[MikeK]

I would incease your calories by a 1/3, 3000 or more

More is always better, especially if you expect to do some physcial labor. Great job on that 2 acre garden...WOW!

I definately agree. 2,000 calories might be enough for bunker type survival where you'd mostly be sedantary. But for most of us, it's pitifully low because of the amount of labor we'll be doing.

Whenever putting away basics, I always suggest variety too. For example, don't just store white rice, when there are other varieties of rice and other grains such as wheat, barley, popcorn (makes the best cornmeal), etc. And pasta is a must!

Same with beans. Instead of just pintos, there are black beans, great northerns, garbanzos, etc.

Variety is not only important nutritionally, but for keeping the meals varied and interesting. Appetite fatigue can be dangerous.

Which of course also means that storing a variety of spices is important. If you store a basic 5 or 6, you limit yourself in what foods you can create. They say variety is the spice of life. I say spices are the variety of life.

There's no sense eating boring foods when there are cultures all around the world that use these same staple ingredients. You can have cajun food one meal, mexican the next, maybe middle eastern, indian or italian after that using the same basic staples. The only difference is in how they season the foods.

Then there's cooking methods. Today, it makes sense to make a big pot of beans and put the leftovers in the fridge or freezer. Without refrigeration, you can realistically only make as much as your group/family can eat in a single meal. That can be energy intensive unless you look into alternate cooking methods. Solar cooking is one option in sunny weather. Another is to make a highly insulated pot cozy. Start your soaked beans in a pressure cooker and transfer them to the pot cozy to finish cooking with their residual heat. This uses a LOT less cooking fuel. This also works with grains. And of course beans can be cracked or ground to make them cook even faster.

 

[MikeK]

So what would you substitute for rice?

You don't really need to eliminate the rice, just suppliment it with other grains too. Again, variety. Wheat is extremely versatile because you can make so many different foods with it, from sprouted wheat, to hot cereal, to breads, biscuits, pancakes and flat breads, and my favorite, fresh pasta. You can find barley and popcorn easily also. There are a bunch of other useful grains such as millet, quinoa, amaranth, etc.

Amaranth is actually very easy to grow and the entire plant is edible and highly nutritious. It grows like a weed in almost any climate or soil condition, is a fast grower so you can start harvesting leaves for greens early on, and has few natural pests. Best of all, the seeds are one of the few plant sources of complete proteins. It's my top survival garden plant.

 

[MikeK]

Not sure were you got your numbers from. A gallon of honey is just under 12 pounds. I can get a gallon locally for about $25-30 dollars and gourmet honey for $55 for a gallon. Top-of-the-line, luxury honeys don't run anywhere near $50/pound.

I was in Sam's Club yesterday and their honey was about $5 a pound or so if I remember right.

 

[MikeK]

White Jasmine Rice is what I purchase. A serving of jasmine rice contains 200 mg of calcium or 20 percent of the daily value for calcium. It also has about 0.4 mg of iron or 2 percent of the daily value for iron. There is a reason the Asian culture eats rice everyday and it is because they do not intake much dairy products.

Converted rice is also a good prep idea because the parboiling process drives some of the nutrients from the bran into the grain before the bran is removed. It's quite a bit more nutritions than white rice, yet stores longer than brown rice. It also takes less time and fuel to cook.

I've known this for a while, yet I have only recently started to move into buying it. I have no idea why. I guess I've cooked with traditional foods so long that it's hard to adopt new things into my recipes.

 

[MikeK]

Lentils. Much better compared to rice which is about the most empty food out there. It is interesting how rarely they are discussed.

They're discussed almost every time beans are, same with split peas. They're a bean and not a grain, and as such, not a replacement for grains. Beans combined with grains make a complete protein. That's why so many of us use them as the staples of our food storage. You cover carbs and protein with those simple foods. That only leaves fats and your various vitamins and minerals to cover.

To get the most useable protein out of the bean/grain combination, the ratio tends to run in the 2-3 parts grain to 1 part beans. Hence the larger volume of grains in storage. This is also why we will need to adapt the way we eat. For example, now we might eat a big bowl of beans with a small piece of cornbread. When it really needs to be the other way around.

 

[MikeK]

I just came across this thread. I'm surprised that in 2 and a half years no one spotted the math mistake.

The 25 pounds of sugar was not added into the calorie totals.

25 pounds of sugar has 43,875 calories. Not any nutriants, but will still burn.

This brings the grand total to 884,625 calories for the year (or 2,423 calories per day).

That's probably because many of us recommend totalling food calories only, minus sugar and sweet drink mixes, etc.

 

[MikeK]

This is fine for a start, but what about some high-quality protein (meats), olive oil, and nuts? How about adding some quinoa?

I don't know what the infatuation with white rice is. I understand it's cheap and stores long; even I have some basmatti rice stored, but it's not a great option. I kind of see it as the last resort.

Quinoa is protein dense, lots of vitamins, and a good source of total nutrients.

White rice doesn't seem to be hurting the Asian nations any. They eat a healthier diet than typical Americans, even though they have a lot of white carbs in it.

But I store a lot more of other grains. Wheat is my number one. Followed by barley. People buy rice because it's easy to find locally and cheap.

 

[MikeK]

Why barley, Mike? I was in Honeyville this past weekend and saw bags of it and wondered why I might want that ... can you elaborate? Thanks

Mostly because I like it. :

It's a healthy, easy to cook and versatile grain. I've always been particular to it. So it just made sense for me to store it.