Whew! All the brain power I used to tally my recipe ingredients wore me out! Don't worry if that part takes a week. It is a bit of work. Take the time you need to not feel overwhelmed and to make sure it is is right. Step #3 - Pantry Inventory
I actually like this part even though it takes a bit of time. I stand in my pantry and just start recording everything that I have into my spiral food storage notebook. Many of the items in my pantry are not on my Week 1 ingredient list. That's OK! I still record it in my notebook. I have three columns:
- Item Name
- How much we have
- How much we need (don't do this part yet, just leave a column for it)
If you have a small house like we do, you have food storage located in several areas of the house...under beds, stacked in closets, in our garage storage room (in the Midwest you can do that, but in Arizona do not store anything in your garage!). I tally what we have on hand right now. This can take awhile if you have a lot or a depressingly small amount of time if you are just getting started. Don't worry! You are getting prepared and that is what counts.
Since we do have items scattered around the house, we made "maps" of what we have and where it is located. For example, we have boxes stacked in our closet and under our bed. The boxes are labeled from the top and the end so that we can see what is in each box. We have a diagram of what is under our bed so that I know which side and whether I should pull from the foot of the bed or the head of the bed if I need green beans for example. Mike is a great organizer and has helped me with this part a lot. We keep all the diagrams, "maps" and list of things together in a food storage binder that also has my spiral notebook in it. This way as we rotate it is easy to find what we need.
RSS Feed