How do you store food like a prepper? 4 Easy Methods & Free Printables for Shopping

Food storage is one of our favorite topics! Personally, as a foodie, it just makes sense. I want to know we have good, comforting food when we need it most. Plus, food is one of the Rules of 3’s of Survival. You can go for three weeks without food, which is good to know if you’re stranded somewhere. But most of us know that morale would start to dwindle before then. We get “hangry”. Plus we need the energy to carry on and function well cognitively. So we make food preparations a priority as preppers.  

Today we are just going to cover the basics. Food storage prep can become quite overwhelming and disorganized if you don’t go into it with a plan. We want to make this a smooth process for you but I understand that people come with different means and resources so, in the end, you’ll need to organize what works best for you and your family in a way that makes you feel confident and ready. 

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Basic Methods of Food Storage Shopping

There are a few ways you can approach this. Each has pros and cons and you might end up mixing them together too:

• 3 days’ worth of food and water, then a week, then 2 weeks, a month, and so on
• Shopping list based on a one-month menu plan
• “20 of everything” method where you plan to buy 20 cans of fruit, veggies, meat, boxes of pasta, etc.
• Premade food storage kits

3 Days’ Worth of Food and Water

This is a great place to start because many emergencies including storms, temporary illnesses, and injuries can be resolved in three days to where you would be able to get more supplies again. It will get you over the hump to where you can make further plans. It’s also a budget-friendly goal that can just get you moving in the right direction. Once you’ve completed this goal, it’s easy to move on to a week’s worth of food, and then two weeks, and so on. I liken it to planning for a camping trip.

Pros

• Budget-friendly
• Less overwhelming-pretty easy to write up 3 days’ worth of menus and then add on from there
• Initially doesn’t require a lot of storage space

Cons

• Some people do a big shopping spree for the 3 days and don’t move on to the week and two-week goals because it hasn’t become a habit
  • This can lead to forgetting about the preps altogether including not rotating food and using it up
• You could end up with quite a variety of items, which in my Tetris mind means fewer single-file columns of cans. I might be weird about organizing visually like that lol so maybe just me and not a true con

Food storage shopping list based on a one-month menu plan

If you menu prep on a regular basis, this method could be super easy for you! Gather up four weeks of your previous menus and make a master shopping list and bam!, you have a month’s worth of food to store for emergencies. You could bulk buy some of the items too.

Pros

• You should have more than enough food for most emergencies bar a complete collapse
• You’ll be buying an organized list of foods that you know you like
• If you have the financial means, you can simply double your groceries for four weeks in a row

Cons 

• Trying to take on a whole month at once might be overwhelming
• If you don’t have the means to buy at once or double your groceries, spreading a month’s worth of groceries out over a longer period of time could become disorganized or tedious which is when people tend to lose motivation

20 of Everything Method

This method is great for those who like the simplicity of counting and knowing that if they have that certain number of items in their inventory that they are good to go. I like this one because it’s visually organized in my brain and easy to check off but I can still have variety! I break the 20s into 5’s over four weeks so that I didn’t have 20 cans of fruits and vegetables but no meat.

Pros 

• It’s easy to add 5 or 10 or 20 cans, boxes, or bottles of an item to your grocery list and check it off
• You can break it up in whichever way best fits your budget
• It becomes a habit, making it easy to do continuously so that your food is rotated out regularly and you’re not having to eat it all at once

Cons

• You may have difficulty seeing your stock in complete meals
• You may want to do the math with the number of people in your family and how many servings you need and then work with that number vs a random number “20”

Premade food storage kits

I’m a major DIYer so I will honestly tell you I have not purchased a pre-packaged survival food kit. My husband has them on his wish list so I’m sure they’ll show up soon or later and I’ll give you an update. Having a variety of options is good though, so I’m not completely opposed. They have some great benefits as you can see listed in this article by Spruce Eats and can last up to 30 years. Primal Survivor reviews five of its favorite brands here.

Pros

• Complete meals
• Long shelf life
• Easy to prepare with hot or boiling water

Cons

• Some don’t taste very good
• Some are not nutrient-dense
• Some are more expensive if you’re attempting to buy the larger kits

Whichever method(s) you decide to go with, make sure each list includes some goodies or treats to help keep morale up. Whether it’s freeze-dried cookies or a jar mix that just needs water, a little comfort food goes a long way in an emergency.

We use heavy-duty shelves like these below because they are great for heavy cans, glass jars, and gallons of water. They don’t sag. They are easy to move. My daughter and I moved ours from one room to the next when setting up for a party.

Below are four free PDF printable meal planners to get you started:  

3 Days Meal Planner 

7-Day Meal Planner 

1-Month Meal Planner

“20 of Everything” Food Storage Plan