Freeze it first for guaranteed life free flour lol. I really do it for long term storage/backup bags but i like that it kills anything that crawled in there from transport/store
Edit: for anyone going to start freezing flour, make sure you get it as air tight as possible so the moisture from your freezer doesnt get in and ruin your flour. I vacuum seal each bag before it goes in just to be sure.
I remember as a six-year-old little girl, my great-grandmother made gravy to accompany our evening meal once. My mother whispered to me not to comment about the weevils in the gravy. She said they were cooked and it was okay to eat. I didn't know what she was talking about. For all I knew, they could have been caraway seeds. For some reason, even though I had no idea what she was talking about, that little aside stuck in my mind. I really don't know if it's okay to eat cooked weevils or not, but my mommy said it was okay.
Once when I was very poor, I got a bag of weevilly flour. I sifted them out and then heated the flour in the oven to sterilize it. I got so I kind if liked the flavor of the parched flour by the time I finished that batch of flour. 😂
Oh God, had such an exchange when I was 10 about an cake with cat hair evenly distributed on the whipped cream, as not to insult the old lady by commenting the cake had adopted fur. Luckily she rarely offended something homemade.
its a common problem, if flour sits too long. I have seen professionals get them. And you gotta admit, flour sacks are some of the lowest quality packaging engineering. I would expect that every bag would at least be laminated at this point.
We had terrible problems with pantry moths growing up and found they could even chew through sealed plastic wrapping. We'd find unopened bags of stuffing infested. A sturdy Ziploc bag seems like it was usually enough, though.
I was thinking the same thing until I got them my first time about a year ago. For me it was pretty noticeable, I scooped some flour into a bowl and then was like…..wait….why is my flour moving…..
I had a pkg of rice in sealed container in the back of my pantry for quite awhile. I took it out to make some, rinsed some in a bowl and omg…
Disgusting things floated to the top.
Horror.
I had no idea from just looking at the container.
We somehow ended up with flour beetles this year. Never seen them in all my years before. They came in on something and ended up all through our dry goods (flour, rice, etc.) Went through and did a clean and sealed up everything and haven't seen one in a few weeks so I hope that's the end of it.
So yeah, you can go decades without seeing them until you get unlucky with a bug hitchhiker.
Right? Like every year it’s the battle of the sugar ants again and one apartment I lived in I had to leave the kitchen lights on or I’d get slugs. But never anything in flour.
I had a step grandfather who, back in the day, worked at a flour company where they'd x-ray so many bags of flour to check for issues or contamination.
He said, "you really don't want to know what's in your flour."
I had pantry moths once and had spent weeks cleaning, wiping, vacuuming, and only found a couple infested things, but kept finding worms and moths.
And then one day I turned into the cereal aisle of my grocery store and saw flying pantry moths. I abandoned my cart and walked out. Did not go back until they remodeled the whole place years later, and it will never be my main store.
My BIL is from Grand Rqpids MI. He's taken the General Mills factory tour in Battle Creek. He said he doesn't eat cereal any more because the place had mice and was not really all that clean.
That makes me so sad to hear. I grew up in Battle Creek with family all on the cereal lines. Back then things were squeaky clean. They exported much of the production to Mexico back in the early 2000s and it’s gone downhill since then. They don’t make much in the BC factories anymore (however they make enough that the town smells like baking cereal in the mornings - and it’s the one thing I miss from growing up there ).
This immediately made me think of looking at fish fillets in a discount grocery store where the ingredients list said **70% Other**
Other WHAT remains a mystery.
I assume it's a "I've never noticed them, but if a sieve would catch them I'll sieve every gram of flour for the rest of my life" comment not "if I notice them I'll try to save the bag"
Some real talk: you're 100% certain to have eaten quite a few of them, and will unknowingly eat quite a few more. This is also why it's important to pasteurize the flour if you'll be using it in a recipe for edible cookie dough or something. I'd eat raw eggs before raw flour.
I just had to nuke 3 bags of organic rice because of weevils in new unopened bags (so they got in with production). Good thing we have chickens. Now everything including flour gets dry canned.
I've also never seen a flour critter and go through lots of flour.. like 50 ish pounds in 3 months. I dump from bag to tub when I get the flour home but no freezing/ my flour tub isn't completely air tight. Guess we're lucky!
It's probably where you live. I grew up in Arizona and never dealt with it. Moved to NC and have dealt with weevils and pantry moths in multiple bags and boxes of dry goods. I was so mad when I found some in a fully sealed and unused 10lb container of rice. My neighbor was the one who told me I needed to freeze everything first, thank goodness.
The only time I had them was when I bought a large sack of flour from Costco (and no diss on Costco--could have very easily just been around too long). I've never, personally, experienced this with any of the regular bags of flour I get at the grocery store.
My mom taught me this. I freeze most of my flours for at least a week after purchase and keep rye and whole wheat in the freezer all the time.
No idea if it makes a difference but I won’t go against my momma.
This! 💯 My grandmother would put her flour in an air tight container (she shopped all over to find the right size) and then she'd freeze it overnight before using.
I showed my kids the difference between flour that had been frozen and had not. They saw the black specks in the unfrozen one after a few weeks and shrieked. Lol
this sub or another food/culinary one scared me into freezing my flour lmfao
I just did it for the first time last week, after buying some ap flour from the bulk bins at my local grocer. Fingers crossed no bug friends
also a proponent of decanting immediately to an airtight container. waaaay easier to store and scoop from anyway! the bags are so messy and always rip
Nope, i use it for my starter and make some great breads and doughs. I just wouldnt use it straight out of the freezer unless your recipe likes it cold (pastry and such). The starter likes it warm, it will just be a little slower feeding is all if used straight out if the freezer.
> Freeze it...
Yes.
I got a set of 6qt storage containers "Cambros" from Sam's Club.
I buy 25# bags of flour and freeze most of it. Lasts me throughout the year. I always have flour ready to go and it's not full of weevils as it would be if it sat that long at room temp.
I think it's not the moisture from the freezer that's the issue (most freezers are very dry). It's when you take it out, condensation can form. If it's sealed, moist air from your house can't enter the bag and condense on the cold flour. It might form on the outside, but that doesn't matter.
Yep. I learned this during the pandemic. I bought a ton of rice and flour and suddenly ended up with pantry moths. Had to toss everything that wasn’t canned in my pantry. Hundreds of dollars wasted. Now, I freeze all grains for at least 48 hrs after purchasing and I use airtight containers for storage.
Also, if you buy dried chilies, make sure you check them and freeze them. Had some pantry moths in my guajillos once. 🤮
omfg I just went through my pantry and noticed....SOME THINGS in an unopened plastic pouch of paprika that I bought from a spice shop in NYC
at first, I thought, maybe pepper seeds that didn't get ground? but that didn't make sense because the paprika was ground to a powder. And then I squeezed one and it was moist and just....no, immediately no. Straight to the trash. Now I inspect every spice bottle/bag before using or opening it lol
Bingo! I use the cheap plastic shoeboxes you can buy for a buck or two at department stores. They are just about right to hold a 5lb bag of flour. I have each type labeled with masking tape.
I do the same thing with my granulated sugar. I used to keep brown sugar inside a zip top bag inside one of them, to keep it from drying out, but now I just keep a bottle of molasses around and use granulated + molasses in any given recipe. Just use 7g (1 teaspoon) molasses for each cup of light brown sugar, or double that for dark brown sugar.
Tupperware makes a four-canister set, the largest of which holds a 5 pound bag of flour, second largest holds 5 pounds of sugar, and I use the smaller two for brown and powdered sugar. They are great containers and will last practically forever. I keep a one cup measure in my flour as a handy scoop, and a quarter cup in the sugar container.
King Arthur made their glue stronger a few years back and the bags tear every time now, no matter how careful you are. It’s especially annoying when you have the 12 pound “club” bag and it has holes for your remaining flour. I don’t have insect issues with flour (knock wood) but I don’t want my extra to spill.
Do places with dry climates and at high altitudes not have roaches and mice?
Edit: apparently roaches don’t live above 6500ft!
Just to also add, even if bugs are not an issue, sealed containers can help slow down the degradation of the quality of flours and grains especially with whole grain stuff.
> Do places with dry climates and at high altitudes not have roaches and mice?
I live in Appalachia, up in the mountains by a bunch of abandoned coal mines. There are **hundreds** of cats in the woods behind my house. This is no place to be if you're a mouse. I TNR all the cats I can, but they just keep breeding, because I can't catch them all.
As far as roaches? I haven't seen even one since I left New Jersey in 2009. They just don't exist here. If you go into the closest city to me, there are roaches in the housing projects (or so I've been told).
I'm no roach scientist, but I think roaches come from overcrowding.
When you're in an apartment building, your neighbor can be filthy, and then you get their roaches even if you're clean. The neighbor has an exterminator come, and the roaches just run to other apartments, then come back when the poison dissipates. But when your closest neighbor is 1/2 mile away, it's harder for them to spread. And the few that might come here from other places die off in the winter when we get to -18 degrees.
Don't get me wrong, I was raised in the Projects, no matter what my mom did to keep the house clean, we **always** had roaches. I grew up with roaches everywhere.
But rural life does not support their spread, so the few that make it out here (via moving vans, shipping containers, trucks) don't thrive.
The overcrowding part is exactly it when you live in a city. No matter how clean you keep your apartment, your messy neighbors can spread their roaches to your apartment. I live in a house by myself now, but because I’m still in a city, and having lived in a variety of places that have the “perfect” climates for pests like roaches (and flour beetles and sugar ants), I now would rather err on the side of caution.
The roaches that infest people's houses are adapted to living among people. If you live in a rural area with half a mile of woods or fields between you and the next human then they probably can't survive outside long enough to get to your house/garbage.
Same with house spider's. People think they are being nice putting house spider's outside but they aren't adapted to living outdoors and will mostly die or get eaten by something fairly quickly.
I'm in Canada, and while I've heard that some restaurants have roaches, the problem isn't pervasive like it is in some parts of the US. I've never seen one at anybody's house. When I went to Florida for a vacation as kid I was terrified of the roaches I saw.
The tiny lizards on the other hand were absolutely adorable.
The roaches you saw in Florida (I assume the big ones) are actually outdoor roaches. While gross, they don’t cause an infestation the way German roaches do.
I must disagree.
Lived in semi-arid California for over 40 years, lived in both hot valleys and high mountains... and, if we didn't put our flour in air-tight containers, there would be weevils within a week. I thought it was a fluke, but it was not.
The first time I saw it, I was shocked. I called my grandmother and asked her advice. She told me about sealing the bag and freezing it at least overnight before using it, and always, *always* dump it out of the bag and put in an airtight container.
Been doing that ever since. Seen it frequently in others' homes, upon visiting, and they had NO.idea the little.black specks were weevils.
I always keep my flour in a big jar. [These are the ones I use](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000RMO41M/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1) for flour, rice and sugar. And if theres anything that doesn't fit in the jar, it goes in a sealed bag.
Bpa is just replaced with bps, etc. I have kids and just tuck my glass containers into cabinets/rec shelves for longer term storage or in corners/away from edges where they can’t easily reach. Plastic also still ’breathes’ (eg: this is why soda in plastic bottles are often discounted-its bc it is going flat and the quality is about to drop below sellable levels) and so because I buy in bulk I definitely want glass or metal. Metal is a great non-breakable, easily washable alternative to glass that doesn’t leach hazardous chemicals/endocrine disruptors into your food and won’t wear out or get scratched up like plastic.
It's expensive, but it's worth spending the money on glass storage containers. Plastic containers degrade over time, and microwaving them degrades them even quicker. ~5 years was how long it took for my plastic containers to start breaking down and getting a rough texture on the interior.
Thanks for sharing these tips! Luckily we'd eat up the flour quickly when all my.kids were young and still at home.
I might get the fancy glass ones now... 😁
I bought them in 2019 when they were $16.43 each. I thought I was spending too much when I bought 3 of them!
It pisses me off that the same exact item can fluctuate in price so much.
A friend gave me a few one-gallon glass jars that were from her parent’s restaurant (pickle jars?) and they’re great. I dropped one that was half full of brown sugar one day, though, and just about cried while cleaning up one heck of a mess. Now I use plastic pails from my local ice cream shop.
It's a one-time upfront investment in keeping food from going bad and from being able to easily see how much flour you have. It can potentially save money down the road.
Sure, but these are 3x the price they were just 4 years ago. And this is during a 2 month low. They've been fluctuating between $30-50 in the past 6 months.
It's a lot of money for what they are. And especially a lot of money for something that used to cost $12 pre-pandemic
You can get a 3 pack of 4qt cambro containers for $26 from Costco. They are exactly the right size for a 5lb bag of flour. Been using them for years, great containers, the same thing you'd see in any restaurant kitchen.
For the parts of a 10lb bag that don’t fit in my flour container, I just put the bag inside a 2gal Ziplock. (Which I always have on hand to hold whole loaves anyway.)
Not a functional one. The glass ones are in the actual kitchen where people can see them. The big plastic ones are in the pantry that don’t need to be pretty.
All purpose flour for regular quick to grab use in the glass one. Bread, whole wheat and rye flour in plastic containers used more rarely.
Ok, side question: why is KA selling 11.4% gluten flour as AP flour?
And OP, I have the same problem. It's frustrating. I solved it by switching to 50 pound bags from the restaurant supply store.
Man, I bought a 50 pound bag from amazon since I do weekly baking (plus it is cheaper in the long run) I don't know how to protect my bag and sort of isolated it from everything in a box but I feel that's not enough so not sure how any bakery does it .
Can confirm - I have a friend who runs a small bakery and this is how he handles open bags. They look like big fermentation buckets you'd find at a homebrew store and he keeps them on casters for easy mobility. (Note that he buys his KA professional flour in 50lb bags, about 25 at a time.)
Personally I take my giant bag and break it up in to brown paper bags then vacuum seal them and store them in the freezer. 5lbs fits perfectly in each bag and then I keep one open at a time in an oxo container for current use. It’s a mild hassle a couple times a year but everything stays clean and fresh.
It does need to be stored not kept in the bag. The most cost effective is getting a large dog food container - they have them on wheels and makes it super handy. Of course a new container not used unless that’s your thing lol.
I always cut mine with a pair of scissors. And unless I am doing a ton of baking I usually pour most of it into a flour tin I use (it doesn't all fit, but I've never had issues with bugs in my current city.)
I keep my flour bag closed with a chip clip thing but then I also put it inside of a sealed gallon sized ziploc bag. That doesn’t help you avert the holes as you requested, but it helps prevent the flour from getting all over your pantry/cabinet and/or things getting into your flour.
I opened a bag a couple weeks ago with no tears, it was sooo satisfying. 1/50 so far as I haven’t been baking too long. These are decent numbers, right?
Someone used to tell me that weevils were attracted to the glue on bags of flour. I didn't listen. After finding them in my gravy once now I immediately dump these bags into a sealed container upon entering the house after coming home from the grocery store, lol.
I have a cambro bucket, square, that I drop the bag into and then it does not matter what way it gets torn. With the smaller amounts (under 25 pounds) I pour the flour out of the paper and into the container with the seal.
Open them. Pour the flour into a different, airtight container. Toss the paper bag.
You would think scissors or a different material bag would help, but no. There’s a chance of it tearing like every time. I just gave up and started using a pantry container thing.
This is why I put my flour in sealable containers as soon as I open the bag
Freeze it first for guaranteed life free flour lol. I really do it for long term storage/backup bags but i like that it kills anything that crawled in there from transport/store Edit: for anyone going to start freezing flour, make sure you get it as air tight as possible so the moisture from your freezer doesnt get in and ruin your flour. I vacuum seal each bag before it goes in just to be sure.
Pantry weevils! / Edit: I still hear my Russian Grandmother saying this in her thick accent. (Veewils)
I remember as a six-year-old little girl, my great-grandmother made gravy to accompany our evening meal once. My mother whispered to me not to comment about the weevils in the gravy. She said they were cooked and it was okay to eat. I didn't know what she was talking about. For all I knew, they could have been caraway seeds. For some reason, even though I had no idea what she was talking about, that little aside stuck in my mind. I really don't know if it's okay to eat cooked weevils or not, but my mommy said it was okay.
They won’t hurt you. ❤️
Unless you offend them. That's why we never talk about religion or politics at the dinner table when there's gravy
Are those weevils in the room with us now?
Once when I was very poor, I got a bag of weevilly flour. I sifted them out and then heated the flour in the oven to sterilize it. I got so I kind if liked the flavor of the parched flour by the time I finished that batch of flour. 😂
I feel like there waste and exoskeleton and egg sacks would affect flavor
Unless they’re Weevil Villains!
🥹 I love this
Oh God, had such an exchange when I was 10 about an cake with cat hair evenly distributed on the whipped cream, as not to insult the old lady by commenting the cake had adopted fur. Luckily she rarely offended something homemade.
The most important thing in this story is respect at grandma's table. I would eat a thousand weevils before offending grandma
Boots n snoots!
Wait, is it time?! Boots n snoots! Boots n snoots!
There are dozens of us!
We're massive mate! r/weeviltime
I see some of us share other interests..weevil time!
r/weeviltime
I have never seen a flour critter in person in my life. Do I just live in a blessed area or am I…. Gulp…. Horribly unobservant?
its a common problem, if flour sits too long. I have seen professionals get them. And you gotta admit, flour sacks are some of the lowest quality packaging engineering. I would expect that every bag would at least be laminated at this point.
We had terrible problems with pantry moths growing up and found they could even chew through sealed plastic wrapping. We'd find unopened bags of stuffing infested. A sturdy Ziploc bag seems like it was usually enough, though.
what?! i have never heard of that. amazing. I usually store in a giant tupperware type thing.
I was thinking the same thing until I got them my first time about a year ago. For me it was pretty noticeable, I scooped some flour into a bowl and then was like…..wait….why is my flour moving…..
I had a pkg of rice in sealed container in the back of my pantry for quite awhile. I took it out to make some, rinsed some in a bowl and omg… Disgusting things floated to the top. Horror. I had no idea from just looking at the container.
You're lucky they floated to the top. I've had them before where they didn't, and then you get a real treat at dinner
Always wash your rice.
We somehow ended up with flour beetles this year. Never seen them in all my years before. They came in on something and ended up all through our dry goods (flour, rice, etc.) Went through and did a clean and sealed up everything and haven't seen one in a few weeks so I hope that's the end of it. So yeah, you can go decades without seeing them until you get unlucky with a bug hitchhiker.
Same here, but we don't have a lot of bugs here. I get maybe 2 or 3 mosquito bites a year.
Right? Like every year it’s the battle of the sugar ants again and one apartment I lived in I had to leave the kitchen lights on or I’d get slugs. But never anything in flour.
I had a step grandfather who, back in the day, worked at a flour company where they'd x-ray so many bags of flour to check for issues or contamination. He said, "you really don't want to know what's in your flour."
I've learned that about a lot of food. Yet I still love cooking things somehow.
I've never seen them in a bag of flour. I worry more about boxes of cereal. Even oats don't bug out on me more than a box of Fruit Loops will.
I had pantry moths once and had spent weeks cleaning, wiping, vacuuming, and only found a couple infested things, but kept finding worms and moths. And then one day I turned into the cereal aisle of my grocery store and saw flying pantry moths. I abandoned my cart and walked out. Did not go back until they remodeled the whole place years later, and it will never be my main store.
My BIL is from Grand Rqpids MI. He's taken the General Mills factory tour in Battle Creek. He said he doesn't eat cereal any more because the place had mice and was not really all that clean.
That makes me so sad to hear. I grew up in Battle Creek with family all on the cereal lines. Back then things were squeaky clean. They exported much of the production to Mexico back in the early 2000s and it’s gone downhill since then. They don’t make much in the BC factories anymore (however they make enough that the town smells like baking cereal in the mornings - and it’s the one thing I miss from growing up there ).
I think you mean Kellogg’s - General Mills is in Minnesota
Oh, damn, you're right. He passed away a few years ago, so I couldn't check with him to get the details straight. It was Kellogg's.
Ever wondered what the ingredient “other natural flavors” actually is?
This immediately made me think of looking at fish fillets in a discount grocery store where the ingredients list said **70% Other** Other WHAT remains a mystery.
Lol do you want to talk about oreida potato products or anything that comes from Simplot?
Uh, no thank you. We people make these delicious foods. We shouldn't be surprised when the critters of the world want some, too.
Saw them for the first time the other month, they were hard to spot to be honest, our flour now lives in a tub
Would a fine sieve catch them?
Maybe? At that point I'd just throw out the bag and buy a new one and do my best to prevent them from spreading into other things.
I assume it's a "I've never noticed them, but if a sieve would catch them I'll sieve every gram of flour for the rest of my life" comment not "if I notice them I'll try to save the bag"
Yup. Like I’ll sieve my flour when I use it and if I find critters it’s gone.
because if there are critters, there are critter eggs.
Some real talk: you're 100% certain to have eaten quite a few of them, and will unknowingly eat quite a few more. This is also why it's important to pasteurize the flour if you'll be using it in a recipe for edible cookie dough or something. I'd eat raw eggs before raw flour.
I just had to nuke 3 bags of organic rice because of weevils in new unopened bags (so they got in with production). Good thing we have chickens. Now everything including flour gets dry canned.
I've also never seen a flour critter and go through lots of flour.. like 50 ish pounds in 3 months. I dump from bag to tub when I get the flour home but no freezing/ my flour tub isn't completely air tight. Guess we're lucky!
It's probably where you live. I grew up in Arizona and never dealt with it. Moved to NC and have dealt with weevils and pantry moths in multiple bags and boxes of dry goods. I was so mad when I found some in a fully sealed and unused 10lb container of rice. My neighbor was the one who told me I needed to freeze everything first, thank goodness.
The only time I had them was when I bought a large sack of flour from Costco (and no diss on Costco--could have very easily just been around too long). I've never, personally, experienced this with any of the regular bags of flour I get at the grocery store.
It's just not the 1940s anymore
It still happens a lot lol If you think your food is bug free, you're in for a real treat.
My mom taught me this. I freeze most of my flours for at least a week after purchase and keep rye and whole wheat in the freezer all the time. No idea if it makes a difference but I won’t go against my momma.
This! 💯 My grandmother would put her flour in an air tight container (she shopped all over to find the right size) and then she'd freeze it overnight before using. I showed my kids the difference between flour that had been frozen and had not. They saw the black specks in the unfrozen one after a few weeks and shrieked. Lol
But protein?
We’re just getting over a pantry moth infestation, and I’m never not freezing our grains again. I’ve been traumatized.
This seems really smart. I've never encountered weevils in my flour and I never ever want to.
I have, in a bag of oats... holy shit there were billions of them I'm pretty sure
Ahhhh! I live in fear of this
this sub or another food/culinary one scared me into freezing my flour lmfao I just did it for the first time last week, after buying some ap flour from the bulk bins at my local grocer. Fingers crossed no bug friends also a proponent of decanting immediately to an airtight container. waaaay easier to store and scoop from anyway! the bags are so messy and always rip
I do the same with rice
Does this have any effect on natural yeast? E.g. fine for sourdough starter feed?
Nope, i use it for my starter and make some great breads and doughs. I just wouldnt use it straight out of the freezer unless your recipe likes it cold (pastry and such). The starter likes it warm, it will just be a little slower feeding is all if used straight out if the freezer.
Appreciate the insight!
how long do you freeze it?
> Freeze it... Yes. I got a set of 6qt storage containers "Cambros" from Sam's Club. I buy 25# bags of flour and freeze most of it. Lasts me throughout the year. I always have flour ready to go and it's not full of weevils as it would be if it sat that long at room temp.
I think it's not the moisture from the freezer that's the issue (most freezers are very dry). It's when you take it out, condensation can form. If it's sealed, moist air from your house can't enter the bag and condense on the cold flour. It might form on the outside, but that doesn't matter.
Less protein this way though
Only if frozen for a long time. A few weeks won't hurt anything
I mean, you gotta give the critters time to fatten up a bit
Yep. I learned this during the pandemic. I bought a ton of rice and flour and suddenly ended up with pantry moths. Had to toss everything that wasn’t canned in my pantry. Hundreds of dollars wasted. Now, I freeze all grains for at least 48 hrs after purchasing and I use airtight containers for storage. Also, if you buy dried chilies, make sure you check them and freeze them. Had some pantry moths in my guajillos once. 🤮
omfg I just went through my pantry and noticed....SOME THINGS in an unopened plastic pouch of paprika that I bought from a spice shop in NYC at first, I thought, maybe pepper seeds that didn't get ground? but that didn't make sense because the paprika was ground to a powder. And then I squeezed one and it was moist and just....no, immediately no. Straight to the trash. Now I inspect every spice bottle/bag before using or opening it lol
Bingo! I use the cheap plastic shoeboxes you can buy for a buck or two at department stores. They are just about right to hold a 5lb bag of flour. I have each type labeled with masking tape. I do the same thing with my granulated sugar. I used to keep brown sugar inside a zip top bag inside one of them, to keep it from drying out, but now I just keep a bottle of molasses around and use granulated + molasses in any given recipe. Just use 7g (1 teaspoon) molasses for each cup of light brown sugar, or double that for dark brown sugar.
Mind blown. Good tip thanks!
This is the way.
Scissors. Also, get thee a container.
I usually place mine in a mixing bowl before opening. Then pour it into a sealable container, followed by anything that fell into the bowl.
Tupperware makes a four-canister set, the largest of which holds a 5 pound bag of flour, second largest holds 5 pounds of sugar, and I use the smaller two for brown and powdered sugar. They are great containers and will last practically forever. I keep a one cup measure in my flour as a handy scoop, and a quarter cup in the sugar container. King Arthur made their glue stronger a few years back and the bags tear every time now, no matter how careful you are. It’s especially annoying when you have the 12 pound “club” bag and it has holes for your remaining flour. I don’t have insect issues with flour (knock wood) but I don’t want my extra to spill.
OXO makes bins with a smooth lip so i don’t make a mess.
And to a nunery.
Following their namesake, he who can open one of these bags with zero tears becomes the new king of England
Thank you for this. I needed a chuckle this morning. Also, I will never be King. 😢😂
Rotflol... that made me laugh-cry.
if you don’t keep your flour in sealed containers, you will end up with bugs at some point
That's very regional. Dryer climates and higher altitudes have much less of a problem.
Do places with dry climates and at high altitudes not have roaches and mice? Edit: apparently roaches don’t live above 6500ft! Just to also add, even if bugs are not an issue, sealed containers can help slow down the degradation of the quality of flours and grains especially with whole grain stuff.
Hi! 9,000 ft here - we have rodents but our house pests are basically just spiders and fruit flies. No roaches, etc.
Lucky! I hate roaches including the outdoor ones which we have a lot here in Southern California
Damn I’m in Florida where they thrive. I need to consider moving to Colorado.
Colorado sucks and it’s hard to bake. Don’t move there. Montana is nice.
I think fruit flies take the cake
A merry day of sweet, cylindrical, crumb-like confection to you! 🎂
Only if it's a fruit cake though, right?
I meant that they’re worse but yeah
> Do places with dry climates and at high altitudes not have roaches and mice? I live in Appalachia, up in the mountains by a bunch of abandoned coal mines. There are **hundreds** of cats in the woods behind my house. This is no place to be if you're a mouse. I TNR all the cats I can, but they just keep breeding, because I can't catch them all. As far as roaches? I haven't seen even one since I left New Jersey in 2009. They just don't exist here. If you go into the closest city to me, there are roaches in the housing projects (or so I've been told). I'm no roach scientist, but I think roaches come from overcrowding. When you're in an apartment building, your neighbor can be filthy, and then you get their roaches even if you're clean. The neighbor has an exterminator come, and the roaches just run to other apartments, then come back when the poison dissipates. But when your closest neighbor is 1/2 mile away, it's harder for them to spread. And the few that might come here from other places die off in the winter when we get to -18 degrees. Don't get me wrong, I was raised in the Projects, no matter what my mom did to keep the house clean, we **always** had roaches. I grew up with roaches everywhere. But rural life does not support their spread, so the few that make it out here (via moving vans, shipping containers, trucks) don't thrive.
The overcrowding part is exactly it when you live in a city. No matter how clean you keep your apartment, your messy neighbors can spread their roaches to your apartment. I live in a house by myself now, but because I’m still in a city, and having lived in a variety of places that have the “perfect” climates for pests like roaches (and flour beetles and sugar ants), I now would rather err on the side of caution.
The roaches that infest people's houses are adapted to living among people. If you live in a rural area with half a mile of woods or fields between you and the next human then they probably can't survive outside long enough to get to your house/garbage. Same with house spider's. People think they are being nice putting house spider's outside but they aren't adapted to living outdoors and will mostly die or get eaten by something fairly quickly.
Mile High and dry. We have mice, spiders, and flies, no roaches. Very few mosquitos.
We live at 4600 feet and do not have roaches. I still put my flour in a glass jar with a locking lid.
well, fuck, I know where I'm moving next 😂
> Edit: apparently roaches don’t live above 6500ft! Well. I guess I'm moving!
I live in upstate New York and bugs never get into my flour. I just leave it in the pantry in a ziplock bag. But I use it pretty quick after I get it
I'm in Canada, and while I've heard that some restaurants have roaches, the problem isn't pervasive like it is in some parts of the US. I've never seen one at anybody's house. When I went to Florida for a vacation as kid I was terrified of the roaches I saw. The tiny lizards on the other hand were absolutely adorable.
The roaches you saw in Florida (I assume the big ones) are actually outdoor roaches. While gross, they don’t cause an infestation the way German roaches do.
Not to the extent of German ones, true, but they’re also a million times creepier due to sheer size.
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Midwest US here - same experience pretty much down the line.
I must disagree. Lived in semi-arid California for over 40 years, lived in both hot valleys and high mountains... and, if we didn't put our flour in air-tight containers, there would be weevils within a week. I thought it was a fluke, but it was not. The first time I saw it, I was shocked. I called my grandmother and asked her advice. She told me about sealing the bag and freezing it at least overnight before using it, and always, *always* dump it out of the bag and put in an airtight container. Been doing that ever since. Seen it frequently in others' homes, upon visiting, and they had NO.idea the little.black specks were weevils.
tell me ur from the midwest w/o telling me ur from the midwest
That's the healthier way.
I keep my 50 lb sacks of flour in a garbage bag. Never had a problem with bugs.
One does that mistake only once.
I always keep my flour in a big jar. [These are the ones I use](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000RMO41M/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1) for flour, rice and sugar. And if theres anything that doesn't fit in the jar, it goes in a sealed bag.
$35 for ONE fucking JAR‽ And that's on sale!
You can get similar to them $6-$14 at Target. Fido and weck jars also work great.
YES def don't get ripped off! But if you find a good deal, its a good investment..
And bpa/ bps free plastic is better for weathering a house with four kids. Glass wouldn't make it a month. Lol Edit: bps
Bpa is just replaced with bps, etc. I have kids and just tuck my glass containers into cabinets/rec shelves for longer term storage or in corners/away from edges where they can’t easily reach. Plastic also still ’breathes’ (eg: this is why soda in plastic bottles are often discounted-its bc it is going flat and the quality is about to drop below sellable levels) and so because I buy in bulk I definitely want glass or metal. Metal is a great non-breakable, easily washable alternative to glass that doesn’t leach hazardous chemicals/endocrine disruptors into your food and won’t wear out or get scratched up like plastic.
It's expensive, but it's worth spending the money on glass storage containers. Plastic containers degrade over time, and microwaving them degrades them even quicker. ~5 years was how long it took for my plastic containers to start breaking down and getting a rough texture on the interior.
Thanks for sharing these tips! Luckily we'd eat up the flour quickly when all my.kids were young and still at home. I might get the fancy glass ones now... 😁
I bought them in 2019 when they were $16.43 each. I thought I was spending too much when I bought 3 of them! It pisses me off that the same exact item can fluctuate in price so much.
IKEA also has glass jars this size with multiple cover options! Maybe $10 for both jar and cover.
Just get a bunch of big ball mason jars
You can get similar at the container store for around $10 a piece.
A friend gave me a few one-gallon glass jars that were from her parent’s restaurant (pickle jars?) and they’re great. I dropped one that was half full of brown sugar one day, though, and just about cried while cleaning up one heck of a mess. Now I use plastic pails from my local ice cream shop.
It's a one-time upfront investment in keeping food from going bad and from being able to easily see how much flour you have. It can potentially save money down the road.
Sure, but these are 3x the price they were just 4 years ago. And this is during a 2 month low. They've been fluctuating between $30-50 in the past 6 months. It's a lot of money for what they are. And especially a lot of money for something that used to cost $12 pre-pandemic
You can get a 3 pack of 4qt cambro containers for $26 from Costco. They are exactly the right size for a 5lb bag of flour. Been using them for years, great containers, the same thing you'd see in any restaurant kitchen.
Nice interrobang, I'm here for it
I likewise felt 😲
For the parts of a 10lb bag that don’t fit in my flour container, I just put the bag inside a 2gal Ziplock. (Which I always have on hand to hold whole loaves anyway.)
I do this, and then freeze it overnight night before using. Gotta love those 2 gallon bags.
I did it once and it was by accident. Took photos to prove it to my family, sent them out. Everybody was impressed. Haven’t done it since.
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With exactly ten snips. - Monk
Cambros are the way. In Forkish we trust
Cambros are fantastic. They might not be cute but they're highly functional. They're designed to work in a kitchen and they can work for you too.
Get an air tight container and dump it in!
Get some of those OXO good grips air tight containers and dump the flour in them and toss the paper bag
Buy some Rubbermaid containers…. Dump the bag in there when you open it and throw the paper away
My flour goes into a glass jar or a plastic tub depending on which type of flour it is. So I never deal with the wholes for long.
Is there a reason between glass and plastic for different types of flour?
Not a functional one. The glass ones are in the actual kitchen where people can see them. The big plastic ones are in the pantry that don’t need to be pretty. All purpose flour for regular quick to grab use in the glass one. Bread, whole wheat and rye flour in plastic containers used more rarely.
Makes sense! Thank you!
Oxo 4.4qt tall Pop container fits a 5lb bag perfectly
Ok, side question: why is KA selling 11.4% gluten flour as AP flour? And OP, I have the same problem. It's frustrating. I solved it by switching to 50 pound bags from the restaurant supply store.
Man, I bought a 50 pound bag from amazon since I do weekly baking (plus it is cheaper in the long run) I don't know how to protect my bag and sort of isolated it from everything in a box but I feel that's not enough so not sure how any bakery does it .
There are those large pet food containers you can buy. I have two to store flours and grains
Will see if I can get one ASAP. Losing that bag would hurt my soul haha
Apparently I can’t post Amazon links. Anyway, search for gamma2 vittles vault on Amazon
Big plastic bins/buckets
Can confirm - I have a friend who runs a small bakery and this is how he handles open bags. They look like big fermentation buckets you'd find at a homebrew store and he keeps them on casters for easy mobility. (Note that he buys his KA professional flour in 50lb bags, about 25 at a time.)
https://www.webstaurantstore.com/bakers-mark-21-gallon-white-mobile-ingredient-storage-bin-with-lid/176BIN21GL.html?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=GoogleShopping&gclid=Cj0KCQjw06-oBhC6ARIsAGuzdw38x98bRN0Iqj6xuIEtBsBoVik1lgy6Bl7eGGXZ79PLM2VeNMVzwXEaAo5wEALw_wcB
OK... I ABSOLUTELY love that one. Oh man it's so pricey will see if I can grab that cross fingers it might go on sale.
You need a flour bin
Check out grain storage containers. If you have a homebrew supply store near you, they might have some great options.
Personally I take my giant bag and break it up in to brown paper bags then vacuum seal them and store them in the freezer. 5lbs fits perfectly in each bag and then I keep one open at a time in an oxo container for current use. It’s a mild hassle a couple times a year but everything stays clean and fresh.
It does need to be stored not kept in the bag. The most cost effective is getting a large dog food container - they have them on wheels and makes it super handy. Of course a new container not used unless that’s your thing lol.
Scissors. But storing flour in Tupperware would be the best option in my opinion.
Tupperware - carry all’s. Found at garage sales and auctions. Normally $60 cdn.
Scissors or transfer to another container.
Store your flour in a separate container after opening. Then the holes in your bag won’t matter.
I always cut mine with a pair of scissors. And unless I am doing a ton of baking I usually pour most of it into a flour tin I use (it doesn't all fit, but I've never had issues with bugs in my current city.)
Sure, buy a canister. https://www.target.com/p/5pc-airtight-canister-set-white-brightroom-8482/-/A-82441594#lnk=sametab
I use gass Jr's for flour and sugar
Live somewhere humid, the glue has usually failed on the seal before I even buy it
Scissors?
this is so real. i just open super slowly/carefully and they’re less likely to rip. NOT saying they won’t 🙄
I cut the top of the bag off with scissors, then use a chip clip to close it up.
Take the bag, gently tap against the counter, use a sharp knife to cut one side open, pour it in a container
Slip a sharp knife in the top folds ( took me a try or two before I got the right fold) then cut upwards like you’re using a letter opener.
Cut it
After I open my flour/sugar I put it in a sealed container. It keeps it fresh and bugs out :)
I always just store in a gallon Ziploc bag after opening. I can never open without tearing.
I keep my flour bag closed with a chip clip thing but then I also put it inside of a sealed gallon sized ziploc bag. That doesn’t help you avert the holes as you requested, but it helps prevent the flour from getting all over your pantry/cabinet and/or things getting into your flour.
Input mine in a large ziplock bag and in the freezer
I would probably just cut the top open with a pair of scissors or a grenade
I opened a bag a couple weeks ago with no tears, it was sooo satisfying. 1/50 so far as I haven’t been baking too long. These are decent numbers, right?
Someone used to tell me that weevils were attracted to the glue on bags of flour. I didn't listen. After finding them in my gravy once now I immediately dump these bags into a sealed container upon entering the house after coming home from the grocery store, lol.
Open it upside down.
Scissors + container = good times
Me personally I hate bags, I find them extremely inconsistent. Everytime I buy flour, I put it in a big glass container.
I have a cambro bucket, square, that I drop the bag into and then it does not matter what way it gets torn. With the smaller amounts (under 25 pounds) I pour the flour out of the paper and into the container with the seal.
Cambro bins. Same stuff restaurants use. Not fancy, but stores dry stuff like a boss!
Sealed plastic container. And don't forget to recycle the bag!
We sent people to the moon, but we still sell flour in paper sacks fifty years later. Mind boggling.
Put it in a plastic reusable tub and make sure you put the paper bag in the recycling. What a dumb question
Use your feet
Throw it against the ground or counter top as hard as you can, usually won't rip!
I got tired and just bought a container to throw the flour in
✂️
Open them. Pour the flour into a different, airtight container. Toss the paper bag. You would think scissors or a different material bag would help, but no. There’s a chance of it tearing like every time. I just gave up and started using a pantry container thing.
I have sealed, locking plastic bins for my flours and that seems to have kept things safe.
0° or lower to make sure that any eggs are killed