How much food a family needs, step by step
Interactive lesson: turn your family's menu into numbers — adult equivalents, kilograms, square metres, head of livestock and the winter pantry.
Free sample Chapters 1 and 2 (8 steps) are free. The full lesson comes with the Family food needs module. Already bought? Unlock
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The whole lesson as text
1. Count your family
A homestead plan doesn't start from the land, but from the plate.
- Plate first — How many potatoes do you eat between October and April? How many eggs go in a week? Everything else depends on that.
- Adults count 1.0 — Adults and children aged 15 and over count as one adult equivalent.
- Children count less — Children aged 7 to 14 count 0.7. Children up to 6 count 0.4.
- Add up the family — Two adults, a child of 10 and a child of 4: 1.0 + 1.0 + 0.7 + 0.4 = 3.1 AE. This family eats about as much as three adults.
Why: Once you know how much your family eats, you know how many beds, fruit trees and hens you need. A four-year-old doesn't eat as much as a parent who has been digging all day, so you count the family in adult equivalents (AE).
- Hard physical work, growing teenagers, breastfeeding mothers: add 0.1–0.3 per person. Older people and desk jobs: subtract 0.1–0.2.
- Count food for sale or for gifts separately; don't mix it with the family's needs.
2. Yearly needs
This is roughly what one adult eats on a varied diet with plenty of vegetables and moderate meat.
- Vegetables and potatoes — Vegetables, fresh and preserved: 120 kg a year per AE, about 330 g a day. Potatoes: 80 kg.
- Fruit and eggs — Fruit, fresh and processed: 75 kg a year. Eggs: 220, about 4 a week.
- Milk, meat, honey — Milk with cheese and yoghurt: 150 L. Meat from poultry, rabbit, kid and lamb: 35 kg. Honey: 4 kg.
- Count your own week — There is no exact standard for milk and meat. Write down what you eat in one week, multiply by 52, and that is your standard.
Why: Multiply the standards by the number of adult equivalents and you get the whole family's need. The World Health Organization recommends at least 400 g of fruit and vegetables a day, and the standard goes above that because some always spoils or goes to the hens.
- Vegetarian diet: meat is 0, and instead of 6 kg count 10–15 kg of dried beans and other pulses per AE.
- One kilogram of fresh cheese takes roughly 5–7 litres of milk, and a hard cheese 8–10 litres.
3. Goals in percent · Locked
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4. From kilograms to square metres · Locked
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5. From need to head of livestock · Locked
Buy the Family food needs module and you get the PDF to download and print, plus lifetime access to this interactive lesson: all 6 chapters, 24 steps.
6. Winter from the pantry · Locked
Buy the Family food needs module and you get the PDF to download and print, plus lifetime access to this interactive lesson: all 6 chapters, 24 steps.