Storing food in Mason jars

I'm storing my dried beans in half-gallon mason jars. I'm really liking it because I can see exactly what I have. I just pour in the stuff and put a lid on.

Is there something I'm missing here? I've heard some people add a bay leaf to wheat or other stuff to prevent bugs.

DH just bought me 65 more quart mason jars at our DI this week... I'm thinking of using more jars for more things, like dehydrated foods, even grains and rice.

Is this a good idea? (Sometimes I think I have a great idea and there's some disastrous aspect I hadn't thought of.)

The only issue I see for storing in glass jars is being able to store them out of sunlight and the fragility of the containers.

If your were to have an earthquake event, your lible to have a mess on your hands.

Ifyou have those concerns covered or mitigated, I can not think of anything else.

Bugs do need to be dealt with but it looks like you have that figured out.

Should a put a bay leaf in each jar of everything... beans and split peas and lentils and everything?

I'm not worried about the light where they are and DH is going to rig extra supports in case of an earthquake, although that doesn't concern me very much where we are.

Not sure.

Hopefully ther is a better expert on bug proliferation than me that will chime in! :)

I don't know what to tell you about the bay leaf. I buy our wheat and beans in the fall and store them in the barn where they are thoroughly frozen within a couple wks, killing any varmits that might have survived the cleaning process. We have some that is 9-10 yrs old and are just fine with no other special measures.

Are you storing ALL your beans in Mason jars? Cause I gotta tell you that sounds awfully expensive. We store ours in 5gal buckets (free or almost free if you don't mind used. The lids are new--about $1 each) When we open one bucket, we put a Gamma Seal on it and then bring a 1gal ice cream bucket-full into the house. I use from the ice cream bucket till it's empty, then refill it from the barn. If I were doing Mason jars, I'd do the same--store the big buckets outside, bring a fillled jar inside for daily use.

LOVE those 1/2 gal Mason jars. Perfect size for canning apple juice. Where do you get yours? I wanted to replenish/add to my supply and I had a hard time finding some this fall.

Plus it would take up alot less space putting your grains/beans in 5 gal buckets.

Well, dozen of the 1/2 gallon jars were free from my MIL's place, so I figured I might as well try to use them... I know you can't stack them or anything, but I thought it was better than just having them sit around. I'm not sure if my canner is tall enough for them and being kind of a neophyte with canning, didn't want to tackle the 1/2 gallons for that purpose.

Another 10 I found on ksl.com for $1 each. The man was about 75 and said they were from his wife's grandma and it was breaking her heart. None were chipped, either. Yay! I thought that was an okay deal, so I got them. That was about 1-2 weeks ago.

We have lots of quart jars, too... I don't know how many, but if there's old "mayonnaise" jars or jars that have a chip, I'll use those for some beans and stuff, too... I have them, they were free from my MIL and I figure I might as well use them.

I can't remember the name of the machine but it comes with plastic bags. You put the food in the bags and the machine sucks the air out and seals the bag (seal a meal?). Anyway, a lady in our ward has one with an attachment for bottles. She is often at our ward/stake preparedness functions showing how it works. A few months ago she brought some bottles of brown rice to show us. It was several years old - like ten or something. Brown rice is only supposed to be good for 6 months, max. Anyway, they had opened one of the bottles and it was not rancid in the least. They cooked it and ate it and lived to tell about it. :yesnod: Try that with your bottles. If they work for rice, they ought to work for grains, beans, and such also.

Seal a jar? Hmm... Cuz I'm wondering if the lids are even air-tight anyway....? They're not "sealed" lids.

What this lady does is use canning jars with the lids that seal. I can't remember exactly how she does it. It seems like the sealing lid is put on the jar and the machine put on. It then sucks out the air and seals the lid via suction. I can't remember if rings are put on as well. (I never thought I'd be explaining it to anyone so I didn't pay enough attention, I guess). So, if you did this, I guess you'd have to get the sealing lids/rings.

Yes, we have one of those sealers, although I admit I never used the jar sealing function. They are a very worthwhile machine.

$1 a jar??? Wow--lucky you! That is a good price. And I think you're lucky to have so many of them.

Yes, they are too tall for normal canners. I use a very tall stock pot and can 5 at a time. I really like having 1/2 gal of juice. With 3 boys (2 are teenagers) a 1 qt jar would last all of 5 min.

Yeah, I know what you mean with the juice not lasting. We looooove juice in our house! We ended up cramming 5 times the amount of seedless grapes the recipe called for (into a quart) and figure we'll just dilute it that much more when we drink it. Figured it was taking up room, it might as well be concentrated.

I'm glad you thought it was a good price on the 1/2 gallons! I thought it was, too, but sometimes I get duped cuz I don't know better. :glare:

Concentrated juice makes more sense to me, too.

Back in 1969, I stored grains, legumes, flour, dried fruit, and other food in their original packaging in plastic garbage cans with doubled yard and garden plastic bags lining them. We stored them for a number of years in our garage, where they froze during our Vermont winters, then stored them in our cabin cellar for a few years more. I used the food 13 years later, and it was as good as the day I put it into storage. Even the sugar was fresh, the raisins were like new, and the flour and corn meal had no weevils or traces of weevils in them. I'm sure the freezing did the trick. If you aren't going to go to the vacuum sealing of the jars, it might be a good idea to freeze the grains and legumes a bag at a time in your home freezer for a week or two before putting them into the jars. I've had very good results storing beans, etc. in mason and used mayo jars that way. Good luck. The main thing is to be getting your storage in place. Having weevils hatch out in it is very discouraging.

Okay, another question...

I'm reading about drying foods. They say dried foods can last a long time in tins or in glass jars or plastic zippy bags. If in glass jars or zippies, you should put them inside a brown paper bag to block out the light.

Could we paint the glass jars instead? Now, I'm not going to "ruin" a 1/2 gallon Mason jar with black paint or something... but other jars, like the mayo jars and stuff. I was thinking it might be fun to paint little scenes or something on them... plus I've got 2 girls that love doing art stuff... maybe it would be kind of a fun project?

The jars would then be "dedicated" for storing dried foods.

That sound like fun to me, but then I am by far knowledgeable.

We always put bags of flour in the freezer for a few days when purchased to kill any bugs & eggs. It has worked great for many years.

It sounds fun. If it blocks out the light, it blocks out the light.

Very clever idea! You could paint a picture of the food inside and it would still be decorative even when empty. I LIKE it. (Just be sure to paint the outside. :wink (4): )

Shyeah! Or pictures of farmland... barns.... Horses, of course. :l0 (22):

Or even night scenes... stars... constellations. We can learn astronomy at the same time! Or fetching anything! Paint each one with one of the Bill of Rights! Or scripture stories, like the Iron Rod or the Jaredite barges... OH, MY GOSH! My head's gonna' explode! :l0 (57):