Living the Pantry Lifestyle - Keeping an eye on the consequences of severe drought and inflation

I was talking to my husband recently as I pulled veggies out of the refrigerator to use up before they spoiled.  I had to remove a few leaves of the romaine lettuce to find the unharmed leaves, cut off a couple bruises from tomatoes (not stored in the refrigerator), and clean up a couple other vegetables.

I was doing this as we were talking about limiting our trips into town since the price of gasoline has written so much since January.  When I was thinking of all of this, I told him that is why I named the Saturday blog posts "Living the Pantry Lifestyle".  

Because it is about so much more than buying canned foods to "put back".  It's a total way of living... from giving thought to ways we can extend our budget to thinking ahead of what food purchases may be like six months from now.

He had to throw away all of the canned goods his mother had in storage because she never rotated them and after she passed away, he and his brother found dozens upon dozens of rusted cans on the shelves in her basement.  When we buy without a plan to use everything, we do tend to waste food (ask me how I know!).

The more research I've done the past few weeks, the more I have come to realize how unstable the food supply now is in this country and in some other parts of the world.  For instance, the extreme drought is taking place in an area where much of our fruit, vegetables, nuts, olive oil, etc. comes from throughout the year. Not to mention wheat farmers having their crops dying in the hot, dry fields.

I've read that olive oil being sold to processors today has gone up around 140%.  We purchase the larger bottle of California Olive Ranch "California Only" olive oil, which is already expensive.  They do offer an option which contains olive oil from various countries but that is why I stopped using Italian olive oil. You didn't know what you were getting.

Because of its' price, I usually keep only one extra bottle of olive oil and add a bottle to my stock up grocery list when the backup has to be used.  However, this past month I added a smaller bottle to my cabinet where I keep various types of vinegar. I hope to add one small bottle for the next few months to have on hand as a hedge against inflation.

Most oils do not have a long shelf life, especially once they are open.  I believe coconut oil may have the longest shelf life.  I used to think Crisco had an indefinite shelf life until a friend had hers go rancid. I only use the Crisco (original) sticks in a couple of recipes so I keep only a few sticks at a time.  I will purchase more before the Holidays if needed.

I was watching a new-to-me vlogger talking about various oils and how long they last and she found quite by accident that the name brand oils such as canola, corn oil, etc. lasted longer in storage than the store brands.  She did her own research and came to the conclusion that is because store brand oils tend to be sold in thinner plastic containers than the name brand options, which caused the oil inside of them to deteriorate quicker.  Makes sense to me.

As I can add to my grocery budget, I plan to buy a large bag of almonds to either freeze or vacuum seal for a hedge against inflation as well as a very real possibility of shortages.  Something like 90% of almonds come from the drought areas of California.

As I mentioned before, the vegetables sold in cans right now are from last year's harvest so I haven't noticed a huge price increase in canned goods, yet.  I usually buy one or two cans at a time to "put back" but I learned from a prepper vlog that the 4-pack of various canned vegetables at Kroger to be a real savings. I checked on my last stock up shopping trip to Kroger and found it to be very true.  So a 4-pack of green beans came home with me.

Of course, there is so much we can talk about shortages and inflation that it will take a few weeks but one suggestion I'd like to make as a hedge against the inflation we have already seen is to purchase canned meats.  The price of Essenhaus canned meat at Kroger and Keystone canned meats sold in various stores have not risen so far.  I bought a can of the Keystone ground beef a couple weeks ago at Meijer for the same price a can of beef cost the previous month.

If you go on YouTube and do a search for Keystone canned meat reviews, there are quite a lot of them.  Most tend to be very favorable.  The thing about Essenhaus and Keystone canned meats is that they are processed in the can with only sea salt added.  I know there other brands like this that are not available in my area.  If you know their names, please add them in the comments.

I'm not sure about when meat is processed and canned but if it is similar to vegetables and fruit, then the extreme inflation that started in January and is expected to only get worse has not reached the canned goods on the shelf, yet.  However, common sense tells us it will eventually.

How do I know?  Because I've looked at the price of beef at the grocery store even now and find it hard to believe.  Chicken has also gone up but I have found the grocery store will still put chicken thighs at 99 cents a pound where I live, just not all the time these days.

As far as the e-mail service goes, I now have all the information sent to the amazing service that has been helping me and I'm hoping it was all done correctly.  As long as it was, then there is no need for anyone to re-subscribe.

There will be more pantry chatting next week, God willing!