Our Pantry/ Family Closet: Stocking Up!

Grocery shopping for stocking a pantry is very different from regular grocery shopping. If I go shopping a ‘regular week’s’ worth of food, I buy lots and lots of fresh veggies and fruits, but if I’m shopping for stocking, I come home with lots and lots of cans and boxes!

There are several things to remember when trying to stock up that will save you from wasting your hard earned grocery budget:

#1- Buy what YOU eat. There are several, very good, pantry stocking lists floating around the internet, but if you are not a baker, stocking up on 200 pounds of flour is just going to be a waste of your money.

#2- Be honest with yourself. Do you really like canned peaches? Honestly? Are your kids going to snack on bags of dried fruit? Are you going to cook those 2 cases of yams you found on sale or is all that stuff going to sit and collect dust. Now, like always, don’t buy food you won’t eat… it’s still wasteful!

#3- It’s not always wise to wait for a sale. Sound like a shocker? If you are going out twice a week to buy bread (and you have a deep freezer), just buy a month’s worth at regular price… you’ll save the ‘On Sale’ difference in gas money. Bite the bullet. $30 now is much cheaper than $100 in gas for the next two months until you can buy another month’s worth for $20. Honestly.

Okay, now that we have that out of the way, I’m going to tell you a little more about what’s in MY pantry!

I try to keep a stock of at least a month’s worth of food, breakfasts, lunches, and suppers. We have eight people in our house, so that amounts to quite a bit of food. My ultimate goal is at least 1 year’s worth of groceries, and for those to be home-grown and canned. But that takes patience, and since I’m just getting my pantry really going… I’m trying to be patient. 🙂 I try to keep supplies for the foods we like to eat on hand at all times, and make my grocery list from my pantry supplies, and buy the fresh veggies once or twice a month. It’s a little more complicated keeping a pantry in our house because we do keep kosher, but that’s a post for another day! 🙂

In the interest of time, I’m going to add a of free .pdf for you to read. (I just discovered I have the ability of producing .pdfs and so I will probably be giving out a lot of these for the next few weeks!) This is my basic pantry inventory. You are welcome to download these and use them to your convenience, just don’t post them somewhere without letting me know about it! I’m not including an inventory of frozen goods, or refrigerated goods.

Basic Pantry Inventory

Again, this is not an all inclusive list, but it’s a good place to get started! Look for my next post next week about shopping for stocking and how to personalize your pantry inventory!

 

Until Next Time,