I loaded up on salt and sugar last night at Walmart







It seems a shame to take the salt out of the round cardboard containers with the spout on them just to put them into the mylar bags



It is necessary to put the salt into the mylar bags like this or can I just store the salt inside a sealed plastic pail and leave them in their container





now to the sugar.

I plan on pouring the sugar out of the paper containers into the mylar and pushing air out by hand by not using o2 absorbers.

is this correct?

Salt and sugar do not require mylar and absorbers.

I keep mine in 3.5 gal, food grade buckets. Each holds around 25 lbs.

You'd prefer something air tight. Zip locks, over a long period, won't perform as well as a bucket.

+1

Just store 'em as air tight as possible.  Even if it solidifies...you crush what you need.

Better yet, divide them up between your other assorted foods, so they're not all in one place

We stock our salt and sugar in water-tight plastic tubs we got at The Container Store.

The containers hold 24 salt containers (which is about 39lbs).

Same tubs in the back for sugar.

We stock these (and not bulk) because they are a convienent size and as we use them we replace them.
The plastic tubs also stack nicely.

Correct.  Do not use O2 absorbers or you will end up with a giant sugar cube.

Go to one of the LDS canneries in your area.  They can help you package those items in mylar bags or #10 cans there - free.  Only thing you pay for is food items and packaging materials.

You don't have to take the salt out of the round containers, but it does waste some space storing them like that. If space isn't a problem, then keeping them in the round boxes is fine.

I don't know how many morton's salt containers you bought but the local food city and other places have 15 or 25 lb bags of table salt, I forget the weight on them since they are the biggest I found locally and I just buy em now and then.



I buy sugar in the big bag now and then as well.



With salt and sugar you don't need to use o2 absorbers and if you do use them the heat can make the sugar into a rock hard cube that you won't be able to crush up.  I don't know if salt has the same issue or not.



I have an old popcorn tin full of sugar.  I use it to refill the sugar thing on the counter and while the sugar gets clumped together it comes right apart with ease.  It clumps due to moisture in the air I guess.



And while salt and sugar don't need mylar I can somewhat see sealing them up on a dry day depending on what you are going to store them in.



I plan to store stuff in a metal 55 gallon drum so I want something like mylar that will last a long time but I am not worried about the outcontainer being an issue since the drum has a gasket for the lid and what not.



I am also the person who has a whole lot of canning jars full of stuff.  The quart size is nice and the jars are dang easy to reuse for whatever when empty.  So I have canning jars full of stuff I rotate.



I am looking at packing up a drum and maybe not opening anything up for a decade or two if I don't need it.



So going with small bags, 1 or 5 gallon size, and packing the drum full of various stuff is my plan.



Mylar might be overkill but I want the salt and sugar out of the paper bags they come packed in.



Overall I would probably just keep the mortons in its container and buy the big bags of salt.



If you bought 400 cans of mortons salt then yeah I could see opening a bunch up to pack the salt into a smaller space.

I have to ask ... what does one use 50# of sugar for?  I can see why a lot of salt would be needed if you're preserving a whole bunch of meat or fish ... but sugar?

I don't own any sugar, and can't think of a single time I wanted or needed any in the past 2 years I've been living on my own.

What are you guys using massive amounts of sugar for?  Baking tons of cookies with your hard red wheat?

Baking...but not just cookies.  Pie fillings use quite a bit of sugar.  Also, many jams and jellis (for the bread you're making with that wheat) use quite a bit of sugar.  Don't forget sugar for drinks, like teas, kool aid and coffee.  Those are just the things I can think or right now.

Well, sugar gets a bad rap because of the fatty pandemic, but Glucose is a carbohydrate, and is the most important simple sugar in human metabolism.  Glucose is oxidized in the body (metabolism), and produces carbon dioxide, water, and some nitrogen compounds and in the process provides energy which can be used by the cells.

Complex carbs reign supreme, but if there are holes in the preps, supplementing with sucrose won't hurt much. There is also the simple argument that calories are calories and we'll likely burn more if the world went sideways. Also, if the world went sideways, we're probably not eating as much processed foods or sugar-laden restaraunt foods.

And cookies are nice after a long day of slaying zombies.

Anyway, I'm not storing mountains of the stuff, but its cheap and easy to have a lot on hand.

How about this?

#10 Can Salt

#10 Can Sugar

I make wine and hard cider That sucks up a lot of sugar.

I won't store much more than 15 pounds.

some for making bread with and maybe some for trade goods





 

So you don't eat candy, peanut butter, ice tea, ice cream, sugar in hot tea or coffee, cake, cookies, jam, jelly, pie or wine ?  Most people for the last few thousands of years have a craving for sweets, and they are loaded with calories.

If your idea of storing food is MREs and mountain house, there is lttle need for it.but if you are making stuff from scratch...  Plus it amazing how many recipes call for a small amount of sugar.

Just curious where di you get that container?  Looks like it seals well with the clips and it's see through.

You're asking what I currently eat?

I eat dark chocolate, the 88% cocoa expensive stuff.   Not much sugar at all added.

I eat peanut butter ... the kind with 2 ingredients, peanuts and salt.

I drink tea ... with honey if anything, but 99% of the time just plain green or white tea.

Other than that .. no, I don't eat those things you listed ... currently.  In SHTF, I'll probably be forced to be more flexible, but only to the extent that I have to be.   I don't eat things that I know are bad for the human body.

I store foods that are nutritionally dense and that will help keep me running strong in bad times ... I have a much different view than most on this forum, but this isn't the place to get preachy.

Honestly, most of what I eat cannot be stockpiled very well ... and the closest substitute goods are underwhelming to say the least.  

Thank you all for your answers regarding my inquiry.

Red.  

ETA - on the off chance you didn't know that The Container Store is a brand and not just a description of a store ...

The Container Store

Just want to point out, Iodized salt IS NOT good for pickling, preserving or using in large quantities for food.   It tastes very different at high levels of concentration like you would get in a brine.  The stuff in the cans is good for "half a teaspoon to soup" or "sprinkle on eggs or french fries" but you do only so much of that when living in 1800's food sources...

Whiskey !

Sugar is one of the pillars of civilization. It's good for everything. We need to stay away from it now due to the massively decreased energy expenditures our comfortable way of life provides. Modern farming vs. 1800s tech subsistence farming differ a lot in the way it puts strains on a human body. When preparing for as many eventualities as logical, storing a hefty amount of sugar and rotating it yearly/bi-yearly makes a lot of sense.

Canning.  Fruits in syrup, jams, jellies, even pickling recipes all use sugar.

+1

For my strawberry jam recipe I believe it uses 4 cups of sugar and usually only yields a couple pints. I could definitely kill a 50# bag in a hurry with a season of canning.




I have never noticed a difference in taste using iodized vs non-iodized salt for pickling. Just cloudiness from the anti-caking agents. I even found this article also stating...

"No statistically significant difference was found in the taste, colour or texture between pickles prepared using non-iodized salt and pickles prepared using iodized salt."
http://www.emro.who.int/publications/emhj/0202/05.htm

I have zero problem stocking up on iodized salt for canning, but I try to have a balance of both types.

In non-shtf world my family uses 10 times as much sugar as salt.

I store all my salt and sugar in 1 gallon Rubbermaid  "jars" .