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With the stay-at-home orders extended through April, and experts warning against too many trips to the grocery store, most of us are desperate for ways to make our food stores last longer. While store shelves becoming increasingly bare, and COVID-19 threatens to keep us indoors for weeks, if not months, more, the concern about running out food and supplies is very real.
And while you probably know to snatch up toilet paper, Lysol wipes and hand sanitizer if you see them on the shelves, what are the less obvious items that you should stock up on as well?
Experts argue that these are equally, if not more important, to weathering this storm.
The answer is flour and yeast!
As personal finance blogger Peter Koch of Dollar Sanity explains, the demand for homemade bread supplies is higher than ever!
"Flour and yeast are regularly out of stock in groceries. If you look at Google trends you'll see that the "homemade bread" search term skyrocketed," he explains. The search term is up five times over it's historical, pre-March average. Wow!
Why so popular now? "Flour and yeast are used to make homemade bread, donuts, fritters (both sweet and savory), pretzels, rolls, dinner rolls and of course, pizza dough," he explains.
Not only can you get a lot of meals out of these two supplies, but baking has become one of the nation's favorite social distancing pasttimes.
Peter points that not only do we have all the spare time to prepare these foods, but, "We all know that homemade stuff tastes better." So true!