Food Storage Concerns when preparing with a Family

In some cases preparing with a family can be easier.  With a large family you have several people that have different likes and specialties.  Just in my family of 6 we have a cook, accountant and computer geek along with three children who can pitch in when needed.  But in many senses preparing with a family can also be overwhelming, especially when looking at food storage.

Looking at food storage for one person the numbers are a lot easier to process.  Looking at something like dried food packages for an adult:

365 x 3 = 1095 meals needed

Current prices on a 120 serving meal bucket (at the time of writing this) is $279.99 per bucket.  So for one adult the cost would be around $2799.90.

Ten buckets of dried food packages will cover an adult for over a year.  Ten buckets I can handle, both with buying and storing.  One shelf and I have dried meals ready for a year!  Easy right?  Lets take the food storage in context for my family though and you can see where things start to get overwhelming.

365 x 6 x 3 = 6570 meals needed

Now this calculation is for my family and assumes that all of my family members are eating a full meal (And with my children that could easily be the case).  Now we get into the over whelming (and expensive!) part.  55 buckets would be needed to cover my family with dried food for a year.  Assuming the $279.99 cost for a 120 serving bucket it would cost me $15399.45 (yikes!).  I would also now need around 6 shelves to store the food.  With a family of 6 space is already at a premium.

Now this is just a glimpse of some of the challenges of being prepared with a family.  I am not suggesting that someone should go out and buy dried food buckets to store for their family, but it is an easy comparison to make and understand.  I always say store what you eat, and with a family of 6 that is quite a lot!!  Factor in the fact that in my family we have allergies to gluten, soy, nitrates and red dye and things get even more complicated, but with a little planning things can be made a lot easier.

Canned good storage

At the moment the market has several options available to families with allergies, and with a little hard work it is possible to can your own food for both storage and daily eating.  Last year we canned pears, peaches, apricots, green beans and tomatoes.  We also dried apples, peaches and pears.  The best part about all of these foods is that we know exactly what is in each one and that we will have no problems with eating any of these stored items.

In a future post we will talk about how to start and how we try to make things easier along the way.  Stay tuned for more!  What have you done today to secure your dynasty?