How to Fight Rising Grocery Prices with Free Checklist

How to Fight Rising Grocery Prices with Free Checklist

Learn the 10 steps to inflation proof your pantry to fight rising grocery prices. With food prices surging and price increases on everything, we need to focus on how to save money and not exceed our grocery budget. Doing the 10 steps in this video will help you inflation proof your pantry.

And be sure to download my free 10 Steps to Inflation Proof Your Four Corners Pantry checklist. This special four-page checklist summarizes the 10 steps and provides links to additional resources. It also includes questions to help you think about how to save money and best use the food you have.

Print out the checklist and add it to your Kitchen Journal. This new download makes the perfect companion to my How to Fight Rising Grocery Prices video.

Free Downloads to Fight Rising Grocery Prices

The How to Fight Rising Grocery Prices video references three files that you can download for free. Print them out and add them to your Kitchen Journal or save them on your computer, mobile phone, or tablet for a handy reference.

Download 1: 10 Steps to Inflation Proof Your Four Corners Pantry checklist

The 10 Steps to Inflation Proof Your Four Corners Pantry checklist summarizes the 10 steps that I describe in my How to Fight Rising Grocery Prices video. You’ll also get links to additional resources.

Download 2: How to Accelerate Stocking Your Prepper Pantry printable

Visit this blog post to download the How to Accelerate Stocking Your Prepper Pantry printable. This download file contains two essential lists to help you inventory your Four Corners Pantry and prepare an accelerated grocery list for your Prepper Pantry. Making an inventory and targeting your grocery store purchases will help you fight rising grocery prices.

Download 3: Thrifty Kitchen Tips checklist

Visit this blog post to download the Thrifty Kitchen Tips checklist. Then, try incorporating at least five of these tips each week to help you fight rising grocery prices.

Create a Kitchen Journal

As a traditional foods cook, you’ll want to keep a kitchen journal to help you remember the combinations of ingredients that worked in a recipe, especially for persnickety recipes like ferments and sourdough.

You can also save coupons and receipts in your kitchen journal to help you identify foods that may be trending down or up in price. Being able to stock up on foods that you use that may be on sale or bottoming out in price will help you fight rising grocery prices.

Kitchen journals are also excellent places to include the files that you download and print from my website or other food websites, such as the USDA Complete Guide to Home Canning, which you can download for free from the National Center for Home Food Preservation.

Watch the following video to learn more about why your kitchen journal is an indispensable resource in your Traditional Foods Kitchen.

Can I Keep a Kitchen Journal on My Mobile Device?

Absolutely! I use an Apple iPhone and Apple iPad, and I often download PDF files to store on my devices and in my iCloud storage. I also take notes in iNotes, as well as in Apple Pages, which is like Microsoft Word. Having my files online makes it easy to access my information and notes when I’m on the go.

However, I still find paper products to be an essential part of my life. I don’t like to look at a computer, tablet, or phone all the time, and I enjoy the tactile feel of the printed page. I can easily make notes with my pen (or pencil) in the margins and underline (or highlight) sections that I find particularly important.

Plus, I don’t have to worry about plugging in my printed kitchen journal overnight. It’s always there whenever I need it.

So it comes down to personal preference. You can go all electronic, all paper, or a bit of both!

Download Your Free 36-Page Pantry List

For an extensive list of the traditional foods you can make and purchase to stock your pantry, be sure to also download my free 36-page Traditional Foods Pantry List. This comprehensive eBook is full of links to recipe videos, helpful articles, and more! It’s a perfect addition to your kitchen journal.

Inventory the Contents of Your Four Corners Pantry

The first step in the 10 Steps to Inflation Proof Your Four Corners Pantry is to inventory the contents of your Four Corners Pantry. As a review, the Four Corners Pantry consists of your:

• Working pantry
• Refrigerator
• Freezer
• Extended or Prepper Pantry

Your Prepper Pantry is where you’ll place your shelf-stable foods for long-term storage. These foods include whole grains, white rice, and canned foods.

File #2 that you downloaded earlier contains two parts: (1) Four inventory lists and (2) a shopping list. The inventory lists will help you record the food you have in each of your four corners. Using your inventory lists, you can fill out the accompanying shopping list, so you know the foods that you need to buy or be on the lookout for to take advantage of sales.

Creating a Prepper Pantry

If you haven’t already started a Prepper Pantry, now is the time. In the following videos, I show you which real foods to choose for your Prepper Pantry and how you can build your pantry inventory over time with just $5 a week. (Yes. Even in these inflationary times, you can put your $5 or whatever you decide to set aside per week to good use.)

If, because of the rising grocery prices and tumult we’re experiencing in the world, especially with unprecedented supply chain problems, you want to build your Prepper Pantry up faster, be sure to watch my accelerating your Prepper Pantry video. You’ll already have the inventory lists and shopping list filled out that are part of the video, so you’re already well on your way!

Multiple Streams of Food

You’ve heard of creating multiple streams of income to help ensure you have money coming into your household in case one of the streams dries up, such as because of job loss or changing market conditions. I bring this concept to our Traditional Foods Kitchens by talking about creating multiple streams of foods in my How to Fight Rising Grocery Prices video.

Multiple streams of food operate in a similar fashion. It helps ensure that you have food for you and your family in case you experience problems obtaining food from one of the streams.

Here are the multiple streams of food you should put in place.

• Homemade – The food you can make from other stored food, such as baking bread from grinding whole grains.
• Homegrown – Your garden’s bounty that you can water bath can for long-term storage.
• Store-Bought – A big supply of your food that you can stock up on during sales and store in your Four Corners Pantry.

For example, if supply chain problems limit the store-bought food that you can bring into your household, because you know how to make food homemade and you have homegrown food that you’ve harvested, you won’t be adversely affected when it’s difficult to get food at your grocery store.

Homemade Food to Fight Rising Grocery Prices

Here are just a few ways that making meals and food homemade helps to inflation proof your pantry:

• You’ll save money by making healthier food at home than by eating out.
• You can buy shelf-stable food when it’s on sale and store it for future use in your Prepper Pantry.
• Instead of throwing away food, make recipes from your food scraps, such as cooking with scraps or making fruit scrap vinegar.

For example, if you have a supply of flour in your working pantry or whole grains in your Prepper Pantry that you can grind into flour, you can make bread that will be a lot cheaper and healthier for you than the store-bought kind in the plastic wrap.

If you’ve never made bread before, try the following easy no knead sandwich bread recipe. This recipe video has over 1 million views, and I guarantee that you’ll love this super soft homemade bread.

Cooking with Scraps to Fight Rising Grocery Prices

Be sure to watch 10 Vegetables You Can Regrow from Kitchen Scraps to Create a Recurring Harvest, but did you know you can also cook with scraps to make meals, such as by using asparagus stalks? Watch the following videos to learn about cooking with scrap cookbooks and a recipe to get started.

You can also quick pickle vegetable scraps or make fruit scrap vinegar. The recipes are tasty as a treat or can be part of a delicious salad dressing. And best of all, you’ll be creating a no waste kitchen in addition to fighting food inflation.

Homegrown Food to Fight Rising Grocery Prices

One of the streams of food you should rely upon is homegrown food. The How to Fight Rising Grocery Prices video and checklist go into more detail on the 10 Steps to Inflation Proof Your Four Corners Pantry, but two of the steps involve:

• Growing your own food
• Water bath canning it for long-term storage

In the following videos, I show you how you can start growing food, from vegetable scraps you can plant in a windowsill garden or to larger plants to create an overflowing victory garden.

How to Get Started Water Bath Canning

You can harvest your garden’s food when ready, and if you have a bounty, you’ll want to water bath can your food for long-term storage in your Prepper Pantry. Water bath canning is specifically for high acid foods. This is covered in detail in my canning videos, as well as in the canning books I recommend.

Water bath canning is an essential skill for traditional foods cooks, and I show you how to get started step-by-step in my Water Bath Canning 101 – Home Canning Basics for Beginners Series.

I use the Ball Electric Water Bath Canner that I show you in the following unboxing video, but you don’t need this device to water bath can. You can also use a stockpot that is tall enough for you to be able to submerge your mason jars for canning. You’ll also need a small metal grate you can put at the bottom of your stockpot that your jars can rest on so they won’t directly touch the bottom of your stockpot.

Don’t Let Rising Grocery Prices Get You Down!

So be sure to watch today’s video, download and print out the printables, and work through the 10 Steps to Inflation Proof Your Four Corners Pantry checklist.

In doing so, you’ll be able to fight rising grocery prices and keep you and your family well-fed with nutritious and affordable real food no matter what may be going on in the world around you.

Kitchen Academy Videos

Are you looking for more traditional foods videos? If so, I invite you to join the Traditional Foods Kitchen Academy. Members of this optional paid YouTube community get access to exclusive videos, live streams, and other members-only perks. Plus, your YouTube comments include a special members-only badge.

In the following video replay of our members-only live stream, I talk about how bone broth and collagen can help restore hair loss and about rising prices at the grocery store.

Stay in Touch with Mary’s Nest

1. Subscribe to My YouTube Channel for Traditional Foods Videos (Free) - When you subscribe, be sure to click on the notification bell that will let you know each time I upload a new video.
2. Subscribe to Mary’s Traditional Foods Newsletter (Free) - Get a free 36-page eBook for signing up: How to Stock Your Essential Traditional Foods Four-Corners Pantry.
3. Join the Traditional Foods Kitchen Academy (Optional Paid) - For more detailed videos and exclusive members-only perks, join my YouTube membership community.
4. Order The Modern Pioneer Cookbook (Optional Paid) - Get a printed book of Mary's nourishing recipes from a Traditional Foods Kitchen. This bestselling cookbook is published by Penguin Random House with their DK imprint.

I look forward to having you join me in my Texas Hill Country Kitchen!

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