BB&A, long term food storage, part 1.

I will try to make this a brief introduction to the BB&A (buckets, bags, and absorber) method of long term food storage. This topic deserves much more detail than can provide here, so as always you need to do your own research, fill in the gaps, and determine for yourself whether this method will fit into your preparedness plan. I will be describing my particular process, and what I have learned over time. The point of this posting is not to be a complete "how-to" guide, but to provide enough information to introduce this method, and you will take it from there developing your own methods by experience.

The main factors that limit long term food storage, are moisture, oxygen, exposure to sunlight (UV), and temperature. The BB&A method addresses most of these storage problems. BB&A's are best suited to the storage of dry items, and not well suited for items that contain significant amounts of moisture or oils. Grains like wheat and rice, are excellent items to store, extending their shelf life to 20-30 years. Dry beans, peas, corn, milk, potato flakes, oat meal, etc., also store well.

BB&A long term food storage, part 2.

An introduction to the components.

Bags...
The bags are made from metallized mylar (polyester), they provide a gas tight seal to lock out oxygen and moisture, and the metallization blocks UV light penetration. Bags come in a variety of sizes, most common are the one gallon, and bucket size which fit both 5 and 6 gallon buckets. The bags are durable, but easily punctured, so they do need additional protection. The bags are usually mechanically protected by a durable bucket and lid.

Buckets...
The bucket also provides protection from rodent or insect problems as well as making stacking easier. My approach is to depend on the bag as the gas tight, hermetic seal, and the bucket is just an additional backup. Some do not use bags and simply depend on the buckets o-ring seal, this works some of the time. My experience has been that the o-ring seal is susceptible to leakage over time, my opinion. HDPE is the plastic with a number 2 recycling symbol. Most of the buckets you can buy at home improvement centers are made from HDPE, but not all, so check if you are interested. I try to stick to new HDPE buckets. FYI, HDPE is one of the food grade plastics, but the manufacturer has to certify the material before it can officially be called food grade.

Absorbers....
The oxygen absorber is the heart of this method, providing a quantum leap in long term food storage over previous methods. Oxygen absorbers contain iron which will chemically lock up the available oxygen in the form of iron oxide (rust). Sealed packages of absorbers contain a test strip, or small pellet shaped oxygen detector which changes color on exposure to oxygen, so you can determine at a glance if your absorbers are good. A properly sized absorber, once sealed in the bag will remove all the available oxygen in a few hours. A sealed bag with an absorber will appear to be partially vacuum packed once the absorber has done its job. Do keep in mind the absorber does not react with the Nitrogen (an inert gas) in the bag, so some gas will remain after use. Oxygen absorbers are available in a variety of sizes to match common bag and can sizes, sizing information is available on line. Modern oxygen absorbers renders older nitrogen packaging methods completely obsolete.

BB&A long term food storage, part 3.

How to seal the bags.

Rather than investing $100+ on a commercial bag sealer, I recommend using your wife's clothing iron, I like dual use technology, ha. Set the iron to high temperature, the cotton setting works just fine. Empty any water from the iron if it is a steam iron before use to prevent accidental scalding.

I use a metal carpenters level to form a nice smooth surface to iron the bag against, a tip I picked up in an online video, and it works well, the level makes a nice 1-2 inch wide seal.

For those that are new to this process, do not worry about applying too much heat, you will not burn the bag.

Before opening the package of absorbers, fill and label the bags you want to seal, a permanent marker works well for this purpose. After the bags are sealed set them aside. The bags should appear to be partially vacuum packaged within 24 hours.

BB&A long term food storage, part 4.

Hints..

I recommend you package your food items in batches with a helper to reduce the processing time.

Once the bulk package of absorbers is opened, the absorbers will begin absorbing atmospheric oxygen, so you will need to complete your packaging within about an hour if possible. If you plan to do your packaging over a few sessions, either store the unused absorbers in a canning jar with lid, or heat seal the extra absorbers in a mylar bag for later use ASAP after opening the package.

If you are packaging a bucket sized bag, you will place the bag in the bucket and fill before adding an absorber and sealing. For one gallon size bags you will fill the bag, add the absorber and seal. The bags are placed in the bucket after you have verified the absorber has done its job. I like to put a content listing in the bucket, under the lid, as external labels sometimes fall off.

Apply the bucket lid using a rubber mallet to fully engage the o-ring seal. Do label the buckets and keep a record listing what you have in long term storage.

Some like to add bay leaves to the bags to help with insects, however, the absorber will kill anything that was sealed inside so I do not recommend adding the leaves.

Conclusion.

I hope this brief description will interest those that have not tried this valuable long term food storage technique. As always, let me know what you think, and correct me if I get it wrong.

Thanks for the posts.

I'd love to figure out how to store nuts long term. (years) I've heard they can only be stored for months even when vacuum sealing them. I'm guessing this is because of the oils inside them.

Great post.

How do you determine how many absorbers to put into a bag or pail? I've used them, but never came across an easy way to calculate (at least, not easy to remember). I have a mylar vacuum sealer, which works okay, but I noticed that the absorbers really work well on some bags and not as good on others. Haven't figured out why.

Some additional thoughts about proper sizing the oxygen absorber to the package to be sealed.

I use 1500-2000 CC (cubic centimeters) of absorber capacity for a 5 gallon bucket (bag), 300 to 500 CC for a 1 gallon bag. In that capacity range I pick the absorber by price, or availability. I live at about a mile altitude, so thinner atmosphere means less oxygen to remove, so the 2000 cc capacity oxygen absorbers may be over kill for my location and a 5 gallon bucket.

The important point is to select an absorber that has sufficient capacity, having more capacity than required is not a problem. If you are packaging a thousand #10 cans of the same stuff, you could fine tune the absorber size (capacity) to match the volume of the container minus the volume of stuff to be packaged (the air space).

If you want to be more accurate, have a calculator, and the time, you can calculate the total volume (of the bucket, jar, whatever), and then calculate the amount of oxygen in that volume. About 21 percent of atmospheric gas is oxygen that could be removed. The number calculated would be the largest size absorber you would need. Since you will be partially filling the container with stuff, you could possibly use a smaller absorber. Estimating the 'fill-factor" for the stuff you want to package is more like guess work, call it a guestimate, ha. Stuff that is loosely packed will have more air space, while finer powders (like powdered milk) will have less "air space" in the package.

Keep in mind, that the absorber will only remove the oxygen, 21 percent of the "air space". If for example, you seal up a bag without squeezing out the extra air before sealing, the absorber will remove all the available oxygen then stop, leaving (mostly) nitrogen gas behind, thus you may well find entrapped gas in the bag. The gas trapped in the bag, if you properly selected the absorber size, is nitrogen, an inert gas. I guess the point to this comment, is you should not worry about a bag that is not "sucked down" tight on the contents if you did your homework.

As all ways your comments are appreciated.