09:50 – There was some discussion yesterday about whether food in #10 cans is suitable for individuals and small families, or only large families or groups. The real answer is that it depends both on the types of food and on your budget.
Meats and other highly-perishable foods are best stored in smaller containers. Even a large family or a group may not consume an entire #10 can of meat in one meal or even one day. Yes, there are various workarounds, such as keeping a large container of pottage simmering for days or even weeks at a time, but it’s best to store meats in smaller cans that can be consumed in one meal. Most of the canned meats in our deep pantry are in 14- or 15-ounce cans, like Costco chicken. The largest cans of meat we stock are Keystone Meats 28-ounce cans.
But shelf life isn’t an issue for the stuff we store in #10 cans. A lot of that is long-term bulk staples from the LDS Home Storage Center: flour, rice, sugar, macaroni, spaghetti, non-fat dry milk, and so on. A lot of it is also stuff from Augason Farms: powdered eggs, butter, and cheese, TVP meat substitutes, Morning Moos milk substitute, and so on. All of these have rated shelf lives of several years sealed (and in reality much longer), but the important part is that their rated shelf lives after opening are typically one year or more. That means we’ll never need to use the contents of any of these #10 cans quickly because we’re concerned about spoilage.
The other issue is cost. A #10 can is expensive. LDS Home Storage Centers sell a limited selection of bulk staples in #10 cans and retort bags, and they sell basically at cost. But those #10 cans are still costly. For example, on our last Costco run, we bought 100 pounds of flour in 50-pound sacks. It cost $0.25/pound. The LDS HSC sells a 4-pound can of white flour for $3, or $0.75/pound, so the packaging cost is twice the cost of the food itself.
LDS also sells 7-mil foil-laminate Mylar one-gallon bags and oxygen absorbers for about $0.50 each in quantity 250. Each one-gallon bag holds about 6.67 pounds of flour, so repackaging 100 pounds of flour requires 15 of those bags, at a cost of about $7.50. One hundred pounds of flour in #10 cans from the LDS HSC costs $75, versus about $32.50 if you package your own. Your cost is $42.50 higher in the #10 cans. Or, another way of looking at it is that $100 buys you about 133 pounds of flour in #10 cans versus about 308 pounds of flour if you repackage it yourself.
In fact, if you’re really on a tight budget you can skip the bags and simply use free 2-liter soft drink bottles. Your $100 now buys you 400 pounds of flour, perhaps a bit less if you add a $0.10 oxygen absorber to each bottle.
Of course, repackaging it yourself requires time and effort and makes a mess, and neither the bags nor the bottles are rodent-proof like the #10 cans, but everything is always a trade-off. Don’t underestimate the convenience factor. It’s a lot faster and easier to buy the flour in #10 cans. They come in cases of six. All you need to do is drive to your nearest LDS HSC, pay for the stuff, and load it into your vehicle. Haul it home, unload it and transfer it to your pantry, and you’re finished. The time required is minimal, and for many people that’s more important than the higher cost.