So just to clarify before starting this challenge I did not stock up on anything. The last time I shopped was the 22nd of January. This challenge formed in my mind over the Australia day long weekend when we were flooded in. And what I really wanted to know was, if without warning, we could not get to the shops how long could we last.
Linda also mentioned flour, and yep I have loads. At a guess there is 2 kg Plain Flour, 2 kg Self Raising Flour, 500gm Wholemeal flour, 1 kg of 000 Flour, 4 kg Spelt Bread Flour, 4 kg Rye Bread Flour, 3 kg Wholemeal Bread Flour and 2 kg White Bread Flour. Heavens that is a lot of flour for 2 people who would be lucky to get through a loaf of bread a week.
So in the spirit of transparency here are our stockpiles... prepare your self...
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| 324 Lt Chest Freezer - Filled with meat from the cow we had killed. There are also blocks of chicken stock (the blocks on top and in the ice cream container) There are also lots of frozen diced tomatoes. |
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| This our second 225lt chest freezer. This one has the last of the meat chickens we killed last year, frozen fruit and veggies, a spare loaf of supermarket bread and general odds and ends. |
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| The freezer above the fridge - More chicken stock, frozen leftovers, ice, butter, crusts to make into bread crumbs, pastry and a bag of frozen bananas |
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| The freezer door - More frozen bananas, tomato paste, yeast and cheese cultures |
I don't actually like bananas but I hate waste so when they get soft and hubby won't eat them a freeze them. I will have to use some to make a banana cake or banana bread.
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| Inside the fridge |
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| The pantry - sauce and spice city |
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| The pantry - Flour, legumes, carbohydrates, baking goods, crackers seeds and nuts |
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| Preserves, cereals and tinned foods |
Your stockpile is awesome !
ReplyDeleteThanks Emma
DeleteOh gosh! You do have heaps of stock in your pile!
ReplyDeleteI guess with the rising costs of groceries, I run a really tight ship here...my pantry of surplus, is quite small, I only have one small square clothes basket at the bottom of my pantry that I keep a few 'doubles'....my freezer is usually run quite frugally with what I have on the menu for the week and occasionally some meat I find on special...I would think for the five of us here, that your stock pile would be more in the line of what we should have, but like I said, $$$ are tight here at the moment, and I am really buying purely off the weekly menu plan with a couple of extras here and there....but well done for all that work and home grown meat...Im thinking your freezer and my backyard vegies could make the supermarket a memory for at least a month or so between us!
Suzanne your veggie garden always makes me very jealous. Mine is empty at the moment but combine we would definitely be able to ditch the supermarkets.
DeleteThat's awesome! I want to come and cook from your stockpile!
ReplyDeleteTracey you are welcome at any time.
DeleteHa ha! You're not going hungry any time soon!
ReplyDeleteLinda you are so right. We could feed your family easily as well as us.
Deleteyou have a great stock pile going there..do you have a generator for back up if power goes down to keep your freezers going?
ReplyDeleteJoyfulhomemaker no we do not have a generator. We have talked about it a bit but we are fully insured for any losses and we know the freezers would be ok for 3 days if they stayed closed. So at this stage we are still just talking about it.
DeleteGreat post Fiona, and your stockpile is inspiring. We are thinking about buying a freeze at the moment, but I had the same question as Joyfulhomemaker - do you have a generator. This is the 2nd thing we are thinking of buying. After the recent storms/floods it made us realize how reliant we are on mains power. We didn't lose power at all fortunately, but know of many who did. cheers Wendy
ReplyDeleteGood god!!! I am speechless.
ReplyDeleteI had to phone my ex this morning to ask him to make the kid's school lunch tomorrow because I had nothing, nothing but the crusts of a loaf of bread!
Patricia (receiver of free seeds)
Hi Patricia glad to know you are still reading. I have been like that in the past having nothing to even put together to make a meal. I found that over time I have built this stockpile. Every week I put some money towards the stockpile and bit by bit it grew. I also hunt down bargains where I can.
DeleteThat's a great stockpile Fiona. Very similar to what mine looked like before we moved, but I purposely used up a lot of stuff so I wouldn't have to cart it all, and our big chest freezer got turned off at the switchboard so I lost everything in the freezer....twice! We are hopefully picking up our chest freezer this weekend when we go back to the other house, and we are on solar power here, so power should not be an issue for u, and we have a large and smaller generator as well. I would implore people to get a generator, even just one that will run the fridge and lights. I reckon you could eat from that stockpile for at least 2 months....
ReplyDeleteAt least 2 months although we would be out of veggies in a few weeks because there is not much in the garden at the moment.
DeleteIt sure is impressive. My childhood home had a cellar, a separate room for pantry stuff (bins full of flour, lugumes, and shelves of preserves and ginger beer and then to top it off a meat room for hanging the kill. Add the dairy products from our own cows and I think we could have lasted forever. Come to think of it, going to the shops was so so special that i remember getting 5 cents to spend on lollies (a whole bag). Am i showing my age? Oh, did i mention there were 6 kids!
ReplyDeleteLynda I am in my 30's and I can remember 20 cent bags of lollies and 1 cent lollies too. That cellar sounds great and it is something I am considering for the house we will build when we move to NZ.
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