Rotating the food that you store can be a difficult task if you don’t stay on top of it. While you can buy items for your food storage when they are on sale you need to keep track of food so that do not overstock items and waste food. It is also important to check the dates on your food and make sure that you are using it up on time. Here are five suggestions on easy ways to rotate your food storage:
1) If you have a lot of canned vegetables or fruit begin serving them with lunch as well as dinner. This will add another healthy item to the menu, and help you to keep up on rotating the items, which you use.
2) Set up a monthly menu where you eat about the same food every month. In order to avoid appetite fatigue I suggest having thirty or thirty-one different meals on this menu. If you know what you eat on a regular basis, then it is easier to plan and rotate the food. Some people prefer to have a different winter and summer months menu.
3) Remember to take into account the fact that your family might be shrinking or growing. I know several older couples who ended up with too much food storage, and couldn’t use it all because they kept on storing food as though they had children.
4) Keep a list of the items that you have on hand. That way you won’t go crazy when green beans are on sale, if you already have your supply of green beans.
5) If you discover that your food is set to expire in six months, but know that there is no possible way for you to eat it all in that time, give it to others. The local food bank could hand out the food to families in need, and it will be eaten and not wasted.