You are so right, Bev! No one ever wants to eat bugs, but we do it. We just don't see them. I grew up dirt poor - We didn't throw anything out unless it was rotten or so infested we couldn't sift the bugs out. No one ever died from ingesting a few weevils, but you can die of starvation by throwing out perfectly good food because a bug was in it. I remember my mom kept a small, mesh strainer near the stove just to skim weevils out of the pasta - They float to the top of boiling water! In 1977, my BF's father worked for the USDA. He had us bring the truck down to one of the warehouses, because someone found some bugs in a few packages of shelled pecans and the entire 1000 lb lot has been marked for destruction. We hauled off 900 lbs of shelled pecans, all in 2 lb packages. This was right before Christmas that year. What we couldn't pack into one of our big freezers, we gave away, and folks were grateful to get them!
I love your attitude! Made me smile for the first time today! My mother had said, better to find a few live bugs in something than some dead bugs....Live bugs means the flour is good, as in no preservatives. Dead bugs, well, maybe don't use the stuff. It could be loaded with preservatives. Makes sense?
Great advice again. My mom always kept her flour and rice in the freezer to fight the weevils. I was so thankful to learn those things from her and be reminded of them from you as well. My flour is going back in the freezer today.
This is a great post. I have always done this and had to keep it as a secrete. I learned it from a neighbor when I was a kid growing up in the 1950's. There is many people that think bugs are bad. I also salvage my dry beans, rice and sometimes pasta like this. Thanks for sharing.
Tfs. I've worked in food factories. You'd be surprised how many critters get dehydrated in onion & garlic powder. Been using for yrs. w/ no issues. God bless.
I once had an infestation and it took me forever to find out where they were coming from....it turned out they came in a box of dog biscuits from the store. Yes, the eggs are already there just waiting to hatch.
Throwing away a perfectly good bag of flour for wevils would have been crazy... You did the right thing Mrs.V. I've done it...was taught to sift by my mother and grandmother...lol You taught me about dry canning my flour...and Thank you very much sugar. Have a great day!
I have honestly never sifted my flour before in my life, and I had no idea this was even a thing. Holy smokes, I bet I've been eating them and not even realizing it! Wowzers. We always just leave our flour in the bag it comes in and roll it down. I feel like an idiot, I had no idea this was a thing.. I always thought people who put it in other containers just wanted their kitchens to look pretty & uniform. This is why I LOVE your channel, Bev! You're the best!
I just got a bag of grits off of my shelf and saw them crawling. I always thought the black specks was just some discolored grains. Now I believe there the eggs from these bugs she mention. Jesus. How many times have I done that. I am serious contemplating a vegan lifestyle without carbs. I am wondering if this play a part in food born illnesses.
@@Angel_Hearted50 It won't make a difference if you go vegan. In fact, it might even have the reverse effect. Insects get everywhere and you've eaten many of them unknowingly your entire life. For example, canned tomatoes will often have fly eggs in them and the government allows a certain amount of fly eggs and maggots to be in each can. I think generally it's something like 5 fly eggs and one maggot per 100g of canned tomatoes is allowed. So imagine all the other foods that insects inhabit. It's always been that way, but rarely talked about so it sounds weird at first but don't worry, it's normal.
Oh yes. One of the reasons for sifting flour was for the bugs! In 1958 we lived in Turkey. There were no freezers and we couldn't kill bugs that way. Everything was sifted before baking anything. We would have not only the weevils but flies and beetles. We sifted, baked and always had good bread. It was better than buying bread off the local market where the bugs were just baked right in there. Needless to say, I only bought bread once during the two years my husband was stationed in Turkey!
I don't do a lot of baking, so I keep all my flour and cornmeal in the refrigerator after I freeze it for a couple of weeks, do the same with rice and grits. Thanks for the tips
Hi Bev, I always, always store all my flours and grains in the fridge for that very reason. I used to have so many issues with weevils in my flour that it was becoming a real problem. About 20 years ago now I started to put it all into the fridge as soon as I got it home from the grocery store. I have not had an issue since. I hate the little buggers. Hugs, Michelle
Before I started freezing my flour I did get bugs in my meal and flour really bad. But I would just bake bread using left over grease, veggies, milk that was starting to go bad and feed it to my chickens. They loved it. And I got more eggs in return.
I love freezing EVERYTHING! I have found, from experience, that having several small freezers instead of only one large one is better as ,if one breaks down you dont lose all your food. We live in the country so I freeze anything that comes in a bag or carton. Crackers, chips, cereal, anything like that. When the kids were little I did it to hide cookies and stuff but its also safe from mice such in the freezer as well!
I watched an old video where you measured out your flour into brown paper bags and wrote the amount on each bag . I loved that idea because it helped me store mine in a smaller space .
My mother used to freeze flour, corn meal, rice, grits, muffin mixes, etc. straight from the grocery store for this very reason and we never had weevils. ;)
It's all good protein ! I do freeze bags of flour for at least a week, then put into half gallon canning jars with a 300cc oxygen absorber, it sucks down the lid and seals it up, no bugs living in that ! But one time I had opened a box of red beans and rice mix, put it in a tupperware container and forgot it was in the pantry !!! Oh my, when summertime came, I had a swarm of them in the house, it took me awhile to find the source, since then i seal everything, thank you for showing this !
HELLO MRS. VOLFIE!!! Thanks for sharing this important info!!! I have had Weevils in corn muffin mix before. So this is great for Everyone to know!!!😊💕
My son had found bugs in rice and he just cooks the rice and eats it bugs and all. He just says it's extra protein. Of course this is the kid that has dug up a worm, rinsed it off and ate it just to see what it tasted like lol.
@@GreatMindsSeekTruth Haha I eat bugs and all depending on what type. Some of them are bitter, like wheat weevils. I once ate a pie teaming with fruit fly larva. Couldn't tell a difference once it was cooked. Free extra protein! If I find ants in my sugar I just eat them. Lol
That is why you should sift your flour and such before using. As far as rice goes, place in a bowl and cover with twice as much hot tap water as you have rice. Which also washes out some of the starch of the rice. My flour and rice stays in clear glass jars and in the sunlight. Oh and weevils will also get into certain spices.
They go through plastic and paper bags. They will eat anything. Including the glue on boxes of food. I had one small bag of flour infested that infested my house. I spent 20 years getting rid of them. I finally starved them out. I put everything in air proof jars. Mason jars mainly and I freeze everything for 2 weeks as soon as I can when it comes into the house. I'm not dealing with that again. I wasn't brave enough to eat anything they were in. I threw away anything in boxes that had been in my house more than a month. I even put cake mixes in Mason jars so I didn't get bugs in them. It was a lot of work but it finally paid off.
Thank you. I have several different bags of flour....I just put them all in the freezer. One bag is whole wheat flour and I have a bag of corn flour, I just used the last of the AP flour...so I know to do that with the new bag. I've always had a curiosity of why they package it...and sugar...in paper. That makes no sense to me...for the very reason critters can get in. Why not package it in plastic?
Sift them out. That what my granny did. Nothing is wrong with the flour. You can store it without oxygen and that works also. I have had it in cornmeal also.
WAY back when I used to buy rice-a-roni for my young children, I brought in weevils in one of the boxes, it took me almost 2 months to get them boogers out of my pantry. I didn't buy rice-a-roni again for YEARS, lol. Now I buy 2 or 3 boxes a year, because my 93 yr old dad loves it. But it goes into a baggie and into the freezer before it ever hits his cabinets.
My grandmother taught me about weevils in flour. I always freeze mine and keep it in the freezer and then sift it. Thanks for all of your tips. I got a huge bag of flour at Sam’s club. I’m gonna do it like you did yours.
Bev, What do you do if you Don't have a large standing freezer & have a refrigerator with a rather small freezer? (the one that's on the bottom.) I don't have the resources right now to buy jars & can them .help.
Mrs. V, I wanted to to dehydrate green beans. My question is how are they for serving by them selves after rehydrating? Do you have a way you like to cook them?
I REMEMBER WHEN I WAS YOUNG BACK IN THE 70'S MY MOM MADE STEW AND BUGS STARTED FLOATING TO THE TOP ALL SHE DID WAS SCOOPED THEM OUT AND WE STILL ATE THE STEW THERE WAS NOTHING WRONG WITH IT SHE SAID THEY WERE BUGS THAT IS ALWAYS BUGS IN DIFFERENT FLOURS SO YOUR NOT GOING TO GET SICK NOW I'M 60 AND I DID'NT GET SICK JUST SCOOP THEM OUT SOME PEOPLE DON'T EVEN KNOW ABOUT THE BUGS AND STILL COOK WITH THAN YOU GOD BLESS YOU AND YOUR FAMILY AND VIEWERS
Flour, rice, and oats... always have weevils.... I ended up getting then from boxed pasta once... Now I put my boxed pasta in the freezer too and then into mason jars.
I purchased some whole grain off eBay. It was infested with weevils. Those weevils traveled all over the house to the downstairs and the upstairs. How do they do that??? That was over a year ago, and still I find a few in storage bins, the wash tub, in change of season clothes, etc... They are incredibly difficult to get rid of.
we were infested with moths last summer. It nearly drove me insane. They even got into Tupperware containers. It took multiple cleanouts, containers washed and put into the freezer for a week, before refilling, a dozen or more moth traps before - hopefully I have beaten them
I once made a cherry cobbler from ones I picked fairly late in the season. After we had done all the work to put it all together, it was sitting next to the oven waiting for it to preheat. My husband and I suddenly heard a lot of "squishing" noises. It was coming from the cobbler. We looked in there and pretty much every cherry had a fruit fly larva in it, and they were crawling out to get away from the lemon and sugar we put in it! These were tiny cherries, the size of your thumbnail, so lots of little maggots crawlin' around. We just looked at each other and were like "well, we're cooking it. Might as well just put it in." (we knew that fruit fly maggots would not harm humans). After it was cooked, you couldn't even see them, and there was zero taste difference whatsoever (we made a cherry pie every 3 days that spring, so lots to compare to). The only difference was that we got a lot of lean protein. No problem whatsoever. Weevils are super bitter though, so I understand sifting out the adults. I couldn't imagine throwing away a whole bag because of a few bugs. People are so pathetic and wasteful these days. Thanks for sharing to help educate folks.
Thank you for this. Icky feeling that we buy food with bugs, etc in it. Freezing and sifting flour will same time and money for us. Time to go back to store to buy new bag of flour and money spent doing so, really don't want to eat weevil protein in my food.
@@OurHalfAcreHomestead thank you so much! If I run out of freezer room, ill look up your canning flour video. I never heard of that but it would be a good idea to prep that way if the electric goes down. Thanks again!☺☺
Mine to have my own sifter grandma told use it was to soften the flour. Mom told me the truth so I would know for my self . I have always sifted .told my daughter she was like I ain't eating bread anymore. She had beans and corn bread last night
Thanks I just threw all mine away . I couldn’t believe it , I had it sealed in a zip lock and it was full of weevils- now I have to get more. I wish I would have seen your video first
Thank you sooooo much!! Very good lesson,now I know what to do,I just thrown away 12 pounds of weevil infested flower.But I’ll tryouts your advice, thanks again.👏👏👏👏🥰🥰🥰🥰🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🤙🏼🤙🏼🤙🏼🤙🏼🤙🏼
I once read a book by a lady who moved with her husband to a South Sea Island long ago. There was no packaging. She wrote that she learned that crawls is not garbage!
I'm sure people have eaten many bugs and just didn't know. Look at the box rice or oats. A little hot water cooked them and we all survived. I typically sift flour prior to using so I'll just put anything that doesn't sift through in the trash bin.
Is it also weevils that get in Pasta too? I boiled some small pasta shells up the other day and didn't know it had some bugs in it and they floated to the top when the water started to boil. We just scooped them out of the water we still ate the pasta and didn't get sick but was just wondering if the same bug that gets in flour.
Now that we are in a pandamic, food prices gone up. People has lost their jobs. Money is tight. Thanks for posting because I was about to throw the flour.
I live in the desert, this can be a problem here. They can hatch in anything that has flour in it. Even those boxes of potatoes with sauce. Then they infest everything. At the asian market, they have them. The worker said, just eat them or take them out. My flour now goes into washed used juice or gallon water bottles to cut the oxygen, the o2 absorber, and lid screwed back on tight. It's life, it happens, it won't kill us. The bugs are probably healthier than the flour. It also kind of tells me, you have good flour, no pesticides on the wheat, or the bugs would be dead. I'll keep telling myself that ;)
For goodness sake I'm guessing everyone on the planet has at one time eaten weevils or their eggs from their flour, pancake mixes, etc. Mom was born and raised on a farm, sifting flour for weevils is as old as the hills.
to stop bugs. After buying flour or pasta, put the bags in a zip lock bag and then freeze for 7 days kills the eggs. After 7 days keep in zip lock and store
Hi...watching you're video here in philippines..lt helped a lot..i cooked banana cake earlier using sifted flour coz it has bugs...then i just remember is it safe?so i watched your video.thanks for your advice/info.
I used do a womens hair at my beauty shop who worked at a cannery and said you be so shocked at the amount of bugs allowed by the government in every food we eat.
For over 30 years I have used dried bay leaves on my food shelves especially, in jars/ bags and no longer bug problems. So even if the eggs hatch out they don’t hang around.
Ms Bev...i know this isn’t the video but i just got through making your simple yeast loaf bread and i am so very new to baking bread..i don’t know all the tips and tricks ...please tell me how to store this loaf bread as it will probably last only a week...i dont want it to dry out or become a soggy mess in a zip lock bag...I’m so sorry to bother you..I’m just trying to start over in life and do the right thing by my body and the best for my family...thank you so much in advance...or maybe someone in the comments could answer..ill take any help i can get...
If you want it crusty..just pop it out of the pan..and let it cool before putting it in a plastic bag..if you like it with a soft crust...take it out of the pan while hot and roll it up in a cotton table cloth to cool. then bag it. DO NOT refrigerate bread...it changes the texture..however it is safe to freeze ( once cool)if you are doing large batches. Hope this helps!
Thank you so much! I returned to my home after a month and was horrified to see these tiny creatures in the flour. Thank God I didn't throw it all out 😅
My mother in law taught me to put all flour, rice, pasta and cereal in canisters or jars to keep infestation down. You taught me about freezing. I freeze all my flours then dry can everything. Can you do that with rice and pasta that is freeze them first. Did you ever get food moths in your pantry. I put bay leaves on all my shelves to keep insects out. What do you do Bev. I think a video on this subject would help a lot of people. Thanks Bev God bless.
Jo-Ann DiGennaro I freeze my rice first. Then pit in jars with bay leaves. Quart jars 1 on bottom & 1 on top. Half gallon jars 2& 2. Gallon jars 3-4 & 3-4. Large bay leaves all. If little or broken put enough to equal it by eyeballing it.
Does it say something about my mindset that the only point in your introduction that made me draw in a huge "OMG - Is that safe" breath was the idea of you re-freezing the Flour? I thought that to do that without cooking or baking it first was dangerous for ALL foods. I didn't start itching until you got to the table and began sifting, (shudder). My worry is that the eggs would surely be too tiny to see? The bugs themselves are pretty tiny. I know we don't eat raw flour, so it's always heat-treated before we get it but it's the thought of them being there that gives me the screaming ab-dabs.
For over 30 years I have used dried bay leaves on my food shelves especially, in jars/ bags and no longer bug problems. So even if the eggs hatch out they don’t hang around.
I knew about these pests, but have never put my flour or cornmeal in the freezer. I've bought a few 5lb bags in the last couple of months. Is it too late to freeze it? I never heard of this, but if it helps, I thank you for the advice. 😊 How long should it be in the freezer to kill any eggs if you don't have room in your freezer to freeze it all? Thanks again. I once opened a box of dry cat food and had moths fly out of it. It wasn't even expired! It's so gross just thinking I am even eating the eggs! I had some expired cornbread, and there were a few black specks the same size of the cornbread grain, are these eggs or just part of the cornbread? Sorry for all the questions, just a little sqeemish about what's in our food...lol
Thanks for the info, I froze my 4-25lb of flour, put each one in a white trash bag sealed and in a storage bin with a lid and still got weevils!!! I am doing the freezing and sifting and bagging and freezing again. I think it might have been the dry cat food stored near by, so freeze your animal food as well!!!
You are so right, Bev! No one ever wants to eat bugs, but we do it. We just don't see them. I grew up dirt poor - We didn't throw anything out unless it was rotten or so infested we couldn't sift the bugs out. No one ever died from ingesting a few weevils, but you can die of starvation by throwing out perfectly good food because a bug was in it. I remember my mom kept a small, mesh strainer near the stove just to skim weevils out of the pasta - They float to the top of boiling water! In 1977, my BF's father worked for the USDA. He had us bring the truck down to one of the warehouses, because someone found some bugs in a few packages of shelled pecans and the entire 1000 lb lot has been marked for destruction. We hauled off 900 lbs of shelled pecans, all in 2 lb packages. This was right before Christmas that year. What we couldn't pack into one of our big freezers, we gave away, and folks were grateful to get them!
♥
I have found my community. 😄
I love your attitude! Made me smile for the first time today! My mother had said, better to find a few live bugs in something than some dead bugs....Live bugs means the flour is good, as in no preservatives. Dead bugs, well, maybe don't use the stuff. It could be loaded with preservatives. Makes sense?
Great advice again. My mom always kept her flour and rice in the freezer to fight the weevils. I was so thankful to learn those things from her and be reminded of them from you as well. My flour is going back in the freezer today.
I'm 72 and I used to watch my grandma sift the weevils before making biscuits and I'm still alive
Exactly!
I have my mother's sifter and I use it .
@Andrew Ruiz ❄️
That’s not the problem. The problem is you used the word gross 😭😭
Thankyou I was boutta toss it in the bin 😭
This is a great post. I have always done this and had to keep it as a secrete. I learned it from a neighbor when I was a kid growing up in the 1950's. There is many people that think bugs are bad. I also salvage my dry beans, rice and sometimes pasta like this. Thanks for sharing.
Flour beetles AKA Tribolium confusum come in most dried food (flour, dog foods etc). They have an aversion to citrus essential oil and love the dark.
Tfs. I've worked in food factories. You'd be surprised how many critters get dehydrated in onion & garlic powder. Been using for yrs. w/ no issues. God bless.
I never knew you could debug your flour. I just learned a very valuable lesson. Thank you!
Adding dry bay leaf leaves helps when you don't have a big freezer. Thank you very much for this video, many people don't know this. Blessings
I once had an infestation and it took me forever to find out where they were coming from....it turned out they came in a box of dog biscuits from the store. Yes, the eggs are already there just waiting to hatch.
Thank you for sharing. I had bugs in a bag of rice once. Threw it all away, washed out the canister, and started over.
Throwing away a perfectly good bag of flour for wevils would have been crazy... You did the right thing Mrs.V. I've done it...was taught to sift by my mother and grandmother...lol You taught me about dry canning my flour...and Thank you very much sugar. Have a great day!
My Pleasure Honey!
I have honestly never sifted my flour before in my life, and I had no idea this was even a thing. Holy smokes, I bet I've been eating them and not even realizing it! Wowzers. We always just leave our flour in the bag it comes in and roll it down. I feel like an idiot, I had no idea this was a thing.. I always thought people who put it in other containers just wanted their kitchens to look pretty & uniform. This is why I LOVE your channel, Bev! You're the best!
Gotta learn sometimes. There’s no shame in that.
Yuck gross 🤮
I just got a bag of grits off of my shelf and saw them crawling. I always thought the black specks was just some discolored grains. Now I believe there the eggs from these bugs she mention. Jesus. How many times have I done that. I am serious contemplating a vegan lifestyle without carbs. I am wondering if this play a part in food born illnesses.
@@Angel_Hearted50 It won't make a difference if you go vegan. In fact, it might even have the reverse effect. Insects get everywhere and you've eaten many of them unknowingly your entire life. For example, canned tomatoes will often have fly eggs in them and the government allows a certain amount of fly eggs and maggots to be in each can. I think generally it's something like 5 fly eggs and one maggot per 100g of canned tomatoes is allowed. So imagine all the other foods that insects inhabit. It's always been that way, but rarely talked about so it sounds weird at first but don't worry, it's normal.
I do the sifting and don't tell my teenager what's going on and it's easy peasy going forward. What she doesn't know makes for a much easier day.
😂 Ain't that the truth!
My kids and relatives are like that. If they only knew what was cooked into their favorite processed foods, they would be shocked?
I’m telling
Oh yes. One of the reasons for sifting flour was for the bugs! In 1958 we lived in Turkey. There were no freezers and we couldn't kill bugs that way. Everything was sifted before baking anything. We would have not only the weevils but flies and beetles. We sifted, baked and always had good bread. It was better than buying bread off the local market where the bugs were just baked right in there. Needless to say, I only bought bread once during the two years my husband was stationed in Turkey!
I bring my flour home n put it right into the freezer where it stays. Always been afraid of bugs. You did a lot of work to save your flour. 👍
Always keep my flour in the freezer. You taught me that a while back. Never had a problem since then. Thanks for sharing. Love you!!
Thanks for sharing this info. I was always told to throw out flour with weevils. Sifting is such a smart idea.
I don't do a lot of baking, so I keep all my flour and cornmeal in the refrigerator after I freeze it for a couple of weeks, do the same with rice and grits. Thanks for the tips
Hi Bev, I always, always store all my flours and grains in the fridge for that very reason. I used to have so many issues with weevils in my flour that it was becoming a real problem. About 20 years ago now I started to put it all into the fridge as soon as I got it home from the grocery store. I have not had an issue since. I hate the little buggers. Hugs, Michelle
Before I started freezing my flour I did get bugs in my meal and flour really bad. But I would just bake bread using left over grease, veggies, milk that was starting to go bad and feed it to my chickens. They loved it. And I got more eggs in return.
I love freezing EVERYTHING! I have found, from experience, that having several small freezers instead of only one large one is better as ,if one breaks down you dont lose all your food. We live in the country so I freeze anything that comes in a bag or carton. Crackers, chips, cereal, anything like that. When the kids were little I did it to hide cookies and stuff but its also safe from mice such in the freezer as well!
I watched an old video where you measured out your flour into brown paper bags and wrote the amount on each bag . I loved that idea because it helped me store mine in a smaller space .
Thank you Bev. This is sound practical advice.
My mother used to freeze flour, corn meal, rice, grits, muffin mixes, etc. straight from the grocery store for this very reason and we never had weevils. ;)
Bev, I also put Bay leaves in my flour that is on the counter. Keeps wevils out there too.
It's all good protein ! I do freeze bags of flour for at least a week, then put into half gallon canning jars with a 300cc oxygen absorber, it sucks down the lid and seals it up, no bugs living in that ! But one time I had opened a box of red beans and rice mix, put it in a tupperware container and forgot it was in the pantry !!! Oh my, when summertime came, I had a swarm of them in the house, it took me awhile to find the source, since then i seal everything, thank you for showing this !
Great tips! I always learn so much from you. Thank you so much.
HELLO MRS. VOLFIE!!!
Thanks for sharing this important info!!! I have had
Weevils in corn muffin mix
before. So this is great for
Everyone to know!!!😊💕
My son had found bugs in rice and he just cooks the rice and eats it bugs and all. He just says it's extra protein. Of course this is the kid that has dug up a worm, rinsed it off and ate it just to see what it tasted like lol.
username checks out
🤮
@@GreatMindsSeekTruth Haha I eat bugs and all depending on what type. Some of them are bitter, like wheat weevils. I once ate a pie teaming with fruit fly larva. Couldn't tell a difference once it was cooked. Free extra protein! If I find ants in my sugar I just eat them. Lol
I agree, when I buy bulk flour and rice I pop it right into the freezer for storage. Easy peezy.
That is why you should sift your flour and such before using. As far as rice goes, place in a bowl and cover with twice as much hot tap water as you have rice. Which also washes out some of the starch of the rice. My flour and rice stays in clear glass jars and in the sunlight. Oh and weevils will also get into certain spices.
Thank you for the heads up tip I never knew that you're awesome keep doing what I do and God Bless you
They go through plastic and paper bags. They will eat anything. Including the glue on boxes of food. I had one small bag of flour infested that infested my house. I spent 20 years getting rid of them. I finally starved them out. I put everything in air proof jars. Mason jars mainly and I freeze everything for 2 weeks as soon as I can when it comes into the house. I'm not dealing with that again. I wasn't brave enough to eat anything they were in. I threw away anything in boxes that had been in my house more than a month. I even put cake mixes in Mason jars so I didn't get bugs in them. It was a lot of work but it finally paid off.
Thank you. I have several different bags of flour....I just put them all in the freezer. One bag is whole wheat flour and I have a bag of corn flour, I just used the last of the AP flour...so I know to do that with the new bag. I've always had a curiosity of why they package it...and sugar...in paper. That makes no sense to me...for the very reason critters can get in. Why not package it in plastic?
Sift them out. That what my granny did. Nothing is wrong with the flour. You can store it without oxygen and that works also. I have had it in cornmeal also.
As soon as the weather cools...I will be oven canning those bags of flour..each one should fit a half gallon jar!
WAY back when I used to buy rice-a-roni for my young children, I brought in weevils in one of the boxes, it took me almost 2 months to get them boogers out of my pantry. I didn't buy rice-a-roni again for YEARS, lol. Now I buy 2 or 3 boxes a year, because my 93 yr old dad loves it. But it goes into a baggie and into the freezer before it ever hits his cabinets.
My grandmother taught me about weevils in flour. I always freeze mine and keep it in the freezer and then sift it. Thanks for all of your tips. I got a huge bag of flour at Sam’s club. I’m gonna do it like you did yours.
Bev, What do you do if you Don't have a large standing freezer & have a refrigerator with a rather small freezer? (the one that's on the bottom.) I don't have the resources right now to buy jars & can them .help.
Mrs. V, I wanted to to dehydrate green beans. My question is how are they for serving by them selves after rehydrating? Do you have a way you like to cook them?
foodstorageandsurvival.com/using-and-cooking-with-dehydrated-green-beans/
I REMEMBER WHEN I WAS YOUNG BACK IN THE 70'S MY MOM MADE STEW AND BUGS STARTED FLOATING TO THE TOP ALL SHE DID WAS SCOOPED THEM OUT AND WE STILL ATE THE STEW THERE WAS NOTHING WRONG WITH IT SHE SAID THEY WERE BUGS THAT IS ALWAYS BUGS IN DIFFERENT FLOURS SO YOUR NOT GOING TO GET SICK NOW I'M 60 AND I DID'NT GET SICK JUST SCOOP THEM OUT SOME PEOPLE DON'T EVEN KNOW ABOUT THE BUGS AND STILL COOK WITH THAN YOU GOD BLESS YOU AND YOUR FAMILY AND VIEWERS
God bless you too.
THANK YOU BEV! You just reminded me I've got a 10 lb. bag of flour in my cabinet that I forgot to freeze!
Flour, rice, and oats... always have weevils.... I ended up getting then from boxed pasta once... Now I put my boxed pasta in the freezer too and then into mason jars.
Don't forget to NOT squish the lumps. Throw those away as well.
Same goes for prepackaged cookies, I cheat sometimes when just too tired to make homemade, or last minute visitors.
Great video! If poop hits the fan...I'll enjoy extra protein over starvation anyday.
I purchased some whole grain off eBay. It was infested with weevils. Those weevils traveled all over the house to the downstairs and the upstairs. How do they do that??? That was over a year ago, and still I find a few in storage bins, the wash tub, in change of season clothes, etc... They are incredibly difficult to get rid of.
Wash down the shelves and canisters of your storage area with water and vinegar a 50/50 cut
@@OurHalfAcreHomestead Thank you!!!
we were infested with moths last summer. It nearly drove me insane. They even got into Tupperware containers. It took multiple cleanouts, containers washed and put into the freezer for a week, before refilling, a dozen or more moth traps before - hopefully I have beaten them
Dealing with moths in the pantry now. What worked?!!
I once made a cherry cobbler from ones I picked fairly late in the season. After we had done all the work to put it all together, it was sitting next to the oven waiting for it to preheat. My husband and I suddenly heard a lot of "squishing" noises. It was coming from the cobbler. We looked in there and pretty much every cherry had a fruit fly larva in it, and they were crawling out to get away from the lemon and sugar we put in it! These were tiny cherries, the size of your thumbnail, so lots of little maggots crawlin' around. We just looked at each other and were like "well, we're cooking it. Might as well just put it in." (we knew that fruit fly maggots would not harm humans). After it was cooked, you couldn't even see them, and there was zero taste difference whatsoever (we made a cherry pie every 3 days that spring, so lots to compare to). The only difference was that we got a lot of lean protein. No problem whatsoever.
Weevils are super bitter though, so I understand sifting out the adults. I couldn't imagine throwing away a whole bag because of a few bugs. People are so pathetic and wasteful these days. Thanks for sharing to help educate folks.
Oh, THAT'S why it's good to sift!! But seriously, without my mom here, thank you Madame for your information 🤗🥰 You are really a good pedagouge
Thank you for this. Icky feeling that we buy food with bugs, etc in it. Freezing and sifting flour will same time and money for us. Time to go back to store to buy new bag of flour and money spent doing so, really don't want to eat weevil protein in my food.
Why is it icky? It's really no different than shrimp.
Been there done that. Had no option, I had no way to the store.
I think I might freeze flour all the time now 😲
Great video! Very informative. Thank you for explaining the process step by step.
May I ask a silly question? Is that a Norman Brumm plate behind you on the wall?? I worked with him years ago.
Question: after you sift it and bag it, can you put it in an air tight container in your pantry?
Just to be on the safe side I'll either oven can it or store it like I am in the freezer
@@OurHalfAcreHomestead thank you so much! If I run out of freezer room, ill look up your canning flour video. I never heard of that but it would be a good idea to prep that way if the electric goes down. Thanks again!☺☺
My oven doesn't work, & freezer isn't very big. Would it be okay to store in canning jars with oxygen absorber or bay leaf?
Popcorn too!
This is a dilly of a pickle for "preppers" that are completely unaware that their insurance policy is being eaten while waiting for SHTF.
My mother taught me to do this in 1974.
Mine to have my own sifter grandma told use it was to soften the flour. Mom told me the truth so I would know for my self . I have always sifted .told my daughter she was like I ain't eating bread anymore. She had beans and corn bread last night
Thanks I just threw all mine away . I couldn’t believe it , I had it sealed in a zip lock and it was full of weevils- now I have to get more. I wish I would have seen your video first
Can I leave my flour bagged up in the freezer until I'm ready to use the flour?
Hey Bev can this tape of bug live in oats as well?
Thank you sooooo much!! Very good lesson,now I know what to do,I just thrown away 12 pounds of weevil infested flower.But I’ll tryouts your advice, thanks again.👏👏👏👏🥰🥰🥰🥰🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🤙🏼🤙🏼🤙🏼🤙🏼🤙🏼
I once read a book by a lady who moved with her husband to a South Sea Island long ago. There was no packaging. She wrote that she learned that crawls is not garbage!
I'm sure people have eaten many bugs and just didn't know. Look at the box rice or oats. A little hot water cooked them and we all survived. I typically sift flour prior to using so I'll just put anything that doesn't sift through in the trash bin.
Is it also weevils that get in Pasta too? I boiled some small pasta shells up the other day and didn't know it had some bugs in it and they floated to the top when the water started to boil. We just scooped them out of the water we still ate the pasta and didn't get sick but was just wondering if the same bug that gets in flour.
Thank you!! I'm 62 on a very limited income. I can't afford to buy bread and dang sure can't afford to throw out my flour 😊
Now that we are in a pandamic, food prices gone up. People has lost their jobs. Money is tight. Thanks for posting because I was about to throw the flour.
Thank you so much for this info.
I live in the desert, this can be a problem here. They can hatch in anything that has flour in it. Even those boxes of potatoes with sauce. Then they infest everything. At the asian market, they have them. The worker said, just eat them or take them out. My flour now goes into washed used juice or gallon water bottles to cut the oxygen, the o2 absorber, and lid screwed back on tight. It's life, it happens, it won't kill us. The bugs are probably healthier than the flour. It also kind of tells me, you have good flour, no pesticides on the wheat, or the bugs would be dead. I'll keep telling myself that ;)
It's hard to know how many bugs we all have eaten unknowingly. Bugs are not that bad..good vedio .I always freeze mine too..
Thanks for this! but how about the scent of the flour ?it might smelled awful because of the weevil
For goodness sake I'm guessing everyone on the planet has at one time eaten weevils or their eggs from their flour, pancake mixes, etc. Mom was born and raised on a farm, sifting flour for weevils is as old as the hills.
to stop bugs. After buying flour or pasta, put the bags in a zip lock bag and then freeze for 7 days kills the eggs. After 7 days keep in zip lock and store
I think this is one of the things I could've lived without knowing.
Thank you for doing this video. Can we do the same with Home-made Multigrain porridge flour? We found some larvae and eggs.
Great advice, I need to be more vigilant!
Hi...watching you're video here in philippines..lt helped a lot..i cooked banana cake earlier using sifted flour coz it has bugs...then i just remember is it safe?so i watched your video.thanks for your advice/info.
I used do a womens hair at my beauty shop who worked at a cannery and said you be so shocked at the amount of bugs allowed by the government in every food we eat.
I bought several 5 lb bags of flour, I froze them for a week and now keep them in the fridge, will that keep the weevils out?
Absolutely
We always had weevils in flour when I was a kid. My mother just sifted them out. No freezers in those days, either.
A couple of bay leaves in your canister will keep bugs out. I've done this for years.
In this case it's not about keeping the bugs OUT..but about killing them off before they hatch
It is what all the big LDS families do, in their HUGE PANTRIES....bay leaves on all their shelves...in all containers.
For over 30 years I have used dried bay leaves on my food shelves especially, in jars/ bags and no longer bug problems. So even if the eggs hatch out they don’t hang around.
@@Thefireslove It keeps bugs out but does not stop them from hatching if the flour gets a little old.
Whenever I bring home a bag of bird seed I put it in the freezer for 3 days. It kills off the pantry moth larvae.
Ms Bev...i know this isn’t the video but i just got through making your simple yeast loaf bread and i am so very new to baking bread..i don’t know all the tips and tricks ...please tell me how to store this loaf bread as it will probably last only a week...i dont want it to dry out or become a soggy mess in a zip lock bag...I’m so sorry to bother you..I’m just trying to start over in life and do the right thing by my body and the best for my family...thank you so much in advance...or maybe someone in the comments could answer..ill take any help i can get...
If you want it crusty..just pop it out of the pan..and let it cool before putting it in a plastic bag..if you like it with a soft crust...take it out of the pan while hot and roll it up in a cotton table cloth to cool. then bag it. DO NOT refrigerate bread...it changes the texture..however it is safe to freeze ( once cool)if you are doing large batches. Hope this helps!
Thank you sooooo very much!!! I really appreciate it...
Thank you so much! I returned to my home after a month and was horrified to see these tiny creatures in the flour. Thank God I didn't throw it all out 😅
Do you put the bay leaves in the container you store the flour in? Like with the flour?
My mother in law taught me to put all flour, rice, pasta and cereal in canisters or jars to keep infestation down. You taught me about freezing. I freeze all my flours then dry can everything. Can you do that with rice and pasta that is freeze them first. Did you ever get food moths in your pantry. I put bay leaves on all my shelves to keep insects out. What do you do Bev. I think a video on this subject would help a lot of people. Thanks Bev God bless.
Jo-Ann DiGennaro I freeze my rice first. Then pit in jars with bay leaves. Quart jars 1 on bottom & 1 on top. Half gallon jars 2& 2. Gallon jars 3-4 & 3-4. Large bay leaves all. If little or broken put enough to equal it by eyeballing it.
Does it say something about my mindset that the only point in your introduction that made me draw in a huge "OMG - Is that safe" breath was the idea of you re-freezing the Flour? I thought that to do that without cooking or baking it first was dangerous for ALL foods. I didn't start itching until you got to the table and began sifting, (shudder). My worry is that the eggs would surely be too tiny to see? The bugs themselves are pretty tiny. I know we don't eat raw flour, so it's always heat-treated before we get it but it's the thought of them being there that gives me the screaming ab-dabs.
You wouldn't be the first person LOL
Will you refreeze it since not Oven canning? It might have eggs in it again now.
Yes I've put it in 829 cup bags and I have refrozen it but only until the weather cools down and then I'm going to oven can it
Thank u for the tip n information. I enjoy all ut VEIDOS. Also ur Cardinal tattoo is Beautiful😀🌹
Im a 62 year old hippie.
I have thrown away flour and cornmeal because of bugs. I didn't know I could have saved them. Thank you.
I'm scared to check my flour now! Lol
For over 30 years I have used dried bay leaves on my food shelves especially, in jars/ bags and no longer bug problems. So even if the eggs hatch out they don’t hang around.
@@FranLuckyflute thanks for the tip!
Your welcome. Also freezing flour for a week will kill any eggs. My bay tree is in a pot and easy to grow as the leaves have health benefits.
At what point do you just toss it?? I got them bad in 2 containers so bad there's a darker ring closer to the top
I suppose that depends on how you feel about food waste and spending money to get more.
I knew about these pests, but have never put my flour or cornmeal in the freezer. I've bought a few 5lb bags in the last couple of months. Is it too late to freeze it? I never heard of this, but if it helps, I thank you for the advice. 😊 How long should it be in the freezer to kill any eggs if you don't have room in your freezer to freeze it all? Thanks again.
I once opened a box of dry cat food and had moths fly out of it. It wasn't even expired! It's so gross just thinking I am even eating the eggs! I had some expired cornbread, and there were a few black specks the same size of the cornbread grain, are these eggs or just part of the cornbread? Sorry for all the questions, just a little sqeemish about what's in our food...lol
We get them very easily. It's not the bugs themselves, its incredible they are eatable. It's their waste products.
Thanks for the info, I froze my 4-25lb of flour, put each one in a white trash bag sealed and in a storage bin with a lid and still got weevils!!! I am doing the freezing and sifting and bagging and freezing again. I think it might have been the dry cat food stored near by, so freeze your animal food as well!!!
Tfs and God Bless 💕😊
Thank you so much. I was just talking to my husband about this. Now, I know how to do it. ☺☺☺
All grandmother have the old flour sifter they used remember turning the handle or hit the side with our you palm . Well they are new
Yep. Or even vacuum seal. WHY would you throw out perfectly good food?
What about rice and other products?
We waste so much food in this country. Good video.
A great video! What we all need to know!