you will develop a taste for certain dishes. You will also feel confident in your use of specific ingredients and get used to keeping them on hand. Rather than MREs and dehydrated meals, those ingredients should form the foundation of your survival food storage plan because they are the ones you know best. Although the idea of amassing a
year’s worth of food is intimidating, if not completely impractical, buying and storing extra supplies of foods you already eat is easy and affordable. When you go shopping, grab one or two extra cans, jars, or boxes of your staple foods as your budget allows. You should also set up an additional food storage area in your home that is dedicated to long-term storage. Organize it so all your staple foods are arranged together with the soon- est expiration date in the front or on top and the other expiration dates in chronological order behind it. When you get home from grocery shopping, the newly-purchased items go to the “back of the line” and the item due to expire soonest moves from long-term storage to your pantry. This basic “first in, first out”
(FIFO) system ensures a regular ro- tation of your foods and ensures the bulk of your survival food stores consist of things you actually eat. For ease of reference, I like to use a felt-tip marker to mark the expiration dates of my foods in large numbers. This allows me to see at a glance what items are due to expire and need to get moved up to the pantry and kitchen. It makes tracking expiration dates much easier and reduces food waste. If you’re an apartment dweller with
limited storage space, you might think long-term food storage is impossible. However, with a little imagination you can also be prepared. Consider picking up a few of the storage bins that slide under your bed. Instead of sweaters and socks, pack them with canned and dry goods and rotate them as described above.
Track Eating Trends Cooking on a regular basis is the
best way to understand how far food actually goes and what foods actu- ally get eaten. Such knowledge is an incredibly important part of under- standing how much food you really have and how long it will last. For ex- ample, a can of soup and half a box of crackers might represent one meal for two adults. An active teenager might eat that same amount all by himself, while two small children wouldn’t finish the meal and might create left- overs — something difficult to store safely when you have no power.
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With this type of understand-
ing, you’ll soon be able to estimate whether a box of macaroni and a couple of cans of chili represents one meal or three meals for your family. And ultimately, that’s the only way you’ll be able to accurately achieve specific food storage goals. This pro- cess of “doing the math” is probably the most important aspect of surviv- al food planning—especially if you make bulk foods like rice and beans part of your strategy. Rice is a staple food in many parts
of the world. People who really rely on it as a major part of their diets know exactly how many meals they can get from a given amount of uncooked rice. Most people in our culture, how- ever, don’t have that kind of insight because, under normal circumstanc- es, we don’t have to. However, when preparing for a survival situation, that’s exactly the kind of information we need, so let’s do the math. My wife and I lived in Asia for
several years and love to cook Asian food. Based on this experience, I know two cups of uncooked long grain rice yields enough cooked rice to easily qualify as a full meal for us, especially when it’s combined with some form of protein or vegetables. Based on this traditional Asian food strategy, where rice is the “filler” and a limited amount of meat, veggies, and sauce is used to flavor the rice, one cup of cooked rice is roughly equivalent to a meal. With that in mind, if I added a 20-lb bag of rice to my bulk survival food supply, how many individual meals is that? To find the answer, weigh one cup
of uncooked rice (make sure to sub- tract the weight of the cup). On aver- age, it’s about 6.75 ounces. Since there are 16 ounces in a pound, a 20-lb bag of rice weighs 320 ounces. Divide 320 ounces by 6.75 and you get about 47.4. That means a 20-lb bag of rice repre- sents roughly 47 meals or almost 16 days of a substantial food source for one person — assuming you have also planned for the water, means, and, yes, the skill to cook it. You should “do the math” for all
your survival food stores, both by themselves and combined to yield your favorite recipes. This process will not only help you quantify your actual food supply, it will help you to buy and prepare food in manageable portions to avoid waste.
What’s Missing? Fresh pancakes are easy to cook
and a great morale booster. Bear in mind, however, many pancake mixes call for things like milk and eggs — stuff you may not have in a
survival situation. Plan ahead and either stock up on mixes that work with plain water or add powdered eggs and milk to your stash to ensure you have all the component parts to make your favorite foods. Butter is another item that gets
overlooked. If the fresh stuff is un- available, powdered butter alterna- tives can be found that add the right taste without any storage issues.
Spice It Up When I served in the Army and we
ate C-Rations in the field, most sol- diers made a habit of carrying a bottle of Tabasco with them all the time. The spice it offered really helped make the rations (which get old very quick) a lot more palatable. With that in mind, you should also
stock up on spices for your survival pantry, including lots of dried herbs. They really make a difference and can transform ordinary food into some- thing a lot more tasty and comfort- ing, which is important in a crisis. I also make a habit of collecting
condiment packets when I eat at fast- food restaurants and cafeterias. Un- like large bottles of ketchup, mustard, and mayo that should be refrigerated to stay fresh, these single-serving packets are extremely convenient and can be used as needed.
Bug-Out Considerations One final aspect of planning your
survival menu should be packaging and weight. If the situation you face demands you bug out, you’ll need to take food with you. A 12-ounce can of tuna (a great survival food) actu- ally weighs 14 ounces. For every can you carry you’re lugging 2 ounces of packaging or about 14 percent of the total weight. If instead you bought tuna in
foil packages, you’ll find that two, 6.4-ounce packages actually weigh 13-1/8 (13.125) ounces. Together the two foil packages only weigh .325 ounces — about 2 percent of the to- tal weight. They also pack flat, take up very little room and don’t even require a can opener. If you’re not a tuna fan, check out the foil pack- aged chicken meat. It’s fully cooked, can be incorporated into other dish- es like regular chicken breast meat, and is an excellent source of surviv- al protein. Survival food storage doesn’t have
to mean stockpiling pallets of bulk rations in your garage. Like any good survival strategy, it should mean de- veloping a practical, achievable plan that is appropriate to your actual needs and the situations you are most likely to face. *
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