Today we will talk about the importance of food storage.
Remember I told you last time about how I stored some of my farm produce inside my BCH workshop office for preservation and for future consumption.
Many people has reasons of storing food
Meanwhile let me take you around my ban where some of my farm produce are stored both processed and the raw ones. Below are the pictures:
The picture above are some of food stored in the BCH house populary known as "Garry" here in Nigeria that is actually a product from cassava. It was processed out of cassava.
The processes are as follow:
1: Harvesting: Is the process of going to your farm to harvest your produce. You can do that using shovel, hoe, pick etc
2: Peeling: Is the process that follows after the harvest; peeling off the back of cassava to get it ready for the next process. After peeling, wash it thoroughly with clean water.
Gratting : You will take them to cassava mill for grinding.
Pressing: After grinding, off course you will have to filter out the starch for a better results. We use presser for this.
Frying: Get a big frying pan to fry it dry, after frying, then your cassava is ready for consumption. I hope you try this process at home.
The next picture below is my stored yams
Above is the picture of my yam tubas, as you can see, they're still healthy and sound due to how they are stored in a good environment; including that they were provided with necessary things to preserve them like light, fan, air conditioner.
As you can see, my groundnut above is still looking like a newly harvested product. Which is not. Due to a good environment, it was well preserved and consumable. Try and get a comfortable place for your storage as mine.
So the picture above, is the finished product, that was processed out of cassava to form another type of food. I will like to maintain my topic; which is the importance of food storage. But I feel it is possible to explain to you, how I came up with the food. As you can see, the "Garri" is still healthy and sound due to good environment and protections. I will show you how to store your processed garri to avoid damages.
The picture above is racks which forms part of good storage process. For you to store up your processed garri, you have to take it off the ground and that is how this constructed wood came to existance in my storeroom. It is not proper to place processed garri directly to the floor because it may go bad after several months. It may change in color or taste due to coldness from the floor. So, they're best in a cool and dry place.
Lets talk little on yam. Like I said before, some products can't be kept on floor because of the side effects that may follows after the storage but in the case of yam, you can see the Yam actually on floor with big standing fan. In terms of Yam storage, if you expose them to hot 馃敟 weather it will result to heat and when the heat starts affecing them it will lead to damages which you may not notice on time until they are rotten inside.
This is a product from yam called yam 'poundo'. Nothing should be a waste. This powdered stuff can be gotten from yam and also from cassava.
Just as I was saying something about the reasons why people store foods. I made mention of later consumption which is basic, but as a farmer, our main reason for storing food is to sell later for good profit margins. We sell them out of season when they're scarce. For example, we sold some of our stored garri today. The prices has appreciated to 80% of what it was past months. As the day count's it will still appreciate more and more; so you see, I achieved good storage and also good profit margin. For your information, this is another farming season in west Africa and we're also in the process of cultivation.
Conclusion
Food with good storage is as good as waste resources, and I hope that I'm able to make some useful points here. Join me on my farming adventures this year because it's going to be inspiring and fun.
Thanks for reading.
