Deep Pantry for people who like food

Jackie Frobese wrote:

Jocelyn,  My sister has these containers for her flour sugar etc on the counter. They do have an effective seal and are easy enough to get the lid on and off. So I would give them a thumbs up. Just figured a review may be helpful for you.

Yes, a review *does* help! Thank you, Jackie, that is very good to know.

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:

Jackie Frobese wrote:

Jocelyn,  My sister has these containers for her flour sugar etc on the counter. They do have an effective seal and are easy enough to get the lid on and off. So I would give them a thumbs up. Just figured a review may be helpful for you.

Yes, a review *does* help! Thank you, Jackie, that is very good to know.

Well I just had a convo with my sister, she says brown sugar seems to dry out. That could reflect poorly on the seal depending on your needs. On the up side she says the rubber seal inside can be removed and cleaned if needed.

Great information here

Ahh, right, another point against using flame around dusty things like flour.

grain dust explosions.





and a more text version.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_explosion


99.999% of the time it'll be fine.    


Just don't sneeze.

Nitrogen packed foods are the gold standard for dry goods like grains and beans for long-term storage. However this is a very expensive product to buy. It's also road if we cheap to make. Or do. Two nitrogen pack something. You get an airtight container. When you put a piece of dry ice in the bottom of the container. And let it smoke. When there is about half full of smoke. Slowly pour your grain or beans through the smoke. This is a nitrogen gas. It is heavier than oxygen. It displaces all the oxygen below it. It is important not to create vortexes with the grains going in. Once you get the container full. Wait for the gases to percolate up through. And roll over the sides of the container. At this point. You put the airtight lid on. Anything that uses oxygen that is inside that container will die. Therefore there is no Weevil or any other bugs. Also oxygen is a degrader of all things food. The nitrogen is not.

For long-term storage. You can't beat a seal a meal and a home food freeze dryer. They're about $2,000. But it's 6 or $8 a meal for freeze-dried materials. It doesn't take long to recoup your money. Put out the extra money for the oil-less pump. The use by date on freeze-dried materials is 25 years. But it will keep much longer than that.

I didn't read everything, so forgive me if its been mentioned before. Mylar bags, which can be vacuum sealed or toss in an oxygen absorbed and seal with a flat iron. other way of doing it can be an actual CO2 canister and filling it with a hose. as stated, Nitrogen is the gold standard, but unless I'm mistaken, that is because Nitrogen is an inert noble gas. would probably be better, but perhaps more expensive.

Anyway, you can reseal mylar bags, though you lose a small bit each time, depending on width of the seal. You could repackage the grain into however much would fit in a jar at once, then just open one to refill the jar.

Freeze drying is good for fruits, veg and meat but i don't know how much good it would be for grains, since ideally they don't have much moisture to begin with. long term consideration/concern would just be the maintenance on the freeze-dryer itself.

Morgwino Stur wrote:I didn't read everything, so forgive me if its been mentioned before. Mylar bags, which can be vacuum sealed or toss in an oxygen absorbed and seal with a flat iron. other way of doing it can be an actual CO2 canister and filling it with a hose. as stated, Nitrogen is the gold standard, but unless I'm mistaken, that is because Nitrogen is an inert noble gas. would probably be better, but perhaps more expensive.

Anyway, you can reseal mylar bags, though you lose a small bit each time, depending on width of the seal. You could repackage the grain into however much would fit in a jar at once, then just open one to refill the jar.

Freeze drying is good for fruits, veg and meat but i don't know how much good it would be for grains, since ideally they don't have much moisture to begin with. long term consideration/concern would just be the maintenance on the freeze-dryer itself.

nitrogen is cheep and at every grocery store... DRY ICE melts into nitrogen gas. Put a small piece in your container anthen slowly fill through the"smoke" and seal. Kills all oxygen dependent life forms(weivle and such) also stops oxidizing

Dry ice is the solid form of carbon dioxide.
It does exclude oxygen.

A tip I learned from a pantry maven of years past.

Instead of using a O2 absorbers use a hand warmer packet -- https://www.amazon.com/HotHands-Body-Hand-Super-Warmers/dp/B0069WE9DW/ref=sr_1_50?crid=3CHM5EUART3PL&dchild=1&keywords=hand+warmer+packets&qid=1606998248&sprefix=hand+warmer+pac%2Caps%2C210&sr=8-50

The hand warmer is a O2 absorber, operates on the same principle. For a quart jar its overkill. But for a 5gal bucket of grains it is just right. One of those in the bucket, seal it. The only thing left will be nitrogen gas (air is 78% nitrogen) and your food product.

How to make your own oxygen absorbers. https://healthrangerreport.com/prep-with-mike-how-to-make-your-own-oxygen-absorbers  8 minute audio. Yes Mike is selling stuff, but the information is good.

Short version is 00 steel wool, salt, and something to to put it in to keep the rust from transferring to what you are storing. I used an old sock. The salt causes the steel wool to rust easier and attracts moisture which uses up the 02 and water vapor to make rust. The reaction also can make a little heat. I've heard that it is similar to what they use in hand warmers.

Jerry Sledge
Rockwall, TX

Much of this sounds like what I do already. A few years back I had 25 lbs of wheat and we never used it. Fortunately wheat is a long-term storage item and we've since used it up.

I had jars and boxes of grains and beans I never cooked with -- and finally composted the lot a couple of years ago. I kept some.

My pantry these days is nearly empty, mostly because of COVID. Rather than running out to the store to get lasagna noodles say, I've been using up whatever I had: rotini or ? And I've been doing that since last March. I started buyjng produce in bulk last September, but we've used all that up, except the onions. My pantry and larder are near empty but I have no regrets. Being able to pull together dinner, or soup or stew from the freezer/pantry in the past few months has been very satisfying.

We're also getting ready for retirement, and that has played in here too. I go through the pantry about every 3 months and do a cull. Eventually, I'll have it down to only what we use and reuse and use.

Things I do, you might not? I have a box at the end of my cutting board, with the ends of the shelf-stable foods (beans, peas, etc.) that are too small for the pantry. I have a basket on a pullout. Both are "use this first" places. I don't mind feeding the compost, but hate feeding it unnecessarily!

Update on using salt and steel wool. I was using it to keep the mildew down in a fireproof filing box. Apparently due to the salt all the staples and paperclips have started to rust. Yes, I think it's funny.

Tom Rutledge wrote:Just be careful with vacuum.

I had a problem with this last year, with the newest 5-gallon food grade buckets I bought. I used the same size oxygen absorber I've always used for these buckets, and this was a first! I rotated everything yesterday and can report that the vacuum is still holding well.

yes.  the bugs are there in the food we buy. as soon as air hits, it a matter of time.  food grade DE is often in our foods for this reason too. i guess you could add DE too, for those canning dry foods.

i remember my mom opening a bag of flour and stored in tins. she alway used a dry bay leaf and said it kept those little bugs at "bay". seemed to work until the flour was used up anyway.  she might have put in a plastic food bag with twist tie, maybe. there werent ziplocs then.  i just think she rolled the bag up.  the seals of the tins were sealed up with flour that escaped!  lol.

i keep dry goods in glass and use a dried bay leaf.  i give mom credit for it.  also, store in dry cool place.

i prefer glass, no leeching to worry about.  but, im small scale as far as stocking up.

dont forget to rotate your stock!

I don't take my grains, salt, sugar out of their paper storage bags when I store them in the 2 or 5 gallon food grade buckets with gamma lids. Is there still a problem since the food doesn't actually touch the container? I also us the FIFO method and only store what we eat. Makes sense to me!