Storing Some Pasta
Seeing the inflation occurring as well as the continued economic malaise, our family has continued to add to our food and other stores regularly. We picked up 10 pounds of pasta and another 30 cans of vegetables this weekend at Publix from their Buy-one-Get-one section. That’s pretty much the only way we buy things now, as we’re just adding to our stores and not trying to fill a pantry.
This month, we’re also going to do a formal written tracking of all expenditures in the household, from the mortgage and utilities to a candy-bar at the gas station. I recommend everyone do it at least 1 month a year, as there is no better way to find the holes in your budget. When I first did it over 10 years ago, I found I was spending more than double my electric bill eating fast food!
I had planned on doing a little Youtube thing on our pasta storage, but my wife beat me to it and was already done when I got back from the warehouse yesterday! She did up 12 bags of pasta, 24 lbs. She also did a bunch of dog food that had been collecting, and that was another 40 lbs. I always find it odd it seems like we put away more food for our two dogs that combined weigh 11 lbs, than my wife and I do for ourselves. We will use up the dog food within a year or two as it has oils in it that can go bad, but we will get a lot more shelf life out of it being stored properly.
I recently read an article about waxing cheese.
http://preparednesspro.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/cheese-wax-will-save-us-all-2/
So I bought some red cheese wax I found on Amazon.com and waxed up a couple of 5# bricks. I plan on waxing 2 or 3 a month as the price has doubled over the years for these bricks. I cut them into 1# chunks and put 3 layers of wax on them. In a month I will eat one of the chunks to see the effects of a month without refrigeration. I wonder if mylar bags and the vacuum process would do the same?
I don’t know for sure, but I’ll do some looking around. If I had to guess I would say Mylar and vacuuming would only extend the shelf life incrementally depending on the variety, because of the milk-fat in the cheese (a cheese expert can correct my terminology if I’ve mis-spoke!). I would suggest dryer cheeses would be better candidates, such as Parmesan, for the same reason we store white rice over brown rice. (less to go bad)
Please let me know how the cheese waxing goes, as that is something I would love to try! Both my wife and love cheese! We regularly just have a meal of apple slices and cheese or kielbasa and crackers with cheese.