How to Stock Your Pantry
Emergencies can happen at any time and without warning. Many can be terrifying, and things can worsen if you aren’t prepared. This is why you should have a pantry stocked with food before the emergency event so that your family has something they can fall back on until your situation improves. Follow these tips to learn how to stock your pantry.
Please note, I continually update posts sometimes more than once. I will add new information and change out old information because things change. The last time this post was updated was 4-5-2021. I have new readers every day and I’m grateful I can teach them new items I learn.
I call my pantry my in-home grocery store. There is something about not having to run to the store for a can of this or a bag of that. Whatever, it helps me stay out of the grocery stores. I still have to go get milk and bananas for Mark’s cereal each morning, but that’s it for most days. In case you missed this post, Cooking From Scratch 101
How to Stock Your Pantry
Are you afraid of being labeled a “doomsday prepper” like the people you see on TV? You shouldn’t. Having an emergency food pantry is pretty smart and has nothing to do with living in fear. Get to work stocking your pantry with these tips.
1. An Established Pantry Takes Time
For most of us, we simply can’t afford to buy an entire pantry’s worth of food with only a few trips to the grocery store. It’s not a logical decision because you have other expenses to account for in your budget. Stocking a pantry takes time and planning. You need to make notes of what your family prefers to eat and how to organize things based on preferences and meal plans. I’d start with pantry staples and add to your inventory over a few weeks.
Remember that you will also be paying a lot more if you choose this route, which brings me to my next point. In case you missed this post, Canned Foods I Highly Recommend You Store
2. Look For Deals
I love a good bargain, whether it’s when I’m shopping for a new pair of shoes or when my local grocery store has an awesome sale on all of its canned goods. You can save a lot of money by waiting for those deals and then stocking up instead of buying everything at full retail.
Just try not to wipe out the entire grocery shelf by hoarding those items because that won’t be fair to other customers. Please ask your grocery store managers to have “case lot sales” if they don’t already. If we can have them here in Utah and in the surrounding states, other states should also have them. They seem to be most common in late summer or early fall. It could be they are based on harvest and related manufacturing schedules.
It all depends on supply and demand, I’m sure. You may be wondering where I put all this food, and I have some closets that I use to stock different foods. I have a small home, so that’s my life right now.
3. Only Buy What You Will Eat
You know your family better than anyone, so don’t waste your money on food your kids won’t touch, even if their lives depend upon it. Those canned mushrooms may seem like an excellent deal at the time, but if you’re the only one eating them, it won’t do your family much good. Stock your emergency pantry with foods that everyone enjoys. Get the family involved in the emergency stash shopping trips, and don’t be tempted to make impulse buys. Stick with the basics as outlined here and make the most of your food budget.
4. Keep Allergies in Mind
For those of you who have family members with food allergies, I’m sure that you take their needs into account every time you’re at the grocery store. You’ll want to do the same when creating a stockpile for your pantry so that they have something healthy to eat without allergy concerns.
That doesn’t mean you can’t still stock up on some of those food items for your other family members, but you will want to keep them in your pantry separately so there’s no mix-up. You may want to make a list of the foods you’re concerned about so if others prepare a meal when you’re gone they understand the issues.
5. Have a Variety
It’s a big deal to have a variety of foods your family can eat during an emergency. Your situation may already be challenging and tedious enough, and if all you have are cans of fruits and vegetables to hold you over, that will be one more reason for your kids to complain.
Instead, have a variety of pasta, grains, nuts, and snacks for emergencies so that you don’t end up with food going to waste.
6. Buy in Bulk
Purchasing foods in bulk makes a lot of sense for large families. It saves them money on items that their family eats a lot of and means fewer trips to the grocery store. Consider buying foods like bagged rice, dried beans, and peanut butter that you can keep in your pantry. By creating different dishes with these items, you’ll get several meals out of them. Bulk buying usually saves money, too!
I like to check how much items cost by the ounce. Sometimes we get caught up buying a certain brand or certain size container out of habit. Most stores now post not only the price but how much it costs by the ounce or pound. You may be surprised that an item you thought was pricey is actually a good deal based on its unit cost.
7. Preserve Your Grown Vegetables
You don’t have to rely entirely on the grocery store for all your emergency pantry needs. You could also preserve the vegetables you grew from your garden and enjoy them when needed.
They taste better, too! I have many tips on my blog for those of you who have never canned before. In case you missed this post, Home Canning-Important Do’s and Don’ts
Dehydrating Posts I have done:
- Dehydrating Apples
- Dehydrating Bananas
- Dehydrating Blackberries and Powder
- Dehydrating Blueberries and Powder
- Dehydrating Cilantro
- Dehydrating Cucumbers and Powder
- Dehydrating Ginger and Powder
- Dehydrating Kale and Kale Powder
- Dehydrating Kiwi
- Dehydrating Lemons and Powder
- Dehydrating Marshmallows
- Dehydrating Peppermint Marshmallows and Powder
- Dehydrating Mushrooms and Mushroom Powder
- Dehydrating Onions and Powder
- Dehydrating Pears
- Dehydrating Pineapple
- Dehydrating Raspberries and Powder
- Dehydrating Spinach and Powder
- Dehydrating Strawberries
- Dehydrating Tomatoes and Powder
- Dehydrating Watermelon
8. Have a Rotation System in Place
Non-perishable foods may have a much longer shelf life, but that doesn’t mean they never go bad. You’ll want a rotation system to use up anything nearing its expiration date.
At the same time, you’ll want to replenish that item with more product so that your pantry doesn’t start to thin out.
One way of doing this is to keep the older dated items on the front of your shelf and, when you purchase more similar items with a new date, place them behind the older ones. I also suggest you generate a list of the items that should be in the pantry inventory so you can match what’s there against that list and replenish as needed.
9. Stock Up on Non-Perishable Food Items
Now that you have a better understanding of some of the do’s and don’ts when stocking your pantry, you need to purchase foods that will last you a long time. Here’s a closer look at some non-perishable food items you should consider stocking up on as pantry staples. Most of my pantry items are freeze-dried foods in #10 cans or what are called smaller pantry cans. Note that the items listed are my suggestions based on what I use for Mark and me, your list may be different based on family size and makeup.
- Canned fruits and veggies: consider peaches, apricots, plums, and berries of all kinds. I have sweet corn, tomatoes, potatoes, peas, red peppers, celery, cucumbers, spinach, green and other onions, and more.
- Canned soups and stews: I enjoy creamed soups like Campbell’s cream of chicken and mushroom varieties. We also like tomato soup on a cold winter evening. We have canned broth
- Canned meats (beef, chicken, turkey, tuna, etc.)
- Canned or dried beans (great for chili if it’s cold outside): we have black beans, pinto beans, kidney beans, red beans, and lima beans. They are great for Mexican meals and soups.
- Boxed pasta: You can make many meals with various pasta offerings. From spaghetti to lasagna, mac and cheese, and much more!
- Rice: rice goes so far in meal preparation. I wrote a post this week about the best ways to prepare rice. We had some rice with egg rolls that made great leftovers for the fridge or freezer. Mark likes his with butter as a mashed potatoes substitute or with milk and sugar for breakfast. I don’t keep much brown rice since it has such a short shelf life.
- Tomato sauce and paste: sauces of various types make for wonderful flavor enhancements. Tomato sauce can be used in many recipes and so can tomato paste.
- Vinegar: white vinegar is called for in many recipes, but don’t forget red wine vinegar, Mother vinegar, balsamic, and rice vinegar.
- Oatmeal (as long as you have a heating method if the power is out): oats are one important grain, but we also have a bunch of wheat we can grind for my famous homemade bread.
- Powdered milk: I also like having a large inventory of instant milk. I have one whole shelf full of freeze-dried instant milk so I’m ready for any recipe calling for milk.
- Spices and herbs: salt, pepper, cinnamon, sugar, cumin, oregano, curry powder, garlic powder, thyme, paprika, nutmeg, basil, cayenne, chili powder, etc.
- Condiments (mustard, ketchup, mayo, BBQ sauce, hot sauce, maple syrup, and various relishes)
- Applesauce
- Protein bars
- Beef sticks, jerky
- Nuts, trail mix ( keep in mind food allergies): we love cashews, walnuts, pecans, almonds, nut butters, and peanuts.
- Peanut butter (most families with children can’t go without this food item)
- Honey: a healthy shelf-stable sugar substitute that lasts indefinitely.
- Snack items: Chips, snack cakes, fruit snacks, candy, chocolate chips, etc. (It’s okay to fall back on comfort foods during an emergency. Remember that most don’t store for very long, so you will want to rotate them out regularly.)
In case you didn’t know, I was asked to write a book called “Prepare Your Family For Survival.”
Final Word
As long as you follow these basic steps, stocking your pantry can be easy while saving you money. It also prevents those last-minute extra trips to the grocery store. Your family will also be left with one less thing to worry about if an emergency ever happens to you. What are some tips you have for stocking your pantry? May God Bless this world, Linda.
You definitely want to eat the preparedness steak one bite at a time because it will choke you financially.
I remember as a young teen I earned a few dollars working a field for a neighbor. I took that and bought a box of 22LR, several cans of beanie weinies and a metal Boy Scout canteen and threw it all in a pack that I’d been given.
My thought process was well I can make it a few days on this even if I don’t get anything else.
If you spend a buck and buy 2 cans of vegetables then look at it like this: I can use that and a fish I catch or a squirrel/bird I kill combined with the Indian onions I allowed to grow in the yard to make it through one more meal for the family. Might not be what you wanna eat but you ate and fueled the body.
The next buck gets a bag of rice. The next buck gets a can of fish. Now you ain’t gotta worry bout catching a squirrel and can stretch that meal into a belly filler with protein.
Remember: Hunger Makes a Good Cook
Hi Matt, oh my gosh, you rock as always! You can see at a young age you were on the right track of survival. I used to teach classes on food storage, and emergency prep. People would say I don’t buy anything in cans. Really, not even olives? You get the drift. We have been spoiled to have fresh everything well that’s not always going to be the case. I love the preparedness steak one bite at a time because it will choke you. AND, the Hunger Makes a Good Cook! I LOVE LOVE LOVE it! Linda
Linda, another GREAT post. We try to only buy extras on sale, but if we run out of something we “need” we will pay full price. I guess you could say I’m cheap. LOL I think frugal. I also don’t buy just name brands. I buy what’s good no matter the brand. From food to clothes to appliances. Brands have never mattered to me. I like what I like. I’m planning on Spring cleaning later this week. We get our Covid shot today at 10:00 am Central time. I’ll see how it goes. Spring cleaning means the pantry as well as everything else. It may take all Spring, but it needs to be done. I’m hoping I can enlist hubby’s help.
Hi Deborah, oh, I love spring cleaning, no matter how long it takes. Thank you for your kind words, my friend, Linda
I don’t like the cleaning part, but I do like the clean. LOL
Hi Deborah, I hear you, I like to declutter. I love cleaning bathrooms, dusting not so much. Mark dusts the house and mops the floors, we don’t have any carpet). I love a clean house too! Linda
Hi Linda,you are so right on most of these items! Just some food for thought! My daughter was having problems in her food pantry with small flying/crawling bugs. We would clean it out,get rid of the bugs and after awhile they would come back. Frustrated, she called a pest control co. He said that he used to work in a grist mill and knew these pests very well. They were Weevils. They were coming from her organic flower. Organic flower!? Yes! Since they do not use pesticides or herbicides on the growing plants the weevil eggs are very prolific in organic flower. So we decided to freeze the flower then keep the bags in a different cupboard in a plastic bag. So far so good.
Thanks God Bless and stay safe…
Hi Bill, oh my gosh, you know I never thought about this!! Weevils! It makes total sense, no pesticides or herbicides, bingo! This is why people put their flour in the freezer to kill them. I can’t put a 50-pound of flour in my freezer, there is not enough room. I do not get weevils BUT, I cannot find organic bread flour. This is why I do not have weevils. I have flour with pesticides and herbicides, this is a bit hard to swallow. But it’s a fact. Why didn’t I think of that! I swear I learn something NEW every single day. Thank you, my friend, Linda
Linda, I don’t buy organic flour and I used to get weevils in my long term storage. I started repacking the flour into mylar bags with O2 absorbers and that ended the problem. Flour still good to bake with after 5 years.
Now that I have a Dicorain I’ve stared sealing flour in quart jars. The absence of oxygen kills all the bug eggs and keeps the flour fresh. And it’s a lot less work and expense than using mylar bags and O2 absorbers and having to heat seal the bags.
The longer I have this Dicorain the better I like it.
Hi Ray, I do not buy organic flour, I buy what Costco sells, it’s bread flour. Sometimes regular flour but never organic as far as I know. I love that Dicorain! It’s the best! I’m so glad you introduced it to us and Matt sent me a video about it. Great option! Linda
Diatomaceous Earth. for bugs.
Hi JayJay, good one! Linda
Linda,
Food grade DE only, but I still prefer vacuum sealing.
I live in Florida so a 50 lb bag of anything would go bad here! But I buy regular flour in 5 lb bags, freeze it, then vacuum seal the whole thing, paper bag and all (to keep the dust from sucking in to the vacuum sealer). Then I seal them into big plastic bins with tight tops, and put them in the storage shed. It works pretty well and so far we’ve not seen bug one.
I have a pretty good sealer, and buy the pre-sized bags from one of the food bag companies. A gallon bag is a nice tight fit on a 5 lb. bag of flour. We do the same thing with sugar, etc.
It’s more expensive than buying in bulk, but there are only two of us.
Hi Tracie, I understand buying only 5-pound bags, I live in the desert where it’s really dry. I can purchase a bit more safely. My daughter lived in Maryland for a few years and she had to put in a de-humidifier. I have two humidifiers going here year-round. She had to keep cereal in the frig, crackers in the frig. It was a learning curve for both of us when I went to visit her. I would do the same thing you are doing. It’s all based on the humidity for sure. Great tips! Linda
This is a great post. One thing that will help avoid or even eliminate the bug problem in things like flour is to keep it in continual rotation. I don’t have any flour stored for long term so I only purchase enough to have for current baking. When I start running low, I put that on my grocery list again. I did vacuum seal some flour with my FoodSaver (youtube video by Homestead Corner). It has been sealed for a few months now (08/2020). I am planning to open it in 08/2021 to see how it fares! If it is good, I will do this with more flour but I wanted to have a test first. My second test I plan to leave for 2 years. I did not freeze the flour first as my only freezer is the top of my apartment sized refrigerator so not enough room to freeze extras.
I’ve also read that bay leaves in your pantry can help keep bugs out. Cucumber peels will keep ants away – save the peels and just lay them on the shelves. They will naturally dehydrate then you can toss them into the composte.
Hi Leanne, I did not know that about cucumber peels!! Someone mentioned the bay leaves, which is a good reminder to all of us. LInda
Leanne,
Your vacuum sealing experiment should prove successful. I’m vacuum sealing flour in quart Mason jars. I’ve kept flour good for up to 5 years now simply using mylar bags and O2 absorbers but I think actually vacuum sealing it in jars will keep it fresh longer than that. I also plan of keeping the Jars of flour in a dark area of my pantry as I’ve heard light can cause the flour to degrade.
Probably the best way to deal with long term storage is to get wheat berries and a flour mill and grind your own. The wheat berries will last indefinitely provided rodents or bugs don’t get at them. I may have to vacuum seal some wheat berries now.
One thing I can say about the crazy prepping non- preppers did? The “almost expired” canned goods were almost entirely cleaned out from supermarkets! I am seeing things best by 2024/25 already!
I am moving in three months. We have been eating out pantry here and saving the money that we normally spend for a huge restock at our next house. The restock will be costly, but all “fresh”. This is a great reminder list Linda. Thank you.
Hi Janette, it will be nice to not have to move the pantry food or at least less. It sounds like a great idea to save money and buy “fresh” when you get to your new home. Thank you for your kind words, I wish you luck in your new home. Change is good. Linda
When I am fairy comfortable with my Food pantry I try to buy “extra’s” things I might not buy but found them on sale. I just bought a case of pimento’s for $2.49. That way if we do have a emergency that doesn’t mean my food has to be dull, It will have color to it. I am also like you I would rather shop in my pantry instead of going shopping in a store.
Hi June, a case of pimentos for $2.49!!! SQUEAL! That’s awesome. This is why I buy pineapple and olives. I love to fancy up my meals from my pantry! Life is so good! Linda.
Just found vacuum sealed 90% ground beef, smoked turkey drumsticks and boneless pork chops
I already get chuck roasts at our local Wegmans. That means less freezer burn, especially since I buy enough for 10 months at a time.
I am filling the freezer about a month earlier than usual, because I don’t know what the future will bring
Hi Chris, oh my gosh, having the meat in vacuum sealed bags is the best! We don’t have a Wegman’s in Utah. What a great feeling to have your freezer full who knows what the next few months will bring. I love this, Linda
Linda, I may have mentioned before that Jane and I buy half a beef every year. (We have more than one freezer). Our butcher cuts and grinds it to order (maximizing steaks and roasts and minimizing ground beef) and vacuum seals it for us. He even labels the bags with the amount, type and date processed. We minimize the ground beef because it is cheaper to get that in a grocery store, whereas steak and roasts cost more at the store than we pay at the ranch.
Hi Ray, as soon as I get everything unpacked that. It is on my list to find a good butcher (Farmer). We got out of the habit when our girls grew up and moved out. Linda