Second annual Frugal March begins.
Last March, I set a goal of spending no more than $500 all month. A couple unexpected expenses came up, which I cheated and put on credit. But not counting those, I slid in roughly at goal.
Last summer, car payments entered the picture. They’re lowish as vehicle payments go, but … ugh. Between those and almost constant construction expenses, large or small, a $500 month seems long ago, far away, and downright impossible. I’ve been blessed by angels since then, though, and gotten through both car and construction with the help of friends.
Now late winter brings a break in house projects. Things are quiet. March is a good time to take a deep breath and get back to basics.
I’m not going to set a specific goal for this month. Just going to avoid optional spending, approach necessary expenses consciously, and get creative when I need something.
Do I ever go full retail when a thrift store is nearby? Well, yes, I do. They’re very unreasonable about bargaining for discounts at the grocery store and the gas station. But this month you can expect some reports from me about how food from those #10 cans tastes and whether pinto beans have a decent shelf life. It’s also time to see how last winter’s stored-and-stabilized generator gas goes in the Kia.
Frugal March? I’ve been doing Frugal 21st Century (pretty much as a sequel to Frugal ’90s).
Comes of being broke, and a lacka blog tip jar hits.
For those who buy #10 cans – I know they are cheaper/per, but how practical are they once they’re opened? How do you safely store the rest, or do you “use it up” immediately? I understand with a family, but for one person…
So far my experience has been that items in #10 cans have a longish shelf life even after being opened.
Some brands (Thrive, IIRC) explicitly say up to a year. I notice that Mountain House, whose entrees have real meat in them, say they keep only a week after opening. But I don’t believe they go to heck that fast. (Joel could tell us, given his recent experiment in Mountain House fine dining.)
I confess I have a few items I opened years ago that are still just fine — though I wouldn’t consider that to be a best practice and I wouldn’t do it with certain fragile products.
In any case, I don’t see why you couldn’t take food from #10 cans and freeze it.
Pat, IIRC, Walton Feed included a half-dozen plastic snap-on can lids with my order of several cases of their dehydrated selections way back when. The lids seemed to do the trick to maintain relative freshness for a few weeks, anyhow.
I haven’t opened a #10 can in quite some time, but I’ll be doing so again soon myself.
Some official word:
https://www.thereadystore.com/food-storage/998/shelf-life-open-10/
Freeze-dried: 6-12 months after being opened
Dehydrated: 3-12 months after being opened
Conventional dry foods like beans and rice: years
All assume storage in a cool, dark, dry atmosphere with the plastic lid on the can.
I had the same worries about survival food in #10 cans, but in the past year or two we’ve gained considerable experience with various sorts. Turns out that a #10 can doesn’t really hold such a daunting quantity of food that it can’t be consumed before spoilage becomes an issue, even for a single person.
I notice that Mountain House, whose entrees have real meat in them, say they keep only a week after opening. But I don’t believe they go to heck that fast. (Joel could tell us, given his recent experiment in Mountain House fine dining.)
I’ve had them open for a few months at a time with no change in perceived quality. Of course they started out nearly 40 years old so who knows. In any case they definitely never spoiled after opening.
Thanks to all for your info. I was looking up more about #10 last night and found a lot of what I needed to reassure me and know what to do.
If you have a pressure caner you can break the #10 cans down and re-can the stuff (some stuff) in pint jars or whatever. But you need a real pressure caner
I’m not sure if the Instant Pot is able to do canning or not, but some of its competition is able to. The Cadillac is the American Pressure Caner, but it ONLY does canning. And isn’t electric.
You can save crazy amounts of money in the long run. Plus you can usually arrange to buy stuff like green beans by the bushel from your local grocer.
Full info, I don’t do this myself. Though I do buy as much as I can via the warehouse clubs.
I should say, and the re-canning of stuff from #10 cans. Mostly the stuff like tomato paste, and beans, and such, not the expensive Mountain Home stuff.
The first of every month, in addition to paying bills and doing fresh clones of all my disk drives, I go the the big pantry and take out a batch of the oldest canned or preserved items in there. These items are consumed in the coming month, and are replaced by equivalent fresher items. When the bank account is low, we put off replenishment until funds are available. Naturally, funds being available, we take advantage of current bargains. This month Aldi’s had ground beef for $1.99 a pound so we stocked up for the freezer.
This is part of our regimen of Eating Cheap.
Zendo Deb — I’m sorry. I just found your two comments in the spam folder. It’s a little late, but thank you for the good ideas.