Prep your pantry with these long-lasting foods that can be grown at home or bought in bulk!
Keeping kitchens, pantries, and root cellars stocked with long-lasting homegrown or bulk foods isn’t just about convenience. It can also reduce plastic waste, save you money, and help you feel more secure by preparing ahead of time for snowstorms and other unexpected situations. To get you started, here are some of the best long-lasting foods that can be stored for a long time without spoiling, plus storage tips to help your stockpile last!
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Why Stock Long Lasting Food?
Making frequent runs to the grocery store can waste time and energy, and lead to impulse buys that cut into your budget. But if you have bulk foods stored away, you can spend less time grocery shopping and more time doing the things you love. Beyond convenience, there are a few other reasons why you may want to keep long-lasting foods at hand:
- Food security. Having food stored away can help you feel more prepared for snowstorms, power outages, and other emergencies.
- Less waste. Buying foods in bulk or growing your own foods at home slashes plastic waste. You can also reduce food waste by learning how to properly store foods!
- Money savings. If you have the ability to store food, you can often save money by taking advantage of grocery store sales and buying foods in bulk.
7 Foods That Have a Long Shelf Life
Fresh foods taste great, but they don’t last that long and often need to be refrigerated. While these foods still have their place, if you’re prepping your kitchen or pantry for the long-haul, look for foods that stay fresh for awhile without refrigeration. That way, if the power goes out in a storm, you won’t need to worry about your food spoiling quickly!
1. Grains and Pasta
I consider dried rice to be one of the ultimate survival foods because it lasts so long and can be used in so many dishes. However, oats, barley, quinoa, and other dried grains and dried pasta last a long time too. Although these foods are hard to grow in large quantities in home gardens, they’re often sold in bulk, they’re usually relatively affordable, they fill you up, and they don’t require any refrigeration!
Recommended for home growing? Not really. While many grains can technically be grown at home, you’d need to grow a lot of them to fill up your food stores!
Storage tips: Store grains and pasta in air-tight, moisture-proof containers in a cool, dry, and dark place. If pests are afoot, choose sturdy containers that rodents and bugs can’t get into.
2. Dried Beans and Other Legumes
If I could only choose two foods for long-term storage, I’d pick rice and beans. Together these two foods make a complete protein and, like dried grains, dried legumes don’t need refrigeration, they’re often sold in bulk, and they keep you feeling full for a long while. Black beans and kidney beans are always popular, but you can also add dried black-eyed peas, lentils, and chickpeas to your larder!
Recommended for home growing? Yes! Dried beans are a budget-friendly food that can be grown in backyard gardens. One kidney bean plant can produce about ¼ pound of beans, although yields can vary depending on your growing season!
Storage tips: Like rice, dried legumes should be stored in air-tight and moisture proof containers, bags, or sealed buckets in a cool, dry, and dark place. Rodents and bugs also sometimes target these foods, so investing in pest-proof containers for long term bean storage is wise.
3. Canned Goods
I always recommend dried foods for long-term storage because they’re really easy to put away, they don’t take up a lot of space, and they’re pretty lightweight. But canned goods are also ideal for storing and they don’t require refrigeration. Plus, unlike dried goods, canned foods are pre-cooked and some canned goodies can be eaten right out of the can if your power goes out!
Canned foods can be bought from the store, but you can also try your hand at home canning and make your own canned pickles, veggies, soups, jams, jellies, and more. If you’re new to food preservation, keep in mind that low-acid foods, like meats and most veggies, need to be pressure canned; however, high acid foods, like pickles, can be processed using the easier water-bath canning technique.
Recommended for home growing? Usually yes! While I wouldn’t recommend trying to grow your own canned tuna, many cannable veggies and fruits can be grown at home, including cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots, beans, onions, peppers, corn, radishes, and beets!
Storage tips: One of the best things about canned foods is that they’re already in rodent- and pest-proof containers. To avoid rust issues, keep canned goods in a cool, dry spot that’s out of direct light and store home-canned foods with the metal screw bands off. If you leave the screw bands on, they can rust and be impossible to remove!
4. Dehydrated and Freeze Dried Foods
Dried beans aren’t the only foods that last. Many veggies, fruits, herbs, and even some meats (think jerky!) can also be dehydrated with a food dehydrator or your oven set on the lowest setting. For more variety, you can store dried foods as-is or blend them into dried soup mixes and other prepared meals that just need to be rehydrated with hot water.
Many foods can be preserved with freeze-drying too. However, freeze driers are usually bulkier than food dehydrators and bit costlier — so they may not be for everyone!
Recommended for home growing? Yes! Many herbs can be grown at home for homemade spices and teas, and veggies and fruits are great for dehydrating too. Peppers, tomatoes (Principe Borghese tomatoes make some of the best sundried tomatoes!), carrots, apples, strawberries, corn, onions, and garlic are just a few growable crops that are ideal for dehydrating or freeze drying.
Storage tips: Dried fruits and veggies should be stored like dried grains and beans: in air-tight containers in cool, dry, and dark spaces. Home preservers often recommend throwing some silica packets into containers along with dried foods to absorb extra moisture and keep foods fresh a little longer.
5. Baking Ingredients
You can make a surprising amount of baked goods and frugal meals from a few simple ingredients, like bulk flour, baking soda, yeast, salt, and sugar. Best of all, these ingredients are usually quite affordable and they last a long time in storage without refrigeration. With these staples in your pantry, you can keep your kitchen flush with baked bread, pancakes, muffins, cakes, and much more without ever needing to visit a bakery!
Recommended for home growing? Not really, but you can grow many “mix-ins” at home – like blueberries for blueberry muffins or strawberries for pancake toppings!
Storage tips: Storing baked goods in airtight containers with silica packets works well. Flour beetles and other pests can sometimes target dried goods like flour, but you can deter these pests by keeping your ingredients in sturdy plastic or glass containers that bugs can’t chew through.
6. Nuts, Seeds, and Nut Butters
Packed with protein, nuts, seeds, and nut butters can be mixed into baked goods, used as a topping on pastas and soups, or eaten alone as a snack. Peanuts and peanut butter are classics, but almonds, mixed nuts, sunflower seeds, and even chia seeds last a long time in the pantry too!
Recommended for home growing? Generally, yes! If you have the space for it, many nut trees can be grown at home. Peanuts and sunflower seeds are even better for small spaces and they can be grown right in your veggie beds!
Storage tips: Most nuts and seeds can be stored for short periods of time in pantries, but they last longer with refrigeration or freezing. Some nut butters also need refrigerating and you should always read food packaging labels to make sure the products you’re keeping are suitable for pantry storage. Like flour and grains, these foods store best in air-tight, rodent-proof containers and nuts generally last longer in their shells.
7. Root Cellar Veggies and Fruit
Long before the advent of refrigerators, our ancestors were keeping garden harvests fresh with root cellar storage and the insulating powers of the earth. If you have a root cellar or a cool, dark basement, you can keep foods like potatoes, sweet potatoes, winter squash, onions, carrots, beets, pumpkins, apples, pears, garlic, parsnips, rutabagas, and turnips fresh for months without refrigeration! That’s great news if you want to keep a bumper crop of veggies from going to waste or if you want to enjoy fresh veggies in mid-winter without popping into the grocery store.
Recommended for home growing? Absolutely! Root cellar foods are some of the best long term foods for home-growing. Depending on where you live, you may even be able to keep a lot of these veggies growing in your garden all winter with a bit of mulch and harvest them as needed. No root cellar required!
Storage tips: Root cellar veggies store best when there’s good air flow, minimal light, and temperatures are between 32°F to 40°F. Storing root veggies, like carrots, in buckets filled with damp sand can keep them from drying out and fruits should be stored separately from veggies to prevent ethylene gas from building up and causing spoilage. It’s also wise to keep light levels low when storing potatoes as too much sun can make potatoes green and inedible!
What Foods Have the Longest Shelf Life and Other FAQs
What food has the longest shelf life?
What foods last the longest depends on how you store them. However, canned, freeze-dried, and dehydrated foods like honey, salt, sugar, white rice, and dried beans are especially prized for their long storage life.
What’s the best way to store rice long term?
The best way to store rice for the long haul is in an airtight container in a cool, dry, and dark spot.
What’s the secret to long term flour storage?
Flour lasts longer if you keep it in the freezer, but you can also keep flour fresh for a long time by storing it in air-tight, pest-proof containers in a cool, dry, and dark spot. Adding moisture absorbing silica packets into your storage containers helps too!
