How Do U Store Opened Bags of Rice/Pasta?

[lisaross]

OK, so i'm embarrased to say that we've found droppings in our house - mouse droppings.. In the kitchen under our sink cabinents and in our cultry draw. We are clean people but i'm sure i need to be doing more..my husband in now under the cabinets sealing any openings etc...in the past i kept my cereal boxes in the cabinets but i've been storing the cereal in plastic air tight containers. But i realize i have bags of rice that are open and just closed w/a clip - and pasta boxes that are closed but not air tight.

how do you store these items in your house?

thanx

 

[Kitikat]

I store rice/beans in their bags in a plastic container.That way i can put more than 1 bag in a container. In our house we don't usually have open boxes of pasta. We are a family of 6 so we cook an entire box. What is left over is put in the fridge. My 9yr DD could eat pasta for every meal.
As for mice i know we have them too. We live in a building (apt/hotel) that is over 100yrs old and we are almost 3 yrs into renvations. I would recommend mice pellets (decon) to kill them unless you have cats. We had a cat pass away last yr from eating a mouse that ate decon.
Kathie

 

[sydneysmom]

first of all, don't be embarrassed....it's freezing outside and the mice are probably looking for someplace warm. it's probably NOT anything that you're doing or not doing.

But, to answer your question....I've got our rice in the flour canister on the counter top. I don't use flour often enough, so that's in a ziplock bag in the freezer. But the canister is airtight so no worries there.
But for sugar and anything like that, if it's not in our freezer, I put the bags in a zip lock bag. (that seems to work fine). I never really thought about the pasta....I just have that in the boxes in the cupboard. but I don't keep that near the baking stuff....I keep it w/ the canned goods. (but I may get a pasta type canister now that you're making me think about it ! )

 

[Ava]

We put open bags/boxes of anything in the refridgerator. I should get some more airtight canisters (have one for cereal) but it's one of those things I just haven't gotten around to yet. We don't have much pantry space either, so really putting it in the fridge or the pantry doesn't make a big difference space-wise.

 

[CTdiznymom]

Nothing to be embarrassed about. Sooner or later it happens to the best of us. The real key is to keep them from getting in in the first place. Sealing up any holes around pipes and drains is a good start. If you have a door going to the basement, make sure it has a weathertrip of some kind. I found our critters squeezing under the door. It's a good idea to keep your opened grains/pasta in a sealed container anyway. However, they'll chew through just about anything whether it's an open box or not. If you're not opposed to bait boxes they go in search of water after consuming the pellets. Hopefully that's outside! My neighbor has the plug in type repellers that send out some high frequency sound, and she swears by them.

 

[kristinw3girls]

I have all of my staples in tupperware containers, just for this readon. We like in a rural area and the field mice are looking for a snack and some warmth, so don't feel bad. Just bag it up

 

[yoopermom]

We buy in bulk at Sam's Club, so store in an old chest freezer, probably not an option for you

Terri

 

[MomofKatie]

We have lots of tall plastic containers with airtight lids that we put all open boxes in. We have cereal, Bisquick, rice, beans, and other items in them. We also have various sized glass canisters where we keep loose pasta, flour, sugar, tea, and rice.

We never have had mouse problems, but down here in the south, we have little teeny bugs that will get in rice, flour, and other dry items- so we need to keep everything sealed away all year long. Airtight containers also help a lot with clumping due to humidity.

 

[theycallmered]

Air tight plastic containers are the way to go. My tip is to clip the cooking instructions off the original package and throw it in with the food item. That way you'll never have to stress out about not remembering how many minutes that rice was suppose to cook or how much water you are suppose to add to the couscous.

 

[pixiewings71]

I just put them in Ziploc bags, that usually works for us. Even when we get mice in the house, which isn't often because my cat (named Mouse) catches them for us.

 

[Crystal824]

We have a set of stainless steel airtight containers; we keep rice in one, sugar in another, and flour in another. Then we have a larger container that is made for pasta that we keep opened pasta in.

 

[DCLbrideSept2009]

Air tight plastic containers are the way to go. My tip is to clip the cooking instructions off the original package and throw it in with the food item. That way you'll never have to stress out about not remembering how many minutes that rice was suppose to cook or how much water you are suppose to add to the couscous.

I do the same thing!!

 

[luvmy3jewels]

Don't worry about being embarrassed! Those critters can find their way in to just about anywhere. Several years ago, when we were living in our old house (which had a large field accross the street) I didn't know we had a mouse problem. One day I was sitting in the floor pulling out boxes of cereal to organize a bottom cabinet with my dd (2 at the time) in my lap and my cat sitting right beside us. Well, one of the boxes fell over and a mouse ran out of it right in front of us! I was shocked and the cat never moved, so I guess he was a little taken off guard as well (or maybe just too well fed ). It was years before I could eat cereal again. I now use Tupperware type containers to store cereal in so I can see exactly what is inside.

We soon found out that mice had eaten through our HVAC duct work underneath our house and were coming up through the vents. We were losing a lot of heat/AC which I know cost us on our electric bills. In addition, it ended up costing us several thousand dollars to have all of the duct work replaced. (In our new house, I insisted on the hard ducts hoping we wouldn't have to go through that again!)

Hope you can figure out how to keep them out of your house!

 

[SandrA9810]

mice don't care what kind of ziploc bag or box food is in, they'll chew right through it.

I would suggest tupperware, or those canisters that have the locking flip top. I want to say i've seen stainless ones at ikea before. And set them on the counters so you can keep an eye on them. I hate living in florida, we have roaches. And down in south florida it was about the palmetto bugs, here in orlando it's the german roaches which seem to be ten times harder to deal with. Can't leave anything opened, and everything must have a good seal.
Pests are everywhere, and everyone has
to deal with one or another.

 

[Straitlover]

Lock & Lock containers - they are the best!!! Get the real thing, not the knockoffs. QVC sells a lot of different kinds. JC Penney sells several sets. Several places online sell them, too. Airtight, watertight, and a lifetime warranty. I personaly like them better than Tupperware.

Here's one link:

http://www.organize.com/lolofostco.html

 

[MEM]

Being clean really has very little to do with it. A good friend of mine has a truly immaculate home, but one day she saw a mouse climbing OUT of the bread bag on her kitchen counter. In her case, she made the food easy for the mouse to get.

I own a home built in 1891 and it has a number of tiny entrance points for mice. I keep all rice, pasta and cereal in glass "cracker" jars I bought at the Container Store, years ago. I prefer glass to plastic but DH has a huge collection of Tupperware and we use that to store flour, sugar and bread in. I also have a metal cabinet in the kitchen that I store items in that I use less often - cake mix, for example.

If you are looking to trap the mice, I can highly recommend the "Rat Zapper" - you never see the mouse once its killed, just slide it into a bag and into your trash.

 

[bookgirl]

Rice, coffee, instant potatoes, stuff that I use frequently and buy in larger amounts in clear canisters with rubber seals and fliplocks on my kitchen shelves.

Same with shaped pasta where I don't use a whole package. I have a tall plastic container that was recycled from another food item..

Flour is in freezer in ziplock bag.

I keep other staples that are in smaller quanties (real suger that I use for cereal or drinks, yeast, beans, lentils, oatmeal, cream of wheat, usually stuff leftover from when I open a package) in recycled glass jars on a corner shelf by my cabinet.

 

[hipchickie]

first of all, don't be embarrassed....it's freezing outside and the mice are probably looking for someplace warm. it's probably NOT anything that you're doing or not doing.

ITA - our old house was a 100 year old farmhouse with a fieldstone walled basement and balloon construction. Mice were a fact of life.

What I did was buy some reasonably affordable plastic bins with pull out drawers, as well as 2qt and 1 gal plastic lidded containers. Cereal and bagged things generally were transferred to the containers; small boxes, bags and stuff like that went in the drawers.
For really large items (like 10# bags of rice) I use something called fish buckets. They are large rectangular containers with lids. If you go to a local fish monger (not the supermarket, a real fish market) and ask they will sell you them. They are about $1 a container here

 

[tomthebarncat]

Those big airtight containers from the euro/dollar store work very well. For the mouse situation I will be glad to lend you my cat "Ms. Molly" as no mouse is safe around her, we call her "killer kitty!". Get a hungry cat and some airtight containers and you should be fine.

 

[flamingglobessigmund]

Tupperware, Lock-n-lock, or clean pasta sauce jars.