Do you keep a lot of food in stock at all times?

[IsThisCluttered]

I'm an over shopper, I recognise that. We ALWAYS have food in the fridge, freezer & pantry.

I have an enormous range of herbs & spices & condiments & we use them all v regularly as we cook a lot & often make more complex dishes.

We pretty much always have stuff that could make a meal or several meals if anything happened & we couldn't get to the shops.

I have a lot of things like various types of rice, pasta, flours, sugars, tinned tomatoes & many types of beans & pulses.

I was in a friend's house recently & was a bit surprised how little food she had in her cupboard & fridge. It was spartan. She said she strictly only buys what's needed that week & by the end of the week the supplies are gone & the frudhd is literally empty.

I get that we're all different but I feel anxious when we start to run low (which would still mean there's a lot of food to someone else) & having a full fridge gives me a sense of calm & peace.

I did not grow up with a shortage of food so don't know why this is.

I'm curious how other people manage this?

Yes.
I reckon we could easily do a month with only having to buy bread milk ham fruit and veg.

Tins. We only use beans and tin toms. I have 10 at all times. We use them maybe 1x fortnight. If I use 1 I replace immediately the day after.

Cleaning products I have so many it's ridiculous. Think 10 Bleach. 10 washing up liquid and so forth .
However I don't hoard anything else. And everything has a place.
At one point I had shelves full in the shed of stuff. This is no longer

I have lots of food in. We have loads of dry staples such as pasta, rice, buckwheat, quinoa, lentils etc

Freezer is full of meat, veg and cooked beans such as chickpeas and soya beans.

I've tried to simplify our meals. Ie porridge for breakfasts, dinners are dhals/curries/pasta bakes. I make all the bread. I do lots of batch cooking and buy stuff in bulk.

I could probably live for 2-3 months on quire basic foods but we would miss all the fruit/yogurts etc that we seem to devour.

I do have plenty in store cupboard stuff. Didn’t had to go and panic buy pasta etc during the loo roll gate of March 2020.

I do tend to overbuy so we always have spares of things in the cupboard, just in case I become ill or the weather turns or not able to get to the shops.

My MIL only ever had the bare minimum in. Which was fine when FIL was alive as he would go to the shops incessantly. When he died it was a nightmare as she only liked having a single small milk in etc. she would do some shopping herself she just wanted others to take her incessantly so she could carry on like that.

We have lots in store. DH is the one who likes to keep fridge, freezer and cupboards well stocked. We have never run out of milk, tea, coffee, bread etc in thirty years since I met him. I reckon our store cupboards could feed us for several weeks if we needed.

If we weren't too fussy we could probably live for at least 6 weeks or more on what I have in store except for milk.

I just don't know how anyone would know what they'll fancy eating in a few days time.

Most fresh food starts to deteriorate if its not used in a day or two.

When people open their fridge and you can't see to the back, I feel revolted knowing there's probably stuff out of date hidden under or behind something else.

@Polyp0 it doesn't all have to be fresh food though. I have enough fresh 'meal' food for about 4 days in the fridge, plus eggs, cheese, milk, spread etc. Then I have food in the freezer from batch cooking and ordinary frozen stuff like peas and fish. I have several kinds of pasta, lots of rice, oats, dried fruit and baking ingredients in one cupboard, several different kinds of cereal, crackers, honey, Peanut butter, marmite tea and coffee in another. I have two shelves full of home made jam, and another cupboard full of tinned goods, custard, gravy granules etc. And a wire basket for potatoes and onions. I like to think that if I had several unexpected guests or family staying for a week I would have enough to do nice meals for a week at least before we had to go shopping, and when it's just us I know we could eat for at least a month.