More Food And Time To Slow Down

Yesterday found me running to the store to pick up some more stuff.  This was the trip I was going to take the other day and didn’t.  The spousal unit and I both felt like crap, so we held off.  However, I felt ready to go yesterday, and she didn’t, so I headed on without her.

Lucky me.

Anywho, I did pick up a handful of things for the food stores.  For example, remember me being bent out of shape about being able to get so few cans of sliced carrots?

Luckily, the spousal unit isn’t overly concerned about brands on sliced carrots.

And remember the peas?  Snagged some of those and some baby carrots, which we enjoy.

We fleshed out the peas pretty well there.  Still not done with those, mind you, but we’re at a decent level for the time being.

I also grabbed some more packets of mashed potatoes.

The upside down thing is a trick my wife likes. She alternates them to fit more in the space.

You may note the box with the Idahoan potatoes.  Let’s be honest; those bags don’t stack particularly well.  To the right, you can see the box we use for the smaller bags of potatoes.  However, I knew that wasn’t going to work for these bigger bags. (We usually fix two of the smaller bags.  With one of the larger bag, we get just as much food.)

When I put these in the cart, I threw in the box too.  At the checkout, I asked the cashier if I could keep the boxes on these.  She said sure because all they were going to do was throw them out.  So, if you need a way to put these on the shelf, try it.  The great thing is that you can keep the boxes so you don’t need to ask every time you buy them, but they make shelf storage so much easier.

AND THEY’RE FREE!  Isn’t that everyone’s favorite price?

Not shown in the photos are the 16 or so cans of yellow squash and onions I picked up.  We needed veggies, and we needed variety.  Right now, we have almost all the canned vegetables we eat regularly.

Additionally, I picked up a couple of experiments.  Right now, we just have canned chicken.  This will not be something we can keep up day after day, so we need some variety.  While my wife will be trying her mom’s salmon patty recipe later (using canned salmon), I grabbed a can of pulled pork and bbq sauce and one of roast beef and gravy.

The pulled pork wasn’t half bad at all.  We’ll be stocking up on this to serve with rice and some kind of vegetable.  It’s a bit too runny to use for sandwiches, in my opinion.  At least, that’s what I found when I made sandwiches out of it.  I wore more than I’m ready to admit.

We’ll try the beef soon, but I’m hopeful.  This could be excellent over either rice or mashed potatoes.  This, along with the pork and possibly the salmon, will give us a nice bit of variety.

Yes, I hear people talking about tuna, but honestly?  I’ve never really been a big tuna fan.  I want to be, but I’m not.  We’ll pick up a can here or there to experiment with, but until that happens, I’m not stocking it.

I also did a bit of math.  One shelf on the Edsal shelf will hold enough canned vegetables to feed my family for about 41 days.  There are five shelves.  I could, if pressed, put about three months of food on this one shelf.  Maybe.

Of course, there wouldn’t be room for anything else, but it’s nice to know how little space a few months of food can take.

Now, however, it’s clear that I’m going to have to slow down a bit.

It’s not because I’m ready.  Far from it.  There are so many holes in these preps that it’s not even funny.  I know there are.  Especially water.

No, I’m having to slow down because the funds are depleting.  Preps do me no good if I’m so broke I have to delve into them just to survive.

So, here’s the plan going forward since I have a nice start.  Each week, when I get paid, I’ll snag SOMETHING for the preps that isn’t food related, and I’ll spend an additional $20-25 on a food item for the food stores.  It will generally be all of one product.  Personally, I think that tends to show up more meaningfully for me.  A few cans

Personally, I think that tends to show up more meaningfully for me.  A few cans here or there feel haphazard and incomplete.  A case of something?  Now we’re talking.

This should be easily doable, though down the road I’ll probably have to adjust this.  I can’t buy a Big Berkey off of what I have to spend in a single week, after all.  Some stuff is just expensive, so I’ll have to save up a bit for those items.

Still, it’s good to have a plan.

A little later, I’ll try and organize my plan based on priorities.  I’ll be asking for critiques on this because it’s always a good idea to have others find holes in your plans.  They exist, and you may be blind to them.

On that note, however, I’m going to wrap this one up.  I feel much better about my food stores at this point.  I think we could shelter in place for several weeks so long as we had power and water.  Making it, so we don’t need power and water will be on the near-term agenda, and that makes me feel so much better about taking care of my family.