcal/g x 894 kg/m3 = 3487 kcal/litre
NavyBean: 3.54 kcal/g x 810 kg/m3 = 2867 kcal/litre
WheaFlour: 3.50 kcal/g x 593 kg/m3 = 2076 kcal/litre
RolledOats: 3.89 kcal/g x 432 kg/m3 = 1681 kcal/litre
Root Cellar Crops:
RawPotato: 0.79 kcal/g x 769 kg/m3 = _608 kcal/litre
RawApples: 0.64 kcal/g x 641 kg/m3 = _410 kcal/litre
Freezer Meats:
LeanMeat: 0.27 kcal/g x 1000 kg/m3 = _270 kcal/litre

Unless you dry and smoke your meat and fish it is probably better to calculate that separately since it takes up so much room and needs a freezer. Pototoes and Squash and Carrots and stuff for a root cellar also take up considerably more space than flour and sugar and oils that go in a larder. But if you have a good balanced diet a good rule of thumb for a mix of stored goods is 1 litre/person/day. This assume 2500 kcal/litre and 2500 kcal/day. This works out to 1 cubic foot per week for a family of 4.

One possibility for a very active family of 4:
Freezer Meat = 4 x 270 kcal/day / 270 kcal/litre = 4 cuft/month
Root Cellar = = 4 x 250 kcal/day / 500 kcal/litre = 2 cuft/month
Larder Goods = 4 x 2500 kcal/day / 5000 kcal/litre = 2 cuft/month
6 months Freezer Meat = 24 cubic feet = 1 cubic yard packed tight
6 months of Root Cellar = 12 cubic feet = 1 cubic yard packed loose
12 months of DryLarder = 24 cubic feet = 2 cubic yard packed loose

Does that seem about right?

If you are less active you will probably eat just as much Meat and Root Cellar stuff, but only half the dry storage. Also some hunter-gatherer types might double or triple the freezer meats and root crops, but reduce the larder goods by half. That will work out to more cold storage, which is in keeping with the cold climate that many a hunter-gatherer prefer.

Now if I could only cut out those trips to McDonalds.

[cpeyus]

hisenthlay - I'm getting my 55 gal drums from a soap company here in CA (got their name from a post somewhere on this site), and he's charging me $5 each. I'm hoping they're pest/moisture proof, otherwise, they'll all be used for water! My dad got the 30 gal drums for me several years ago, not sure where, and they're used for water. We only keep the easy-to-carry water in the basement, the barrels are ridiculous-heavy to move (water weighs about 8 lb/gal).

mamakatinmd - I was worried about the bottom of the barrel, too. I'm thinking about making bags (I have tons of fabric) to fill with the flour, sugar, etc. and putting the bags into the barrel, then I just need to reach in for a bag & won't have to worry about the loose product at the bottom.

JAK - great info from that site! I'd never thought of calculating the space used, but it's interesting.

[mamakatinmd]

I like the idea of making cloth sacks. I do fill gal size plastic bags with sugar, rice , etc before I put them in my rectangular bins w/ lids.( I of course keep the plastic bags for reuse over and over again) I think the cloth sacks would be more durable in the long run and money saving. (the material from the sacks the bulk good were bought in could be cut down and remade into smaller bags too. Some come in cloth or a plastic woven fabric.) The bags would make using the barrels more managable. The nice thing about the barrels are they are water proof. I think a flood could happen and what was in them would still be ok. I cannot say the same for my bins. I live on a mountain so I am not too concerned about flood and do not have fear of water damage in basement. The pro for my bins is they stack up on top of each othe nice and I can utilize more space than I could with the barrels. I'm definately going to give a look over my fabric thanks for the idea!

[JAK]

Originally Posted by hisenthlay

Just curious. I probably keep 2-3 months of food on hand for the 2 of us, and 6 weeks of food on hand for the dogs (80 lbs), but that takes very little space, and happens naturally because we buy mostly in bulk (we play games, like, how long will it take 2 people to get through 5 lbs of walnuts, 10 lbs of raisins, 10 lbs sugar, 10 lbs coffee beans, 10 lbs oats, 20 lbs pasta, 20 lbs flour, 20 lbs rice, etc., etc. ). All of that fills our kitchen cupboards and a small pantry, a big fridge/freezer, and an extra 7.2 cu.ft. freezer in the basement. I don't know how to estimate the footage of those, but it might fill about three 5' tall bookshelves. Maybe 70 cu. ft.??

We could make more use of our big basement, but it gets pretty damp in wet weather, even with a dehumidifier running, so I'd have to really seal everything I wanted to keep down there very well.

Anyway, it seems like stocking up for a year for a family of 4 or more would take up a ton of space. I know you don't all have enormous houses, so where are you putting it all??

Do you have an area in your basement that you can close off and insulate from the interior and leave exposed to a North basement wall. A corner work best. A bumpout to the North works better. If it has a little window well up to you can even open that in winter for some extra refrigeration. A 6' x 6' room in a corner could store a lot of stuff. In Southern PA if you have a deep basement it might stay 55F in summer and be as cold as you want in winter. Having it on the North side would be important. Here in New Brunswick the ground temperature is even colder at 40F so root cellars are called cold rooms and whether or not it is a North side is less important. These work best for root crops but not so good for dry goods like flour and sugar unless they are well sealed like you say. If you put a fridge or freezer down there you should put them with the coils exposed through the interiors walls so they heat the rest of the basement and not your enclosed space. The dehumidifier in summer I would also put outside the space rather than inside, as it would heat up the space too much. The cold room will stay dry enough as long as air isn't getting in from the rest of the house or from the outside in summer.

I think your family of four would need about 27 cuft of freezer space, 27 cuft of cold room, and 54 cu ft of dry storage, as described in my previous post. If you are not all that active or eat out some you would only need 27 cu ft of dry storage. Everything should fit nicely into a 6'x6' room in your basement, but some extra space would make it easier to organize.

[SquashNut]

look into a home vacuum sealer that allows you to seal canning jars. We just got one and we are sealing dry goods into glass mayo jars using used canning jar lids.
You have to be carefull removing the lid from the canned goods in order to reuse it, but its like free packageing.

We are putting about 40 pounds of each 50 pound bag in a bucket with a mylar liner, then the other 10 or so pounds are going in jars and other canisters for use in the short term.
I bought 6 pounds of shelled sunflower seeds and because of the high oil content I am vacuum sealing all of it in jars. I am trying to find out if I should freeze them too.

We have a spare room that has been many things over the years and is now becoming our stash room. There are shelves, one of our small freezer and a table to process goods on. The shelves can hold about 600 canning jars. we put shelves in the closet to hold store bough canned goods and bought several barrels for bulk goods.
It is getting crowded though.

[WindowOrMirror]

... I figured that vittles for a single person would take up 4'x2'x2.5' (for a year). That was some freezedried, some canned, no root cellar crops, grain, honey, dried milk / cheese, etc.

With that calculation, it would be 4'x8'x2.5' or 80 cu. ft. (same space as 4 regular refrigerators take up).

Now... what you REALLY need to concern yourself with is fresh drinking / cooking water. The human needs ~1/2 gallon of drinking water plus some water to prepare food. For a family of four, that's near 1,300 gallons of potable water per year, with a huge additional sanitation requirement.

That's gonna take space too... just the potable water would take ~175 cu ft.

R