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34K views 57 replies 39 participants last post by  CaffeineBuzz 
#1 ·
I hope I have posted his in the correct forum....I didnt see a forum for long term food storage

Because of increased family needs, I am going to have to store much larger quantities of food and I need a little advice...

right now I have stored my rice in the following manner... I buy a 2 lb bag, freeze it for a week, then toss it into the micro for 5 minutes followed by vacuum sealing the bag with my food saver.. I use this procedure to try to eliminate "buggy" rice that develops if you dont take procedures to destroy the micro eggs in the rice....

I need to buy bulk now (25 lb bags) and quite a few... whats the best procedure to eliminate the "buggy" conditions that develope in stored bulk rice over time?.. I'd hate to have to break down large bags and repeat the procedure I described above... any ideas?...thanks
 
#36 ·
How do you know that the bugs are'nt the most important micronutrient in the rice/beans? With the chemical way they raise food now, the food is not as nutritious as it once was due to the earth not being replenished-all chemical additives. Thats why your grandmother/grandfathers tomatoes and other stuff from their gardens taste so good(may not look perfect) and the stores are like cardboard. Insects are a very important source of protein and who knows what they give in the food you think is "clean"? If most people just knew what kind of bugs and such is present in our food they would never eat again. This past Thanksgiving we went to my son-in-laws mothers house and got one of her ducks that is only fed naturaly(only whats around her small place). I killed it and the wife cleaned it and our 2yr old grandson just loved it! It was great tasting and moist. I had some duck someone bought from a store and it was bad, cardboard tasting, dry, not worth even eating. I think everyone should goto a meat processing plant(they might not ever eat again). Right now I am looking for a good source of mylar bags and o2 absorbers.
 
#40 ·
Interesting that a three year old thread comes to life and the OP talks of the dollar losing reserve status. And now it is happening. This "re-birth" really deserves it's own thread as I never heard of Mylar DE-laminating like that. With all the talk of bugs, I have rice put into a deep freezer for two weeks, placed in Ocean Spray plastic bottles and put under the bed. I have never had bugs in any. Started this in 2008 and am currently using Jan 2009. I just bought 40lbs more. Going into the deep freezer today. I also store lentils and sugar in the juice bottles. Fits perfectly under the bed.
 
#43 ·
I really dont think freezing helps anything. it will kill bugs, but not eggs. ive known a lot about this from my cigar hobby, all tobacco has eggs on it. unless you have a super cold freezer it wont do anything. the only thing you can do for tobacco is keep it cool and dont let the humidity go to high. I imagine its the same for food. with the added benefit of an o2 absorber, I would think that even if the bugs did hatch, the lack of oxygen would kill them before they could do much.
 
#42 ·
What I did is portion out the rice so that
1. in the event the container is compromised i.e. bullet hole , the whole thing is not compromised .
2. if I am inclined to share some portions, the whole thing is not compromised.
3. If a single bag fails the whole thing is not compromised.
4. it makes it simple when preparing meals to simply grab the amount I need .
Each portion has an oxygen absorber including the bucket it's self.
 
#45 ·
I'm not sure why people keep trying all these other methods when mylar and O2 packs are inexpensive and work perfectly.


Nitrogen never works perfectly outside stringent control conditions and is also very costly to obtain those perfect conditions.

Vacuuming cannot pull all the atmosphere out of anything that isn't 100% self supporting at 29.9" of mercury stress, like plate steel. Any atmosphere left includes oxygen that ruins food.

All consumer plastic is gas permeable. It's only a matter of when the outside atmosphere gets in. Mylar works because it uses metal to stop that permeability.

Freezing doesn't kill insect eggs. Otherwise local bugs would have to migrate from tropical areas every year.

Bay leaves do not kill bugs. Bay repels bugs but in a sealed container they have nowhere to repel to and simply learn to adjust.


Again, mylar and O2 packs are not expensive and work like everyone wants them to without a bunch of fancy equipment or extra steps.
 
#49 ·
Time frame

Need some help here also. After reading numerous threads I have a question. I to have read to put rice and beans in freezer for a while to kill any bugs. My questions is I have left mine in the deep freeze in mylar bags, vacuum sealed with O2 absorber for a few months now and was wonder, will it hurt any of the food to just to take it out of freezer leave in bags and place in plastic buckets? Would there be a codensation issues? It was dry when placed in mylar bags.
 
#50 ·
Need some help here also. After reading numerous threads I have a question. I to have read to put rice and beans in freezer for a while to kill any bugs. My questions is I have left mine in the deep freeze in mylar bags, vacuum sealed with O2 absorber for a few months now and was wonder, will it hurt any of the food to just to take it out of freezer leave in bags and place in plastic buckets? Would there be a codensation issues? It was dry when placed in mylar bags.
Viper29, as stated by others, freezing it is really pointless. In a zero oxygen environment, the bugs will die (not from oxygen deprivation, but from dehydration interestingly; without oxygen, they can't metabolize the water they need) and eggs aren't a problem.

With what you already have, condensation on the inside will be very minimal, and it will disperse throughout the Mylar bag after it warms up. So you're fine.
 
#57 ·
Id used the 5 gallon bucket with a single large mylar bag + 2 larger Oxy absorbers.... packed in 2007

I opened them up last year and just finished eating it all. Not a bug or anything else.

I picked up 25# bags of Jasmine rice and froze them immediately and packed it up within a couple days of coming out of the freezer.


This time around, in restocking, I couldnt find a good price on large bags, so I ended up buying 10# bags a couple time a week until I had a good amount.

But, this time I got lazy, or busy anyway. I have more work and more kids this time around... anyhow, the bags sat in my pantry closet for a month or a little longer.... then the moths came. Once i realized that they were coming from the rice, I had to start packing right away.

I put the bags in the freezer to kill everything, which worked. Then I sifted it all to pick out the dead larvae & put it into smaller mylar bags.

I went with smaller bags (about 14 cups) for ease of moving them. I lose some storage space over a single bag/bucket however I can get into it without exposing the other 40# of rice.

Plus with smaller bags its easier to take along if you have to leave or smaller amounts are good for bartering if needed.... And, after my spinal injury, carrying a 5g bucket full of rice anywhere is out of the question.
 
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