Starving Sucks - Stock the Basics

All of the fancy bugout gear aside, nothing is a more important thing to have prepared than food and water. I will skip over water here, and focus on food. In a world where many people decide what to eat on an app, and order food delivery multiple times a week, and a world of “just in time” supplies and grocery stores, having enough food at home that is nutritious, shelf stable, and easy to prepare is vital.

People make poor choices when hungry, and hunger drives desperation. I shudder to think of the things I personally might be capable of if my kids were starving, or I couldn’t find food for my wife. There is almost no price I wouldn’t pay, and I know I am far from alone.

If you are reading this, you have likely heard some version of the statistic that every major city has at most a 3-4 day food supply. This means grocery stores, restaurants, etc. The real story is much more complex (after all, why would you store silos of grain in downtown San Francisco when the San Joaquin Valley is half a day’s drive away?) of course. I read this interesting article by Toby Hemenway about Fear and the 3 day food supply which I’d recommend. I don’t know Mr. Hemenway, but he has some good thoughts. The main point here, however, is that even the smallest disruption can cuase grocery stores to run dry. And fast. Remember when the US was out of baby formula (Wikipedia article on 2022 Baby Formula Shortage HERE)? Or Cream Cheese? Or Eggs? Or TOILET PAPER? There wasn’t even an earthquake, and the supply chain showed us that it was a little more fragile than most folks might like or expect.

I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist, or an expert in trucking and logistics to realize that if there was a significant local disaster (Earthquake) or, god forbid, a larger one like a grid failure, or some sort of EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) attack, your local grocery store would run out of food VERY quickly.

For me, the goal is to avoid starving, and be flexible. If there was an earthquake, I have two primary tasks: Find my family and get them to safety. Those are complicated enough problems that adding on “going grocery shopping because my cupboards are bare” isn’t a good plan.

Basic Food Preparedness - More of what you already eat

The easiest way to be prepared is very simple. Just stock more of what you already eat. It makes no sense to store a bunch of Lifeboat Rations if you never eat any of them.

The government has thoughts on what you should do to prepare. A little thin, but all of that is sound advice. Don’t eat swollen cans. Stock what you would like to eat. Pay attention to dietary needs or special dietary restrictions. All solid advice.

The basic way to start preparing is quite simple. Then next time you are in the grocery store, and you reach for anything that has a shelf life of more than a year, buy two of them. Reaching for a can of Tuna fish? Buy a few. Sale on that delicious Hamburger Soup you like? Get a couple. Do you like eating Corned Beef Hash as much as I do? Get three or four cans. Pasta? Two boxes, not one.

A small part of my pantry. Nothing special here, just a little extra of the things we already eat a lot of.

If you have the space, I recommend labeling the things you like on shelves, so you can see what you have. Yes, I love labelmakers (that link goes to a topic I wrote on how to use one). I admit it. Those shelves above are oak shelves I made in our pantry, and I used regular old cheap shelf label clips (those are for 3/4 inch shelves, and that link takes you to Amazon where they are cheap) and added my adhesive labels. They are easy to slide around, and easy to change and they help me see at a glance what I am short on. As you can see we like baked beans and corned beef hash at my house. We also make a lot of things with pumpkin (that’s more my wife, but she makes really delicious pumpkin muffins, so we keep a bunch). You can also see an assortment of backup baking supplies, soups and other things. And if you look close, you can see a small selection of my (delicious) homemade jam! I really should write about canning!

There’s nothing doomsday about the preparation pantry above. Our family eats all of that stuff. I just buy more of each thing, and stock it behind the current stuff. One important thing to remember is to always use the FIRST IN FIRST OUT policy. Make sure you aren’t buying a zillion cans all at once (they will expire all at once) and make sure you are eating the oldest stuff first. Basic common sense.

Sounds stupid, but don’t forget a can opener. IN the pantry.

Yes, me reminding you to get a can opener is pretty dumb. But you really need to have more than one. Most any can opener will do, but in recent years they have come out with these really nice ones that open cans with no sharp edge!!! I actually have two different kinds. The one I keep in my drawer is this Rosle one. This one is VERY well made and very deluxe feeling. It doesn’t do anything other than open cans, but it does so super well.

Rosle can opener. Leaves no sharp edges, which is nice to not cut yourself, but also nice if you want to use that can for something later.

The other one I have a few of is the Kuhn Rikon. You can get it in black, white and red. I have a few of the red ones, and I keep one in my pantry in case of emergency, because that would be the one I grabbed to take with me if I had to leave and haul food with me. It opens can just like the Rosle, but also has a bottle opener, a way to pup pull tabs, and open sardine cans. It is also the easiest one for my kids to use. I recommend the red one, because it is easy to see. I don’t have a full size can opener in my bugout bag, but if I did, this would be the one I would take.

Try to get in the habit of checking expiration dates

I am not going to debate (or even weigh in on) whether manufacturers’ expiration dates are real or not. Can you eat that can of tuna a year later? Yup, probably. But no one wants a pantry full of expired stuff. My wife and I have a funny “synchronization” where we both tell each other something like “uh oh. We are out of Peanut Butter!” So I buy some. And she buys some. And then we don’t tell each other that we each bought some. And then the next time I go to the store, I think… “woah.. we were out last time… I should get more!” And then we have 14 jars of peanut butter which is more than we need. So then we tell each other “Woah! We have way too much peanut butter!” And then, of course, we run out. Needless to say, I do not recommend this policy.

Try to keep organized, and keep the older stuff in the front of the cabinet, and the new stuff in the back. Also, I tend to use my birthday as a reminder to “go look through the cabinets and donate the stuff that expires this year (or last year).

All in all, this is really an easy topic. Stock what you eat that lasts a long time. Easy.