Whether it’s a result of living through a devastating hurricane with all the power outage results, or sheltering in place due to Covid 19 with all the food (and toilet paper) shortages, more and more people are getting serious about a back-up home-management and food supply.


And rightly so. It’s a simple truth that PREPARING NOW can go a long ways in helping us COPE LATER. Having your favorite spaghetti sauce, mayonnaise, toothpaste, or laundry detergent on hand makes stressful situations so much more bearable.

And since we keep hearing that this pandemic may well return (with a vengeance) come fall/winter, now’s a good time to seriously look at our food and home-management situation and stock up a little, if we can. I’m not talking hoarding, but rather, sensible planning for how we prefer living.

It’s with this thought in mind that I want to share some important information that Linda Loosli of www.foodstoragemoms.com recently shared. She reminds us that food should be rotated, just like it’s done in the grocery stores. The oldest products are placed on shelves and in refrigerator cases in the front so they’re purchased first. It’s called the FIFO system—first in, first out.


This is also the method we want to use when stocking our cupboards and pantry—oldest USE BY dates in the front, newest USE BY dates in the back. If you highlight these dates with a bright colored marker, you’ll have an easier time seeing these dates on the product labels.

Then we follow the motto: Store what you use, use what you store. I keep 4 or 5 weekly menus in a food storage booklet that I refer to often when making a storage list. I study these menus and can see at a glance what foods I use over and over to make my meals (cream of mushroom soup and bottled pasta sauce, for instance). Obviously, these are the things I want extra of.

And as we get into our food supplies, there are two things Linda says we want to do:

Keep an Eye Out for Spoilage. It’s an important practice to also pay close attention to any signs of spoilage. You may notice evidence of a dented can or seeping liquid from one of them. In that situation, it’s a good idea to go ahead and throw the product out so that you don’t run the risk of getting food poisoning. Bulging can tops are another indicator something is amiss.


Stock Heavier Foods on the Bottom. It’s smart to place heavier foods that come in cans or jars along your bottom shelf. The further a heavy object has to fall, the worse your smashed toe or explosion of food will become. Also, having the heavy items on the lower shelves helps to keep the shelving balanced and less likely to tip over.

And here’s my own tip: Keep a clipboard and pen on the door of your pantry or storage area or near your freezer, that holds an inventory page of what you’re storing. This way you know what you have, what you don’t have, and what you are running low on. This information is very helpful when making your grocery shopping list.


And speaking of grocery shopping, I always try to allow $5 to $10 dollars for items I want to store. An extra bottle of Ken’s Buttermilk Ranch Dressing or jar of Best Foods Mayonnaise, three or four cans of Trader Joe’s Tuna in olive oil, or a bottle or two of Dawn Dish Detergent, for instance. Adding a couple things to your pantry or home management storage each week is an easy way to build it up (and without that self-centered hoarding that we all despise).

I’ll close with one last thought. When you are prepared with extra food and home management supplies, you can worry less prior to a catastrophe, you’ll have less stress experiencing the catastrophe, and you’ll be more emotionally and physically available to help others experiencing the catastrophe! It’s not rocket science and it’s easy to do, so why not do it?