Food Storage
A while back my husband and I decided that we needed to clear out space in what we call our mudroom, that we have turned into our pantry. Our kitchen is on the smaller side, so it made since to us since otherwise the mudroom wasn’t going to get all that much traffic. 3 Harbor freight shelves later and we have a pretty functional pantry,
But then I started learning how to hot water bath can. So of course I wanted my own home canned shelf. And I still have that to some extent (even though I haven’t really canned in a while) I’ve canned Onions, pears, and jalapeños.
Then the most irritating thing happened one day. I got home, with a strong craving for Broccoli Beef. And I was so ready to make it when I got home from work. I walk in the mudroom and there is white rice, all over the mudroom floor. After inspecting the bag it was discovered that a mouse/rat had chewed through the bag. Well, that whole 20lb bag of rice went in the trash. I was not about to risk eating it. I had to think of a new solution to keep my food safe from the rat. The canned food should be fine. But what about things in bags ? I had to think of a solution.
That’s when I noticed all my empty mason jars. And most of them I still had the lids to. That same day I went and bought a new bag of rice, putting them all into mason jars. Since Rice is a staple that we use often, I wanted it to be easily accessible.
That still left one problem. My pancake mix, sugar, flour, my bagged goods. That’s when my husband had a great idea. We don’t often use those as much, but enough to where we did buy them in bulk. For that, we got a tote. One tote, clear, to contain everything. And the flour and sugar I already had separate, glass containers for those things, so this would allow me to get a really big bag of both, and keep them contained in the tote until I need to restock my canisters.
I chose clear because I can easily determine what’s inside, and if we ever move, this is all ready to go as is!
Since we’ve tried this method, we have been able to keep our mudroom/pantry clean and organized, and we don’t buy duplicates of things nearly as much anymore, cause we can easily see what we have and can make our list accordingly
