5 Gallon Buckets & Mylar - My First Experience

Good Evening ATS,

I just wanted to share my story of how EASY it was to use Mylar bags for Rice & Bean storage. I have had a ton of canned goods but had not gone to the trouble of storing long term dry goods before. Of course this was because I thought it was going to be a big freeking pain in the a$$ which to my surprise wasn't.

First, Let me tell you how inexpensive it was.

GFS (kind of like Costco) sells 50 pounds of Rice for $16.00 (So about .32 cents a pound)

Lowes sells 5 gallon pails with their logo on it for $2.30 cents. The lid sells for another $1.00


20 (5 GALLON BUCKET) 20x30 MYLAR BAGS + 25 OXYGEN ABSORBERS $52.00 after shipping (5 star rated ebay: stores.ebay.com...)


So, I started in my computer room sitting in my chair. I placed 2 buckets on each end with a board (actually a shelf) in between them to have a flat surface for the iron. I stuck a piece of cardboard on top of the shelf to have a nice flat surface.

Anyway, the reason to use the buckets was to have the proper height needed to iron the bags shut.

So, I put a mylar bag into the bucket, poured in about a 1/3 full of rice then twisted and shook the bucket to settle then filled it up the rest of the way. Threw in the oxy absorber.

Then I simply placed the remainder of the bag on the board and Ironed it 90% of the way shut. For even extra protection I duct taped the end of a baster onto my vacuum hose and had my wife suck out the rest of the air... while she pulled the baster end out, I ironed it shut from the bottom up. It worked wonderfully, vacuum sealed with oxy absorber and it was SO easy (with 2 people of course for the vacuum).

Total cost: I will provide appoximate estimate:

For arguments sake, I will round down the rice to 25 pounds per bucket.

So, $8.00 for Rice, $3.30 for bucket & lid, $2.60 for the mylar and oxy absorber.

So about $14.00 -$15.00 (because you get a bit more than 25 lbs) per bucket once completed. That is about the same or just slightly higher than buying little bags of rice by the 5 pounds or less size except you have 5-10 years of long term storage with it now.

It was so easy. I am buying more along with dried beans this time.

(Note, the rice is to stretch my current inventory of canned goods. All the Chili, Soup, Beef Stew, etc can be poured over the rice (and beans) to really stretch out my food supply. I would not recommend storing just rice and beans alone.

This weekend, I am doing beans, spaghetti noodles and other dry goods.

Seriously it is to damned easy, I don't know why I didn't do this before.

One Note: You need to have the materials to do 10 -12 buckets, the oxy absorbers come in sealed packs of 12 or 13 and need to be used as soon as possible once opened (they start working quickly, getting warm). I did 10 buckets of rice and one of beans (using 2 oxys for the beans because I had an extra one to use ad only had 11 buckets at the time.)


[edit on 15-12-2009 by infolurker]

been seriously considering this myself, I know there are ways to get the buckets cheaper or for free if you go around to bakery's, restaurants etc. Just need a little clean up. I would also suggest a food saver type thing, if you can afford it, helps a lot with long/medium length storage of foods.

As far as storing the full 25 pounds of rice/beans in 1 mylar bag, I would split these into 5 pound bags. The main reason is that you'll want to rotate your stocks and it's much easier to just use 5 pounds. With the full 25 pound bag, you'll have to re-seal and re-vacuum them when you're done getting the 1-2 pounds out that you'll need.

I totally agree with not just storing rice and beans, would get old really fast. Make small bags of seasonings and bullion cubes. Seal up bags of beef/deer/chicken/rabbit jerky, you can actually add these to stews and soups and they come out fairly tender after cooking.

Never tried the mylar, where do you get it? As far as oxy pacs I get them from vitamins, bags of beef jerky ect. Lentils, dried peas, barley, oats, flour, nuts. Honestly though I have has trouble storing bullion long term. Any advice on what I am doing wrong, it goes bad in just a few months. Homemade jerky in a lentil stew, YUM!

We drop a dessicant (moisture absorber) packet into the bottom, fill in the rice, 'evacuate' the oxygen from the bags by blowing CO2 into it from a cylinder, throw a oxygen absorber on top and iron it tight.

With beans you dont use dessicent.

The rice buckets / lids literally buckle inwards from the oxygen absorbers 'sucking'. With a mylar bag of beans (outside a bucket), the bag gets so tight you can see and touch each individual bean touching the surface. YOu could literally bust someones head up real good with ones of these. It was so effective in 'vacuum sealing' the bags I'm concerned it might crack some of the beans (each bean is a seed).

[edit on 28-12-2009 by IgnoranceIsntBlisss]

I find that freezing the grain is a good idea. It will minimize or eliminate the insect grown. Otherwise, someday you're going to open a bag full of tiny black bugs and rice.

Fill it with CO2 gas and oxygen absorbers and the bugs should die just like you or I. Theres another thing you can do for that, but I cant recall wwhat it is right now.

Since it is winter and 25 degrees, grabbing a couple hundred pounds of rice and throwing it in the garage for a couple of days should do the trick pretty well.

I did a thread on this a few months ago,here's the link.
I hope you find some of the info useful.
DIY - Long Term Food And Seed Storage

wHERE DO YOU GET MYLAR BAGS ANYWAY?

Originally posted by The Lord and Savior
wHERE DO YOU GET MYLAR BAGS ANYWAY?

Ditto
second line

Originally posted by calstorm

Originally posted by The Lord and Savior
wHERE DO YOU GET MYLAR BAGS ANYWAY?

Ditto
second line

What is a Sorbent System?

Mylar Food Storage Bags

How long with something like this store?

Originally posted by MiLAN66
How long with something like this store?

Depends on temperature and the type of stores.
for instance at 65 degrees...
Soft grains=25 years
Hard grains=30 years
Beans=25 to 30 years
Rice (white)=25 years
Rice (brown)=2 years (at the most)
Pasta=20 yrs

DIY-Long Term Food and Seed Storage


[edit on 19-1-2010 by The Utopian Penguin]

Thanks for the great post -- just purchased 50x 1 gallon bags + oxy absorbers from the same seller on eBay, can't wait to get started!

I chose the 1 gallon bags simply because I like to pack in smaller "day sized" quantities, that way I don't have to re-pack what I don't use.

This is a great solution for me since my only storage area left is a storm cellar, and although it doesn't leak, it is kindof damp down there. I would prefer to move all my supplies down there for space in the storage closet for other items, this may help me get there.

Uncooked Pinto beans are best stored for about a year. After a few years they won't soften up.

We opened a few cans that we had stored(DIY), and gave them to a farm hand. He soaked them and cooked them and they were still not soft. They were still crunchy.

I spoke with my mother(80) who was raised out in the sticks and she confirmed this. She said they only last about a year then you throw them out when the new harvest comes in.

If you don't have Diatomaceous earth, get some. It's ground fresh water shells that acts as razor blades to bugs but is edible to humans and animals. When your good become infested it just takes running it through DE and you are free from critters. It can also be used as fly and flea repelant as it slices open tiny eggs. I use it on my quail and cats and in my dry good storage area.