Between inflation, extreme weather events affecting crops, and geopolitical conflicts, it is more important than ever to have food security for your family. The USAID defines food security as “Food security means having, at all times, both physical and economic access to sufficient food to meet dietary needs for a productive and healthy life. A family is food secure when its members do not live in hunger or fear of hunger.”
For me, being food secure comes from having a year’s worth of food stocked in our home. Knowing that if something were to happen like an illness or job loss we wouldn’t have to worry about food.
A pantry is a pantry whether you use it for prepper foods or as a working pantry. I do bulk buy things like baking supplies, flour/sugar/yeast, etc. but you won’t see me buying thousands of dollars worth of freeze-dried meal buckets to use for an emergency. Homesteading gives me a natural advantage when it comes to food security and emergency preparedness and it can for you too. You don’t need acres upon acres to do it.
During the summer months, we can, freeze, dehydrate and ferment the excess harvest for winter. Instead of tin cans sitting in the pantry or MRES stocked away, we rotate our food storage, eating through it during the late fall, winter, and early spring. The goal is to have enough of an item to last us until the next harvest. Learning how to cook from scratch and incorporate preserved foods into meals is not only a more affordable way to eat, but is also way healthier. You control all the ingredients that go into your food.
I personally believe that the homesteader’s way, having a working pantry, is far superior to a straight prepper pantry because it is healthier, tastier, and a renewable resource of food.
Here is a list of ways anyone can increase their family’s food security.
This is the number one way to increase your food security. Many people think you can just purchase one of those emergency seed kits, store them, and then plant if the need arises. The truth is gardening is a lot more nuanced than that. Knowing how to set your garden up, companion planting, what varieties work well in your climate, your soil nutrition, when to plant, and I could go on listing so many more things that are so important to have a successful harvest. My favorite saying is ” The difference between a good gardener and a bad gardener is the good gardener has killed more plants”
Even if you are in an apartment or in the city, there are community gardens you can join. Grow bags for balconies. Even growing herbs in your window is an option.
Seed saving is the practice of collecting, storing, and replanting seeds from plants you’ve grown, preserving genetic diversity and enabling self-sufficiency. It saves you money by eliminating the need to purchase seeds each season. Did you know saved seeds adapt to your local growing conditions, leading plants that yield better harvests? This process also contributes to the conservation of heirloom and rare plant varieties saving them from potential extinction. Check out my post on seed saving here.
Learn how to safely can your food. Know what should be pressure canned and what can be put in a water bath canner. Not a fan of canned food? Thats ok! You can dehydrate, ferment, and freeze instead. It’s good to have a wide variety of preserved foods that serve different purposes. Dehydrated fruits are an awesome snack. Throw dehydrated veggies in broth and make a soup. Ferment your own salsa, hot sauces, or sauerkraut. Freeze peppers for fajitas, green beans for stirfry, and broccoli for meals. There are so many vegetables and fruits you can freeze and use in your cooking. I’ve found that when I freeze them myself, they don’t have that weird freezer taste that store-bought frozen vegetables have.
Preserving what you grow saves you money and makes healthier, tastier meals. You control the ingredients that go into what you preserve
Most people do not realize that meat from your grocery stores and a lot of local farms comes from hybrid chickens, either cornish cross or rainbow rangers. They won’t live long enough to breed before their hearts give out or their legs break. They are bred to grow very fast in a short amount of time with the most meat possible.
If your local ordinance allows, get heritage chickens. They are super hardy and can be bred if necessary. Most heritage breeds are dual-purpose, meaning you can have them for meat or eggs. This coming year we are adding a rooster to start hatching our own chicks. It is really easy and fun to do. Find my Backyard Chicken Guide here.
Like most people, I do not have enough space to grow all of my family’s yearly grain consumption. I purchase grains in bulk because it is more affordable, we use them all the time, and if properly stored grains can last decades. When you buy food in bulk, IT MUST BE STORED PROPERLY. Check out my post on The Basics Of Food Storage for an in-depth guide on building your storage pantry.
Aside from grains and dry goods, store a year’s supply of canned goods, dehydrated foods, and fermented foods. When cooking from the pantry you want options. Surviving on grains and canned foods is doable but you will probably get sick of it really quick. Having vegetables stored in different ways gives you variety in your diet.
For example, I can, freeze and dehydrate green beans. Canned get used as a side for meals, frozen are great for stirfry and roasting in the oven, and dehydrated are great for soups and casseroles.
As beautiful as ornamental trees, shrubs, and bushes are, with the small size of yards we have nowadays and the low water in a lot of areas, we should really be planting food-producing landscaping instead. Berry bushes look great year-round. Grape vines are great for trellising fencing and gazebos. Strawberries make beautiful ground cover. There are so many beautiful edible plants.
Cooking from scratch means different things to different people. It could be a meal kit from the grocery store because you didn’t go out to eat or order delivery that night. Others might think buying veggies, meat, and rice from the store and making a stir fry is cooking from scratch Then you have the hardcore cooking from scratch. Like making homemade pizza from the cheese you make a few weeks in advance, topping with homemade canned sauce and veggies you’ve grown and preserved with meats you cured yourself from animals you’ve grown.
I am nowhere near the hardcore stage nor do I want to be. Would it be nice to be able to make my own cheese and dairy products? But for my family size having a milk cow just doesn’t make sense. For me, there is a healthy balance you can have between the store-made frozen meal kit and the hardcore make-everything-from-scratch. Learn to make what you can from scratch from the items you store in your pantry. You will save money, have healthier foods, and spend less time in the grocery stores. Learn how to make things from the raw ingredients and have the skill to cook completely from scratch if you really needed to.
Sources: https://www.usaid.gov/agriculture-and-food-security
