What do you have in your pantry at any one time?

[mommyof4]

I buy in bulk, so I have all that PP listed and more. I have a deepfreeze in the garage, one in the basement and 2 full refrigerators also. We could probably eat for 90 days or more, but would run out of fresh milk. My chickens and ducks lay daily, so they are always replenishing my egg supply.
There is a picture of my basement stock up pantry on my blog below.

Do you eat your duck eggs? I find them to be a yolky, but if I do use them, I use them to bake with.

[NeedaDollar]

Sugar
Pasta Noodles
Pasta Sauce
Rice
Cookie or muffin mix
Salt/season all
Brown Sugar
Coffee (instant)

[Judi Dial]

Lets see:
baking items (flours, sugars, levening) liquid sugars (syrups), canned goods, pasta, jams, canned prefab foods, canned veggies, seasonings, extra personal care items (tp, toothpaste,etc.), light bulbs, furnace/water filters, onions, potatoes, fruit, dried beans and grains (rice, lentils, etc.), drinking water and household water. We also buy our soap in bulk so I have large quantities of laundry, dish soap, and multipurpose spray concentrates.

[whitestripe]

thanks everyone for all your replies! :-)
the reason i was asking is because as some of you know, DF and I are in the process of buying a house. Currently the hosue we rent is about 5 minutes to the shops, or two minutes walk to the convenience store. I always try to have a pretty good stocked pantry, but I want to be REALLY organised when we move, because it's not really anywhere near any shops. So i guess I was just fishing for ideas as I am at a loss to what else I could stock in our pantry. This is what I usually have:
pasta, rice, risotto rice, rice noodles, wheat noodles, 2 minute noodles (DF's quick lunch), lasagne sheets, rice papers, canneloni tubes, nori sheets, tinned beans, dried beans, tinned tomatoes, passata, tomato paste, tea, espresso coffee, herbal tea, raw sugar, soy sauce, tomato sauce, bbq sauce, chilli sauce, plain flour, bi carb soda, juice, mineral water, ginger beer, coke (for DF's rum mixers), tuna, rice crackers, tinned fruit, oven baked muesli bars, oats, desicated coconut, dried fruit, tinned coconut milk, honey, cocoa, peanut butter, hazelnut spread, jam, tahini, plus ALL the herbs and spices you can possibly imagine. well. not ALL. but lots.

so yeah i don't know. sometimes even with ALL that in the pantry i still feel like there's not enough. any suggestions??? :S

[disneysteve]

sometimes even with ALL that in the pantry i still feel like there's not enough. any suggestions??? :S

Make a list of 10 or 12 common meals that you like to make and make sure you always keep the ingredients around for those meals. We have lots of things in the panty that get used very rarely when we make a particular item, like a jar of molasses which might get used less than once each year. Other things, like breakfast cereal, get used every day. In between things, like soy sauce, get used every few weeks.

What matters is if you have what you need when you need it.

[SnoopyCool]

Just a side note - you can substitute unflavored gelating in the place of eggs in whatever you bake. Gelatin can keep for a very, very long time and goes a long way. You can order bulk gelatin many places on the Internet.

1 egg = 1 tsp gelatin, 3 Tbs cold water and 7 tsp boiling water
2 eggs= 2 tsp gelatin, 1/3 C. cold water and 1/2 C boiling Water
3 eggs= 1 Tbs gelatin, 1/2 C. cold water and 1/2 C Boiling water

[mom-from-missouri]

I think i you are trying to build up your pantry, you need to look at your eating habits. My aunt had 8 kids, worked full time nights and was soooo organized. She had 12 menus--one for each month that she used and her pantry was based on her menu. They also farmed and provided their own meats and veggies. The menu was based around the seasons and weather--for example, she had chil on the fall and winter months but not in July.
She also built it to use up leftovers. For example if one day 5 you ate chili, day 6 or day 7 had chili dogs to use the rest of it up. Nothing ever went to waste in their house.
She had one freezer for meats, one for veggies & fruits and a smaller one for grains to keep out critters as she bought her flour, sugar and oatmeal in 50 lb bags.

[wincrasher]

We used to be daily shoppers. That is expensive and there was never much food in the house.

We checked into couponmom.com which is a free site that cross references what's on sale at your local stores with what coupons are out there (from Sunday papers).

We built up quite a pantry but it was odd the items we were stocking for a while.

One week I bought 28 bottles of ketchup for $.15 each. Another week it was microwave popcorn - like 40 boxes for $.20 each. And so on.

Love the looks you get from the cashiers. "you like ketchup, sir?"

Sometimes we have to throw stuff out because things pass their expiration. Not a biggie because most stuff is bought so cheap.

Love Costco too. Buying in bulk is much cheaper than most grocery stores, but they don't take coupons.

[whitestripe]

thanks for the ideas guys!
I am going to make a list like disneysteve said for the main meals we eat and try to have a stock of those ingredients.
unfortunately we dont have costco or walmart where i live (aus) but soon I am going to look into shopping at aldis if it works out cheaper. and we dont really have a coupon culture like in the US. but i am definately going to put some great ideas into use. thanks!