Set aside $5 a week to buy the specific items each week. You will have a kitty set aside that you put the $5 in and you can't touch it for any reason but to buy the food storage item for that week. Put in the remaining change back into the kitty. Some things in the beginning are going to be cheap and then later will be more expensive. In order to pay for the expensive stuff later you need to keep the leftover money in the kitty. Weeks 38 and 44 you will have "off" to replenish the kitty.
Week 1: 2 cans tuna fish, 2 boxes salt
Week 2: 5 boxes of Macaroni and Cheese, 4 cans tomato soup
Week 3: 3 cans mushroom soup, 1 2.5 lb peanut butter
Week 4: one bottle 365 count multi-vitamins
Week 5: 4 cans tomato soup, 1 10 lb powdered milk
Week 6: 1 bottle aspirin (500 tablets)
Week 7: 1 100 lb container wheat
Week 8: 1 5 lb powdered milk
Week 9: 1 5 lb honey
Week 10: 4 cans tuna, 4 boxes macaroni and cheese
Week 11: 1 10 lb sugar, 1 box salt
Week 12: 4 cans mushroom soup
Week 13: 1 bottle 365 count multi-vitamins
Week 14: 1 100 lb wheat
Week 15: 1 box macaroni and cheese
Week 16: 1 5 lb honey
Week 17: 2 cans tuna, 4 can tomato soup
Week 18: 1 10 lbs sugar
Week 19: 1 100 lbs of wheat
Week 20: 2 10lbs of sugar
Week 21: 1 10lb powdered milk
By the end of the 52 weeks, you should have:
700lbs of wheat,
240 lbs sugar,
40 lbs of powdered milk,
13 lbs of salt,
10 lbs of honey,
5 lbs of peanut butter,
45 cans of tomato soup,
32 cans mushroom soup,
15 cans tuna fish,
10 macaroni and cheese dinners,
500 aspirin, and
730 multiple vitamins
They suggest adding 6 lbs of dried yeast and 6 lbs of shortening and this should be enough to sustain 2 people for a year. For every 2 people you have in your family add $5 more and double or triple the amount of whatever you are buying that week.
By Christi from Paducah, KY
Editor's Note: I searched and there is another version of this. Prices may be a lot higher for some items now (I know that honey costs a lot more.)
There is also a Morman version which is slightly different:
http://www.themormonchannel.net/tmc/1yrfor5.html
In any case it is always good to have food stores for lean times or emergencies. You may want to change what you buy but it's a good guide.
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I think it is a wise person who stocks up for an emergency. It may only be a matter of time before some of us experience some type of catastrophe and will be grateful to have some basic food to eat. Although they don't want to scare people, the emergency management people on a federal and state level are working on plans to deal with various types of disasters we may encounter in the future. In our state we deal with tornadoes and floods and there is a very strong possibility that we could have another earthquake along the New Madrid fault!
I have a few tweaks to this plan. Rather than buying so much flour, get 1/2 cornmeal and 1/2 flour - makes same amount, but you get 2 different meals. Also, rather than buying all tuna, watch for sales and get canned beef stew. Store rice as well as flour in freezer. Also, instant grits will store easily, come in flavors, and are very simple to make -- Plain goes with tuna too, I mix them together for breakfast or quick dinner.
In this day and age of pandemic threats, this is probably not a bad idea at all. My question is where and how do you store all this? How do you keep the flour and such from going rancid or getting buggy? There's so much of it!
FLOUR CAN BE STORED IN A FREEZER OR REFRIGERATOR
Only if you have room for a huge refrigerator and freezer.
Whow! That is all startling! However, storage for me would be a huge problem. I live in a 4 room shared apartment, no outside storage.
Also I have no car so couldn't pick up a 100 lbs of anything!
A really modified down scale might work well for small households and dwellings though.
Ellie.
Actually I do store flour in the freezer but for this much, you'd have to have a whole freezer dedicated to just this plan!
I would love a scaled down version of this. I am not doing this yet cause we are living in a small apt for now. When we move we will hopefully have a deep freezer and I am wanting a food pantry and maybe a sub shed where produce will keep longer.
Hm-m-m-m-m, there are lots of good ideas out there and this sounds a lot like the Y2K (2000)suggestions, which seem good, but do present a huge storage problem, even for me. I also am concerned that if FOOD is ever a problem, so will the
WATER be, and when I tried calculating/saving water in bottles, I ran into a HUGE loss, learning it's almost impossible to store enough for even a small
family's short term needs, drinkable and potable.
There is a govt. warning out about a small bacterium that begins to grow in stored water that NOTHING can kill, which is deadly to humans.
I think I'll place my trust in the Creator of Heaven and Earth, and perhaps a modified scaled down version of all this wonderful list.
Thank you for reminding me of those days, and of the left-overs I still have/had to toss when expired. God bless you and those who follow
the ant, wisely storing for times of shortages. : )
i dont think i would want to eat powdered this and tinned that i would rather starve than eat bags and bags of salt etc
i grow my own fruit and veg and keep some chickens for meat and eggs however pasta and rice can be stored indefinitely and it would be better for your health to freeze orange juice and fresh butter i think the multivitamins with iron would be a good idea
I live in the country and think this is a great idea. I will start with a smaller version at first. I would love to have some ideas on how to search this on the web as well as easy recipes that use these items
For heavens sake!!!! what are you going to do with 700 pounds of wheat, and 240 pounds of sugar and 13 pounds of salt. I'd say take the $5.00 a week and buy an extra one of something ON SALE that you will be using later. All these items can be bought on sale and with coupons at one time or other. Buy them when on sale and not when they come up on your list. You have spent $250.00 here, and don't have one single meal except mac and cheese, and maybe bowl of tomatoe soup.
In an emergency, due to possible power outages,cooking anything might be a problem unless you are used to and have the area and resources to make a fire for cooking. How about rotating canned goods and keeping sterno, lighters, and a hand can opener handy instead? Any flour products are going to become buggy after a while (yes, the bugs do hatch from within the flour). Wheat and rice do not keep without getting buggy unless in a freezer ( again, the power outage problem).
Dried fruit and jerky are easily stored and can nourish. Peanut butter and honey are good. Water can be a problem, but adding a drop of chlorine bleach ( look it up ) to a gallon of pre-boiled water helps stave off bacteria growth, Then rotate the gallons every 2 months to maintain optimum 'freshness'. The key, as I understand it, is to rotate your stock regularly, replenishing as you use.
Sounds complicated to me.
Yes, what are you gathering the flour, sugar and salt for? Not making bread because some ingredients are missing...or what? Very curious.
I believe stocking the pantry for emergencies is a great idea! I do stock flour, too. I find that if I freeze it for a week, then vacuum seal it in glass jars it keeps without getting buggy. Same with rice. I prefer canning, and buying canned food items. I rotate them. And I only stock what we eat on a regular basis. For example, if you don't grind your own wheat, don't buy it. Last year we went through an emergency in our area. No power for a week. No stores open to buy food. People who did not have pantry shelves filled had to drive 20+ miles to find food.
This is an awful lot of tuna, tomato soup and mac and cheese. And a lot of wheat?
Wow, great list, we have been storing food for about a year now, but there are many things on the list I didn't think of. Thanks Barb
A lady I know just started a website that talks about food storage and other ways of being prepared. It is:
www.providenthomecompanion.com/
What are we storing all this food for? Armageddon? And, where are we storing it? I don't understand this "Food for 2 Years for $5 a Week" plan.
I don't understand why you'd buy a year's worth of vitamins every few weeks. And unless you've got a freezer, a lot of this stuff will go rancid or get weevils. Besides all that, wheat is one of the worst things that people can eat now. It's definitely not gluten free.
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