Jun162010
Thoughtful Food Storage: Vegetables
Guest post by Debbie Cee
Storing food takes up a huge amount of space. Trying to figure out how to store three months worth of food for six people when just one week’s worth can fill up my car, led me to review my knowledge of nutrition. I broke down my storage needs into the basic food groups, and I’ve been trying to decide the most nutritious, cost effective, and space-efficient way to store each. I found each group has its own strengths, weaknesses and ways to be stored.
Let’s start with vegetables because they took the most thought. A healthy diet has a lot of vegetables in it. How do you store that amount of vegetables? Canned? There is a lot of sodium and waste liquid in a can. Plus, they’re heavy and take up lots of space. Frozen? With my family of six, I’d need an entire freezer for three months worth of
image by superbez
veggies. I can’t count on having power in an emergency. We would eat about three pounds of veggies per day in an emergency setting with the additional huge calorie burning you would expect. On normal days I cook two pounds of vegetables for dinner – and they usually get eaten.
Dehydrated and freeze dried vegetables are the best solution. This is pretty easy to figure out. Every place that sells emergency food has cans of freeze dried vegetables. However, freeze dried is rather expensive, especially to feed six people. I also prefer to practice cooking with my stored foods, and I’m happiest if I use it routinely. This made dehydrated vegetables the best choice for me.
I tried home dehydrating first. I have a four-shelf Excalibur that makes excellent jerky and fruit snacks. Dehydrating a pound bag of frozen carrots, however, took almost a day and took up my whole dehydrator. I got perhaps 1/3 cup of carrots when I was done. Very space efficient! However, multiplying the time it took to see how long a three-month supply would take, and considering the cost of electricity and storage containers, sent me Googling for dehydrated vegetables in a hurry.
There are a few sources for dehydrated vegetables on the internet. The one that fit my needs best is Harmony House Foods. I get nice reusable plastic jars of veggies with a low shipping charge. There are sales a couple times a year, and there are small sizes so I can sample their product. After trying their samples and doing some math to check the cost of buying from them versus drying grocery store vegetables, I bought their pantry stuffer and started cooking with it. This is a collection of 16 quart jars of vegetables. Harmony House allows substitutions for vegetables you do not like, which was nice for me. I have a family member allergic to mushrooms.
Cans of dehydrated veggies are more expensive, although they’re packaged for long-term storage, and the shipping charges and annoyance of the Internet Grocer outweighed any savings from there. Other online stores had only small selections of vegetables. Perhaps another family’s solution would be to buy Harmony House to learn how to cook with dehydrated vegetables on an every day basis and then, possibly, buy cans for long term storage. Another option would be to buy large amounts of dehydrated vegetables and then seal them yourself in cans or buckets with oxygen absorbers.
Every person has to decide the best way to store food for themselves and their family. I have ended up choosing a 3-year cycle of the pantry stuffer from Harmony House. Harmony House claims 12-24 months of storage time for unopened jars, but I have seen and tasted no change at three years. Moisture is sealed out of the jars, and I keep them in a basement that doesn’t get very hot or cold. Commercial dehydrators are also able to get more moisture out of the vegetables then a home dehydrator typically can.
I cook all our meals from scratch, so always having a supply of vegetables on hand is very convenient. I never run out of vegetables anymore and never have to run to the store for a small amount of onion or celery that a recipe calls for. I just grab a jar from the larder. Cooking with dehydrated vegetables is rather easy. It takes just 15 minutes of soaking to rehydrate them. I use a slow cooker frequently and found I could dump the dehydrated veggies and the water in and not worry about it. Soups, too – just dump the veggies in with a bit of extra liquid, and off you go. Using dehydrated vegetables has become normal for me, making them fit the rule of, ‘Eat what you store, and store what you eat’.
I strongly recommend practicing cooking with your stored food. Learning how to cook with dehydrated vegetables for the first time during an emergency would not be pleasant. Experimenting with soups and stews in your warm, well-lit kitchen, however, can be fun.
My day-to-day vegetables are still fresh or frozen. When I run out of a vegetable, or when I am making a soup, stew or slow cooker meal, I now use dehydrated vegetables. You can’t see or taste the difference, and I end up saving a little on my grocery bill. At the same time, I’m taking the important step of rotating my storage food. My goal is to make sure none of the food I buy goes to waste. I usually manage it, too.
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Hawaii Honey
Thank you for the great low-down on dehydrated foods. I just bought a 9 tray dehydrator and am ready to start experimenting with different fruits and veggies.
I must tell you that the image of the baby in the cooking pot with the vegetables around it really bothers me.
Maybe because I just finished reading ONE SECOND AFTER.
juju_mommy
Great post! I'll add that it's a great idea to look into jars of applesauce too! Sure, they are kind of heavy, but they'd last for a long, long time. I have toddlers and so they eat it often and will continue to as they get older. Great source for vit C. Also, can be added to quick oats, wtih a little cinnamon, to make them tastier. You can also baked with it (replace part of your butter with the applesauce). Just a thought…
Debbie Cee
I agree completely. I'm working on a fruit post now, thanks for reminding me about applesauce. I am very willing to store fruit cans and jars, every bit of the product inside the cans and jars is nutritious food. With vegetables, I can't really consider the sodium laden liqid in there 'food'.
TheSurvivalMom
One use of the liquid in canned veggies is to pour it in with your rice or pasta to give it more flavor. Maybe you could use it to steam fresh veggies? I haven't tried doing that yet.
Debbie_Cee
Where you are, every bit of liquid is valuable, right? In your place I'd probably find room for canned vegetables because I'd also be storing the water in the cans. For me, I have to work to keep the inside of the house from geting too damp with all the rain and humidity outside. I do not need the liquid in canned veggies.
I'd probably use the veggie liquid to cook in rice? That would be very efficient. I think, but I'm not sure, the veggies are basically cooked in the can. Its the case for home canning at least. If that is true, by using the liquid, you get some good vitamins and nutrients.
.
LizLong
You can also dehydrate applesauce into fruit leather.
TheSurvivalMom
My kids love applesauce fruit leather. Sometimes I'll add some pureed cherries or berries for a different flavor. Then, I have to hide it! LOL
TheSurvivalMom
I wanted to make a comment about Harmony House. At first, I was dismayed by the packaging, obviously not intended for long-term storage. But I now realize that HHouse has a different purpose than Honeyville, All in One, and so many others. HHouse foods are meant to become part of your everyday cooking, which, naturally, makes their packaging different. I'm thinking of possibly buy some HH products that I haven't been able to find elsewhere, and then repackaging them in mylar bags with an oxygen absorber.
Jan
Great post! Its nice to see what others are trying and how its working out for them.
I have a 9 tray excaliber and it gets used non stop for weeks at a time. It paid for itself within a few weeks of use. We are a gardening family and put away food to use all year long. Right after I got my excaliber, I found the videos for dehydrate2store. I was hooked. We live in a small town where there are alot of older homes with established fruit trees. My friends and I pack up our kids and go ask people if we can pick the fruit on their trees. Only one person has ever told us no. In return, we bring them some of the finished products. We pick berries and fruit to can, freeze, and dehydrate. We use the berries and fruit in ceral, granola bars, desserts, muffins/breads, pies, etc. We grind it up and use as a topping for yogurt, applesauce, and muffins. We use veggies for soups, casseroles, stew, dip mixes, etc. I add dehydrated veggies to meats that are slow cooked in the oven or crock pot. If you grind down veggies and herbs, you have the perfect soup base, dip mix, etc.
Debbie_Cee
That is great! How lucky you are to have such nice neighbors. We go to u-pick places for fruit and have found a place raspberies grow wild. Unfortunately, all the wildlife and a few neighbrs know where it is too…
I should have bought the 9 tray, but didn't realize how much space I could use. The 4 tray looked very big back then.
Different vegetables can add nice flavors to pasta sauce too. I love experimenting with that.
Jan
I wish we had u-pick places nearby. We live 100 miles from any cities. We have several small towns within 40 minutes of here, but they are smaller then we are. Living in small towns has its advantages. Many of the older people living in older homes with established fruit trees love that younger moms want to can foods for their families. The younger people living in older homes with established fruit trees don't want to use the fruit and don't like the mess it makes. So its a win-win for us.
1rightwingmom
Debbie, Great article. Can you post a few of your favorite recipes using Harmony House veggies?
Debbie_Cee
I'm sorry RWmom, I don't really do recipes anymore. I have a recipe book called 365 ways to clook chicken and another called the Everything Slow Cooker Cookbook. I used them until I got a kind of a feel for how things worked, then became a 'whats on sale' and 'what would be fun to try' type of cook. Even my pasta sauce never tastes the same way twice.
Just try adding different vegetables to your favorite recipes. Add a smalllish amount of things at first to develope your own feel for cooking. In an emergency, I think we would have to do a lot of improvising, why not try it sometimes now?
Sue
Thank you for this great post. I have been using dehydrated and freeze dried vegetables for soups, chili, and stews for over a year now. It is total freedom as I can use as little or as much of each as I want. I have also used the onion and celery rehydrated in potato and macaroni salads with no complaints. It has given me a way to introduce these foods to my family without fussing on their part. Fresh, frozen, canned and long term packed veggies are all in my master plan.
Debbie_Cee
Aren't master plans great? It takes a lot of thinking and work to teach kids to appreciate all the different vegetables.. Mine are still firm in their dislike of cabage though, darnit. Cabbage has vitamin C and lots of other good things in it. I'm still putting little bits of cabbage in slow cooker dishes and hoping they'll get used to it.
Red Icculus
This is a great post with lots of thought put into it. We personally don't buy any commercial products, but we do can, freeze, and dehydrate as much as we can. Foodsaver should give us a lifetime supply for the endorsement.
Debbie_Cee
I have a 45 by 30 foot garden that my kids and I are learning to grow vegetables in. This is our third year – we still aren't very good at it. We can grow: zucchini, cucumbers, radishes and tomatoes. Our green beans, carrots and asparagus die so far.We are bravely trying watermelon and hot peppers as new items this year, and trying green beans once again. wish us luck!
Obviously there is no way we can grow enough vegetables for the 6 of us. I am settling for learning how to grow some vegetables, and hoping I will never have to depend on that knowledge. Congratulations to you, Red, for having the skills and land to grow your own vegetables!
Barbara
You should be able to grow nearly all the vegies for a family of 6 in the space you stated. I get most of what I need from a similar space. Perhaps you need more compost? Green beans should be one of the easier plants. I don't know what you need of course, not knowing where you are or what your soil condition is.
Contact your Agriculture Department Extension Agent for your area. It costs you nothing to ask them questions all day, and they know YOUR area. Get on-line to the garden sites.
I've seen small suburban yards that resemble tropical jungles for all the goodies they grow. I wish you best of luck, and don't give up, you'll get the hang of it.
TheSurvivalMom
This comment came via email from Krzysztof Lis in Poland.
In Poland it is very common to store vegetables pickled in glass jars.
My
Wikipedia says that pickling can preserve foods for months, but from
my own experience I may say that it preserves foods for years.
family often prepares pickled cucumbers (both in brine or vinegar) and
some other vegetables (chopped pumpkin, beetroot, pepper, and of
course cabbage). My favorite: cucumbers in brine (for sandwiches,
salads, and as an easy dish for dinner), cabbage (also in brine, to
be eaten cold or as a part of bigos) and bell pepper (for
sandwiches and salads).
Pickled vegetables are good to eat even after 5 or more years, if the
jars are kept sealed. My family often prepares too many jars of
certain kind, much more than we can eat in one year.
Preparing pickled vegetables is very easy (you prepare the mixture of
brine/winegar and vegetables) and cheap. You can surely do it
yourself.
Drawbacks? I can think of two: picked vegetables are rather heavy and
take a lot of space, when compared to dried ones. Also, the jars are
somewhat fragile.
Kathy
Can I send this to my daughter by a link?
Kathy
Is that the whole site? Vegetables, nothing about meat. I only see the one page.
Michelle in ID
Wondering if anyone knows or can direct me to this information. I'm thinking about using the #10 cans with plastic lids you can buy at the LDS store houses to store home dehydrated foods. Curious about the shelf life with and without an oxygen absorber. Thanks for all the terrific info here!