Bulk Food Storage

What with Katrina having caused so much strife, recent flooding in the northeast leaving folks stranded in their homes, and us living in the boonies, we have decided it makes sense to be prepared to hunker down in an emergency situation. One of the things we're doing is stocking our pantry. It's easy to buy cans of fruit and veggies at Sam's Wholesale, but many folks ponder over how to store other items such as dry milk, sugar, oats, etc. This is a fairly frequent question asked on homesteading forums I visit.

Here's how we do it at Palazzo Rospo: we double-bag everything and store it in 5 gallon pails.

I recently got two fifty pound sacks of hard red winter wheat. Buying in bulk saves money: I paid .40 per pound, rather than the normal "discount" price of .49 per pound for a bag containing around five pounds. Wheat berries don't spoil like flour does, so we store a lot of wheat and grind it as we need it.

Now, you don't want to open a five gallon pail every time you need some flour or a cup of sugar, so you'll have cannisters in the pantry or kitchen. My cannister for hard red winter wheat berries is a 7.2 liter plastic container.


I've found it more convenient to bag items based on the size of the cannister I'll be using for my "in use" foodstuffs. That way when I open up the five gallon pail (it's a pain!) one bag will fill my cannister. I could use fewer bags by simply filling each bag full. This is how I did it when I first started. I found that when I got to the last bit in the pail I'd have to open the next pail just to finish filling my cannister. Those buckets are a REAL pain for me to open (I have to turn them sideways, sit on them, and wrestle the lid off with the special lid-opening tool) so I find it worth a few extra bags to know that I have several neat "cannister servings" in my pails. As you can see in the photo above, my wheat cannister is getting low - just about where I'd like to refill it. This is a perfect time to break down my 50 lb. sacks of wheat and put them into long term storage.

I put a bag in the cannister (I just left that bit of wheat in the bottom and opened the bag on top of it), and use a coffee cup to scoop the wheat from the fifty pound sack into the plastic bag until the cannister is full.
I tie up the bag with a twist tie. Then I put the bag in the freezer for 48 hours. This kills any little moths or larva or eggs that might have accidentally gained access to the wheat during harvesting, storage, and shipping. I sometimes do the freezing in stages, depending on how much I have to freeze and how full my freezer is. Some folks use diatomaceous earth (food grade) and some recommend a bay leaf in each bag to prevent unwanted visitors.

After the wheat has hung out in the freezer for 48 hours or more, I put a six gallon plastic bag in a five gallon bucket. Then I drop my bags of wheat in. When the bucket is full I close the six gallon plastic bag with a twist tie and seal the bucket. My two 50 lb. sacks of wheat filled up 3 1/3 five-gallon buckets.


I label each bucket and stack them three high in the pantry. I put the oldest on top. When I get another fifty pound sack of wheat, I'll put part of it in my bucket that's only 1/3 full. I'll put the fresher plastic bags on the bottom and the older plastic bags on the top. I'll edit my label on that bucket to say "Hard Red Winter Wheat 7/06 1/07" or whatever is appropriate. That way I know that is a transition bucket between older and fresher wheat.