A recyclling center is a great resource. I may actually have too many containers of various sorts now. When the guys at our recycling center realized I was picking up nice containers for Y2K storage, they began to save the kind I wanted and when I'd drive up they'd be heading for my car with a bunch of stuff before my vehicle had come to a stop.  The clumping cat litter jugs are food grade plastic. The smell comes out after storing water in them then dumping it after a few days. Storing wash water in these.  People keep dropping off the large tins that Christmas popcorn comes in. Smaller but good are coffee tins.  Plastic buckets with plastic snap-on lids and handles are handy for a lot of things.  Gallon wine jugs are great for reverse osmosis drinking water. Also the large soda bottles.  A local group that has a lot of fish fries drops off a lot of 2 1/2 and 5 gallon food grade plastic jugs that had cooking oil in them. Take some cleaning, but the price is right.  From a nearby Italian restaurant I got two big garbage bags full of plastic 1 gallon containers with snap-on lids. Big grocery stores that have bakeries also have good containers. Bars get cherries in gallon glass jars. Ask around.  From a bottling plant nearby I got so many food grade plastic 55 gallon drums that had had apple juice concentrate in them that I was able to pass some along to friends.  If you don't have a recycling center, you could ask neighbors to save containers for you. (If you don't mind them knowing you are preparing.) Or on garbage day you could cruise around neighborhoods at a distance from where you live, if you don't feel shy about picking stuff up off the curb. No laws against it that I know of. Dumpsters are another resource. I have also found some real treasures doing this. It is amazing what people throw away.

-- Shivani Arjuna (SArjuna@aol.com), October 23, 1999

Answers

Think Greek restaurants--feta cheese comes in 5-gall buckets, olives often in gallon glass jars.

Italian--olives and pickled banana peppers come in gallon glass jars; Parmesan cheese comes in large plastic containers, about a gallon. But don't try chain places; their stuff is often delivered by tanker truck, LOL.

Dumpsters are great.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), October 23, 1999.

I hate to have to say this, but in many places it is illegal to take trash or recyclables from the curbside.....

-- biker (y2kbiker@the.land.of.the.free?), October 23, 1999.

I envy you, Shivani. We've been saving containers of all sizes (even little pill bottles and 35mm film canisters), and we've bought several of the large empty popcorn tins. Empty containers seem important to me.

-- Pearlie Sweetcake (storestuff@home.now), October 23, 1999.

The Hungarian and I usually ask the store or restaurant manager if it's okay just as a matter of courtesy--but not if the business is closed and there are treasures just begging to be re-used.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), October 24, 1999.

Another source that is not free, but very low cost are the buckets with sealable lids that can be purchased from donut shops, etc. I bought a high quality five gallon container that held hot chocolate mix for $1.50.

-- Nancy (wellsnl@hotmail.com), October 26, 1999.