Food How do you store your grocery store canned food?

nomifyle

TB Fanatic
I was looking at those first in first out can racks. They would not work for me because I have hundreds and hundreds of cans. I was using the case bottoms but I got a bug infestation and threw out what I had and didn't get anymore for a long time. I have a handle on it now and scored some of those cardboard bottoms yesterday. So I went into my pantry room and started to load them up. It was like a pin drop in a bucket. So now I'm overwhemed again.

Judy

I was in for a rude awakening. One bottom usually holds 12 cans.
 

SouthernBreeze

Has No Life - Lives on TB
I was looking at those first in first out can racks. They would not work for me because I have hundreds and hundreds of cans. I was using the case bottoms but I got a bug infestation and threw out what I had and didn't get anymore for a long time. I have a handle on it now and scored some of those cardboard bottoms yesterday. So I went into my pantry room and started to load them up. It was like a pin drop in a bucket. So now I'm overwhemed again.

Judy

I was in for a rude awakening. One bottom usually holds 12 cans.

I store and stack mine the same way you do. When I shopped at Save-A-Lot, I always bought cans of whatever by the flat. I saved all those flats as I emptied them. Today I still use them to fill up, then stack. I rotate the flats and stacks, instead of individual cans. All are dated, so I can keep up with it. I never have had a problem with bugs in them, and I've been doing it this way for years. I still buy canned items by the flat when I can. That's one reason I like to buy things by the case from Sam's. They are easily stackable.
 

SouthernBreeze

Has No Life - Lives on TB
Another reason I like to use the empty flats and refill, is that if you run out of shelf space, you can begin stacking the flats in your floor. That's what I've had to do. It works the same for buying in cases. I don't stack over waist high to keep the stacks from possibly falling over.
 

aviax2

Veteran Member
Through the years I’ve bought a few of those FIFO can racks along (too expensive for me to buy all at once) until I now have several, and I use them in my working pantry on metal shelves. Most canned goods we buy in bulk by the 12 can or 24 can case are in cardboard containers and are stored in the cardboard they come in, in a small pantry in our basement. When I need to refill in the working pantry DH brings up what’s needed and loads the rack. It has helped tremendously to be able to rotate things and keep better track of what we have regardless if it’s something we use a lot of or things we only use maybe 6 to 12 cans of in a year.
 

moldy

Veteran Member
I know it seems like a lot of work, but I pull mine out almost every year and reshelve according to dates. Most of my food is home canned, and seals need to be checked, so it's a big deal, but not really. I try to do this in the spring, so I have an idea of what I need to can up as the garden progresses. Right now, I"m low on home canned slaw, so that will be a must once the cabbage starts coming in. And I keep a lot of lists - I just need to remember where I put them...
 

nomifyle

TB Fanatic
I know it seems like a lot of work, but I pull mine out almost every year and reshelve according to dates. Most of my food is home canned, and seals need to be checked, so it's a big deal, but not really. I try to do this in the spring, so I have an idea of what I need to can up as the garden progresses. Right now, I"m low on home canned slaw, so that will be a must once the cabbage starts coming in. And I keep a lot of lists - I just need to remember where I put them...
it is an overwhelming amount of work, but I'm going to break it down into a shelf at a time. As I'm going through what's on a shelf I'm putting the date on top. Since the middle of 2019 I've done a huge stock up and did not date the cans. It seems like each shelf on a regular book case shelf has at least 60 cans on it. I have five of those shelving units. I have some large wire shelves but don't have the liners on the shelves and the cans tip over.

I did one box bottom and got tired. I'm old, although healthy, I get tired easily. Everything makes me sleepy. so off to do another box on the same shelf.

God is good all the time

Judy
 

Jeff B.

Don’t let the Piss Ants get you down…
We've gone through a few methods/ideas. We've reduced what we keep in canned goods, but keep almost all of the canned goods in a walk in pantry we made from some less useful space/cabinets. There was a closet style pantry and a butlers pantry that mostly collected the kids book bags, books, phones, etc... we took both of them out and replaced them with a shallow walk in pantry with two full lite style doors. All the cans are on shelves and get dated and rotated as we buy. I know the dates on cans are "best by" but we keep pretty close on dates and haven't had anything go bad in a while.

As an example, during our recent "cold wave" we only needed to pick up a few perishables (milk, bread, fruit) after a week of the weather, and that was with youngest daughter and SIL staying over as they had no power. I do keep a fair amount of dry stores in a climate controlled closet/small room sealed in mylar and 5 gallon buckets for real emergency use.

By staying more on top of what we have, buy and use, I think we actually spend less on food and are more efficient in using it and have reasonable stocks.

Jeff B.
 

moldy

Veteran Member
Slow and steady. I honestly get thru mine maybe every 2 years. On one hand, it's just DH and I now -so I'd love to downsize a bit. But when TSHTF, who knows how many it will be? Up to another dozen at least.
 

SouthernBreeze

Has No Life - Lives on TB
Slow and steady. I honestly get thru mine maybe every 2 years. On one hand, it's just DH and I now -so I'd love to downsize a bit. But when TSHTF, who knows how many it will be? Up to another dozen at least.

I try to keep my stock on a 2 year rotation, too. I have some items that are older, but when opened, they are still fine.

It's much easier to keep track of what one has and when it was bought if you date and rotate every time you restock.
 
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