buckets and food storage
 

I just put in an order for 400 mylar bags (8"x8") so they are smaller, tradeable, and I only have to open a little bit at a time.

I bought a table top sealer because I have a LOT of food I need to store seal up (500 lbs of rice/wheat/and beans). Both from Sorbentsystems.com

I also bought 12 "gamma seal" lids to put on some buckets, but I want to get the buckets locally because buying buckets online seems expensive. Do the buckets need to be "food grade" since they won't actually be touching the food as it is inside mylar bags? Any recommendations on where to pick up some buckets?

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Local donut bakery - I score about 5 buckets a week - they are typically the 3.5 gal size. About half have a rubber gasket seal in the lid.

Sometimes they make me pay $2.00 a bucket. I have nearly 100 in storage.

Re: buckets and food storage
 

They don't have to be food grade if bagged in mylar. The only cheap source of buckets I know of are pickle buckets from MacDonalds (check Craigslist). I bought some for $2 apiece with lids but the gaskets are poor and you have to deal with the pickle smell.
If I had to do this over again, especially if I intended to trade, I would go with mason jars. I would rather buy rice or beans from an individual if I could see the merchandise through glass and see the convex on the lid.
But since you already have the bags, you could put them in pickle buckets. You have to wash them out real well or the pickle smell will go through the mylar I'm told.

Re: buckets and food storage
 

I use 5 gallon buckets from Emergency Essentials, but I didn't mind the price since I was only buying 12, and I plan on keeping these same buckets for the rest of my life. I may have to buy new lids / seals at some point. I also use 1/2 gallon mason jars. You can order them from ACE Hardware's web site; free shipping to their store. If you are really wanting to go cheap, you can use those large plastic trash cans, new of course. It would not provide a vacuum, but you could duct tape a seal for bugs.

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Thanks guys, I already have about 200lbs of rice/beans/corn/wheat packed in 1/2 gallon jars. I do like that method a LOT but I just recently moved and the jars add a LOT of extra weight that I was hoping to get away from with this next batch of storing them.

I do like the 1/2 gallon jars though like I said and I have quite a bit put away, but I know I'm going to be moving again sometime as I'm only renting this place and it was a bear to move all of that last time!

Also I wanted to try this method too as it seemed cheaper in the long run then doing the jars! I'll be doing dehydrated veggies in the jars though as I just got my excalibur dehydrator...I've used it twice and we've already eaten everything I dehydrated so I'm hoping I can get some put away sometime!

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Craigs List and local Walmart sell buckets cheap!

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Very smart, the one gallon size is perfect and you can use those big, cheap, square plastic storage containers to pack them in.

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Yeah, I saw buckets at walmart tonight for $3.97 each, 5 gallon sized. I doubt they're food safe, but inside the mylar who cares?

Extra $1.50 for a lid with no seal. I bought the gamma lids so I should be good to go! Hopefully they fit the walmart buckets.

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Yeah, I can't really picture how much the bags I bought will hold. If they are too small I may try to trade some of them with a survivalist friend that I have.

If I can't do that then mylar bags that I can seal myself will always have a use for something...shipping things in the mail, packing gold/bullets with o2 absorbers/dessicant for deep moisture free storage, etc...

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Are those the 7.5 mil. bags? Those seem awfully thick for basic food storage. I'm using the 3 mil 10X14 bags at the moment, although 8x8 would be a better size to be able to fit more bags in a bucket. Are the 8x8 bags available in 3 mil. thickness?

Re: buckets and food storage
 

The 10-by-14-inch bags from Sorbent Systems are just the right size for 5 lbs. of rice, beans, etc.

Re: buckets and food storage
 

we have a supermarket that sells used food grade buckets for $1 each. 5 gallon, 4 gallon, 2 gallon, all $1 each.

actually, this sounds like a good application for Craigslist. either to find out which store in your area has a good deal, or to hook up with a bucket collector that wants to thin out their bucket collection.

Re: buckets and food storage
 

They are the 7 mil bags. I picked them up because they have a special on them at the bottom of the page. @ $0.265 each they're some of the cheapest on the page. Even cheaper then their 4 mil bags.

Only bags I saw that were cheaper were clear bags, and I don't want clear bags.

I think they'll make anything you want if you put in a big enough order...

Re: buckets and food storage
 

I'll look around some more before I buy any buckets. I just want to stay away from used pickle buckets...I HATE pickles and I don't want my food anywhere near that smell...

Re: buckets and food storage
 

Hey Rup, I've been getting lots of these size buckets too and just storing them--packrat mentallity I think!!-- Anyway, what size mylar have you used? Seems a waste to use a 5-6 gal bag even though the bucket is the same diameter. But sorbent sys. doesn'tseem to carry anything else really.

Have you run across anything??

sb

PS I told my local grocery store bakery that they were for a Church food storage project. I had offered to pay for them but when they heard that they let me have them for free.