Best (cheapest?) places in PDX for bulk food?

[EZLivin]

I do some shopping online at Honeyville Grain ..

Honeyville, and Healthy Harvest (Vancouver) are my companies of choice for dehydrated at the moment. Have bought other items from the TheEpicenter and am pleased with their service. Between the three a lot of our food items are covered. One mistake I made in the past was not utilizing the products via rotation. Have only started doing that in the last few months. What I have found is by using dehydrated in recipes there is a lot less waste at our house. From that standpoint I think it is a good value. Wish I would have been doing that all along.

 

[MissJ]

well, I don't know if this is good advice or not; but I'll just tell you what I've done.

First off; a couple of years ago I grossly overpaid by buying freeze dried #10 cans of food....not generally a bad idea, but best to save for items such as powdered milk, butter, eggs etc. which have naturally shorter shelf lives... a #10 can of salt or rice is simply idiotic and needlessly expensive. And I am the proud owner of quite a few such cans....oh well, you live and learn, right?

For the past month I have been packing my own wheat, rice and beans in 5-6 gallon buckets at a fraction of the cost. I just buy the food from WINCO. a 25# bag of hard red wheat is $12.00, a $25# bag of rice is about $13.00 a #25 lb bag of sugar is about $10.00 a 25# bag of pinto beans is about $14.50.

in general a 6 gallon bucket holds about 35-40 lbs (depends on the density of the food) so you can do some rough math and figure about 3 bags will fill 2 buckets.

Some of the items you have to special order from a bulk-foods department manager/supervisor such as the hard red wheat...you order it and then it is available for in store pickup within about 2-3 days and no shipping charges. best of all, they let you do it all in cash and don't ask for your personal information....SO YOU BETTER NOT LOSE YOUR RECEIPT!!!!!!!

hope this helps.

I plan to visit the LDS store soon, next time I have a tues or thurs off I will try and go....

 

[Bunny]

#10 can of salt or rice is simply idiotic and needlessly expensive.

Not necessarily. What you can do is buy anything you want in bulk, and break it down into smaller airtight rations. Instead of keeping all of your foods separate in 10# buckets, diversify and get (10) 10# buckets and put a pound or two of each item in each bucket. Say with, a pound or two of: flower, sugar, salt, baking powder, baking soda, corn meal, rice, beans, noodles, potato products, or anything else you might want or need to prepare whole meals with. If you do this, you won't be opening large portions of long term food all the time and exposing it to air and moisture. It'll last longer, be easier to grab a couple of these if you have to move, and make it easier to share with others if you want to, without disrupting your own long term storage.

 

[MissJ]

Not necessarily. What you can do is buy anything you want in bulk, and break it down into smaller airtight rations. Instead of keeping all of your foods separate in 10# buckets, diversify and get (10) 10# buckets and put a pound or two of each item in each bucket. Say with, a pound or two of: flower, sugar, salt, baking powder, baking soda, corn meal, rice, beans, noodles, potato products, or anything else you might want or need to prepare whole meals with. If you do this, you won't be opening large portions of long term food all the time and exposing it to air and moisture. It'll last longer, be easier to grab a couple of these if you have to move, and make it easier to share with others if you want to, without disrupting your own long term storage.

Yeah, there is some wisdom in this. My basic point was that if you are on a limited budget and just starting out; it's better to store foods with naturally LONG shelf lives in buckets....the real benefit of the nitrogen or O2 packed #10 cans is that the shelf life is GREATLY increased this way....so it makes a lot of sense for foods like milk, eggs, butter powder etc. which would otherwise expire quickly. I learned (from the school of hard knocks) that I could have stored A LOT more food with the same amount of money if I had originally gone about it this way. When you are prepping for a family, a bucket of rice is going to get used up pretty quickly. If you are prepping for 1 or maybe 2 people and you are primarily concerned with that food being portable then a bunch of #10 cans is a good compromise; but you still pay a lot more per lb. of food than you have to...

 

[Bunny]

^

You can add oxygen absorbers to anything you repack. Most foods are cheaper per unit in bulk, although I do understand what you mean about not everyone being able to pay as much up front for bulk quantities.

If you're going through 10 lb buckets of rice faster and feeding more people, 10 lbs of anything else doesn't seem that needlessly expensive or idiotic to me. And if for some reason you have to change locations and there's only enough time to grab say, 2-3 buckets of your food storage, who wants to be stuck with a big bucket of just rice, one of just salt, and one of just sugar. It's not very sustainable and I don't know what you'd make with it. Plus diversifying your food rations leaves less chance of wasting a whole bucket of one of item if something should end up contaminated or unusable. And assuming you have canned or bottled goods as well, you my not use your larger dry storage as fast as you think. Not saying anything is wrong with storing things in large quantities though. I think it's good to have variety and do a little bit of both. JMO

Btw, your tractor in the other thread is really cool. I was going to comment there, but they try to keep it conversation-free.

 

[MissJ]

You can add oxygen absorbers to anything you repack. Most foods are cheaper per unit in bulk, although I do understand what you mean about not everyone being able to pay as much up front for bulk quantities.

If you're going through 10 lb buckets of rice faster and feeding more people, 10 lbs of anything else doesn't seem that needlessly expensive or idiotic to me. And if for some reason you have to change locations and there's only enough time to grab say, 2-3 buckets of your food storage, who wants to be stuck with a big bucket of just rice, one of just salt, and one of just sugar. It's not very sustainable and I don't know what you'd make with it. Plus diversifying your food rations leaves less chance of wasting a whole bucket one of item if something should end up contaminated or unusable. And assuming you have canned or bottled goods as well, you my not use your larger dry storage as fast as you think. Not saying anything is wrong with storing things in large quantities though. I think it's good to have variety and do a little bit of both. JMO

Your opinion is well received. and as it turns out either through folly or fate I actually DO have a little bit of both..... Our "relocation tubs" contain entirely different types of food (mostly MREs etc.) than our "long term storage" food...but that's a different topic entirely!!!!!

I guess since hind-sight is 20/20 and all, I wish I had only bought #10 cans of the more perishable products (such as dairy, eggs etc.) and had spent the money I would have saved on larger quantities of grains in buckets. That money savings would have put me A LOT closer to my food storage goal.

By the way, when you say 10lb buckets; I'm not quite sure what you mean? there are #10 cans which are roughly equivalent to a gallon, and there are 5-6gallon buckets (usually 6 gal buckets). the 6 gal buckets for instance typically hold about 30-40 lbs depending on the grain/staple. speaking in terms of pounds is greatly variable for instance rolled oats are a lot "lighter" than sugar or salt and so a 6 gal bucket of sugar is about 40 lbs, but the same 6 gal bucket of oats is about 20 lbs...

just some food for thought (haha pun intended....I'm such a dork!)

cheers!

 

[Silver Fox]

I plan to visit the LDS store soon, next time I have a tues or thurs off I will try and go....

My little brother went to the one in Happy Valley and I don't have the math at the top of my head but for around $400.00 he got 96, #10 cans (16 cases), labeled with O2 absorbers out the door.

Thought you might want to know.

SF-

 

[MissJ]

My little brother went to the one in Happy Valley and I don't have the math at the top of my head but for around $400.00 he got 96, #10 cans (16 cases), labeled with O2 absorbers out the door.

Thought you might want to know.

SF-

thanks for that!

WOW!!!! I am humbled as I recently spent nearly $900 for 78 cans from waltonfeed.com (a very reputable online long term storage food source). granted I was buying only the higher priced items such as milk, dairy, eggs, and TVP but even so...that is an obvious cost per calorie difference!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Basically, your post has reinforced to me that I need to try and hit the LDS store next time I have a few hundred bucks to spend on food....

 

[Silver Fox]

Basically, your post has reinforced to me that I need to try and hit the LDS store next time I have a few hundred bucks to spend on food....

He also did some canning while there. He, my nephew and two friends of ours went there for 6 hours and had a blast canning. He had my old toyota pickup stuffed full in the back (canopy covered). The whole truck looked like it was taking a squat out in the woods.

The folks there were really friendly, no religion or recruiting. The smiles went a 1,000 miles with those folks. The discussion of prepping was not some taboo topic but in full open and I think my brother sold some of the mormons on the idea of an AK.

I am trying to take some vacation time during the week so he can take me and I can fill the dodge instead. I'll let you know more as it comes closer.

SF-

 

[MissJ]

He also did some canning while there. He, my nephew and two friends of ours went there for 6 hours and had a blast canning. He had my old toyota pickup stuffed full in the back (canopy covered). The whole truck looked like it was taking a squat out in the woods.

The folks there were really friendly, no religion or recruiting. The smiles went a 1,000 miles with those folks. The discussion of prepping was not some taboo topic but in full open and I think my brother sold some of the mormons on the idea of an AK.

I am trying to take some vacation time during the week so he can take me and I can fill the dodge instead. I'll let you know more as it comes closer.

SF-

thanks! I would greatly appreciate some up to the minute info as you get it. The closest facility is about 35 mins from my house; which is totally do-able for us.

What I would like to know is do they stock some of the more "difficult" items such as milk, butter, eggs, peanut butter powder, heirloom seeds? If not, would they be opposed to you bringing in your own eggs and heirloom seeds (for example) and canning them yourself?

Eggs in particular are REAL tough to find these days...but at my place we DO have chickens so we could potentially dehydrate some eggs in our food dehydrator unit and then bring them to the LDS cannery and can them...that is IF this sort of activity is permitted.....I don't even know; but it is surely worth pursuing....

 

[Silver Fox]

MissJ:

Here is a thread I started about the storehouse in Kent, WA: http://www.northwestfirearms.com/preparedness-survival/30430-bishop-storehouse-kent-wa.html It applies to all the storehouses to include the one there in portland. Post #6 I have a link to the price sheet. If you go in and shop only, you will be able to buy cases (6, #10 cans) of Red hard winter wheat, pinto beans, white long grain rice and quick oats. Everything else you have to can on site. To can, I would recommend your smile and a bunch of thank you's. I am sure you can work your feminine charms (hhhmmmmmmm hhhhhhhhhhhhhmmmm.... you go girl!!! *shake head from side to side*) and find out when the next scheduled canning session you can join in like my little brother et al did. The one in Kent at the time was not able to take debit cards (and said they were working to change that), they like checks and cash. I was supposed to get about $6.00 back from my purchase and told them to keep the change and put it in the plate, they appreciated that. Everything is at cost so just don't get all giddy the first time you go (Like I didn't... ). They aren't going anywhere and will welcome you next time.

SF-