[Pinemarten]

I was searching here on the forum and see that folks recommend freeze dried food as lasting longer than say, MREs.

What brands do folks recommend?

Should you look for a can or pouch as packaging?

Any ideas as to how long would freeze dried or dehydrated food last?

Thanks in advance.

 

[sachson]

Freeze dried, longest storing 25yrs Dehydrated, 5-10yr Dry grain, lifetime- beans, not so long of practical storage. 15-25tops. they really get hard, hard to cook, when aged. It would suck to open something in 25 yrs and find it funky If even edible. I like SurvivalArk The shipping is painful, but its alot of heavy stuff, too.

But thats things like meats, vegetables- the staples, rice/beans/wheat, corn. Lentils are my favorite, easy to cook- lite fuel/time use. Wheat needs a grinder, rice can always be fried to mix it up a bit, spanish rice... Dehydrated Milk stores well too. Can always use it in baking for protein rich bread, cakes, or rice puddings

Gotta balance out protein, carbs, calories. 1500/day minimum If theres any labor involved, gonna need 2-5000 calories per day. Dead cold of winter, burn alot of calories if working hard, 3-5000 cals!! Need more fats then, too. 4 gal of oil recomended for regular conditions. I'd get several 4 gal buckets, plus crisco, etc. There is dehydrated butter, sour cream, etc available Freeze dried mozzerella, cheddar, etc too.

 

[Cryptkeeper]

freeze dried /MRE = samething

cannd good or MRE's last just as long it all depend on what temp they are stored at that will help them keep longer. that why ppl like to store supplies in the basement or in an underground bunker.

when i was in basic trainning in 1983 we had 1 box of C-rations (canned food) dated 1945 and it was just as good as all ther others dated in the 70's. why ppl like freeze dried/MRE's is for backpacking its ALOT lighter to carry on your back than C-rations(cann goods) . the dates they put on cann goods is just to psych everyone out so they will throw away the canned goods once a year and buy new.

both would go bad if you was to leave them in the summer sun for 2 weeks.so storage is VERY important.

freeze dried foods are much more expensive if you dont plan on bugging out. then you dont need freeze dried foods just get canned and maybe a box freezer and fill it up with beef, pork and chicken and rotate :thumb: if you do plan on bugging out at some point i would only get enough freeze dried foods to put in your backpack and stock up on canned foods


i dehydrate my veggies that i grow out of my garden :thumb: they will last many many years so far ive heared of veggies lasting 25 yrs dehydrated


or you could do what these ppl are doing which is a good idea :thumb:

 

[MikeK]

Freeze dried lasts 25 years or so. Dehydrated is close behind. Many of the dehydrated foods were conservatively rated low, years ago. But as new info and testing on old dehydrated foods have come out, they're showing far longer storage lives than was predicted. I can personally verify that, as I'm eating dehydrated foods that were stored in a metal shed in the hot Texas sunshine for 11-12 years and they're just fine, even the powdered milk and eggs.

MREs tend to be heat sensitive. They last a long time when kept cool, but can go bad in just a few short years in the heat. I've gotten entire cases that were inedible, despite being only 3 years old, because they were stored in tents out in the desert.

Personally, I tend to prefer most dehydrated foods. It's a better value, stores more compactly, and cooks up fine. I also prefer it because it's an old technology, and reproduceable. Which means we can continue to make our own dehydrated foods to replace what we use. Also, there are a LOT of old world recipes that use the ingredients.

I ate my way through a year supply of freeze dried once (and part way through a second) and thought I'd die before I finished it. The seperate ingredients are superb. But the entrees get tiring very fast when that's all your eating. It wasn't long before I started having to choke down foods that earlier, I thought I liked. TOO repetitious and bland! They also make it hard to add the fats that is missing in such a diet. Whereas cooking with basic dehydrated ingredients, the fats are part of the recipe.

I keep some freeze dried entrees around, but mostly for camping or short term use. There are times they come in handy, but to me, they just don't make sense for the bulk of a long term storage food supply. If for no other reason that the cost. You can get the same amount of dehydrated food for about 1/2 to 1/3 the cost.

As for packaging, cans are superior O2 barriers to even the best pouches. Dried foods stay fresh for a very long time after opening, so a can full is not a worry. You'll finish it in time. It also tends to be cheaper per serving that way.

 

[Medic73]

Both Dehydrated and Freezedried will require water to prepare, so you better count on having extra.

My family strongly believes in store what you already eat and eat what you already store. We have a huge supply of canned goods as well as beans, rice, wheat (for grinding into flour) and many other food items. We date each item as we purchase it and rotate each item so we are eating the oldest items first.

We aso pressure can our own food, much that we grow ourselves in our garden. Sometimes we go to Farmer's Markets and buy a bunch in bulk when it's in season and CHEAP.

We do also have SOME Freezedried, Dehydrated and yes, some MRE's too, but they are not a large percentage of our food storage.

One thing I'd advise anyone to do is before you pour out a large chunk of money on something for long term storage foods, buy some of it in smaller quantities first and TRY IT. You may find that you do not like the taste of something or you may find that it doesn't agree with you (like bloats you and gives you wicked gas). TVP is a good example of this. It's one thing to sprinkle a little on a salad or on a baked potato, but to prepare a full meal of TVP might really tear you up. Then you're stuck sitting on cases of #10 cans of something you won't eat until it's the last thing on earth.

Again, store what you eat and eat what you store and you won't be disapointed.

Medic73

 

[ChristyACB]

There are positives to both of them but there are a couple of things that put dehydrated goods far, far out ahead of freeze dried:

-You can do it yourself. I dehydrate from my garden or from produce purchased at peak of season. It is super easy to do, reproducible and you can create any entree you can think of and package it up just the way you want if you want to.
-It lasts pretty much as long as freeze dried and because you can do it yourself, you can rotate all the time and use it in your regular diet.
-It is super healthy and allows the use of peak of season tastiness throughout the winter.
-It is very economical
-No shipping required, just do it at home.

The only downside is that freeze dried meat is better. Dehydrated is pretty much jerky. I know people make hamburger rocks but I have no idea how that really is.

 

[Survivalguy72]

Dead cold of winter, burn alot of calories if working hard, 3-5000 cals!!

Olympic swimmers burn 5000 calories a day. What do you think you're going to be doing?

 

[Cool Hand]

Dehdrated, but only because I got a dehydrator.

 

[MikeK]

My family strongly believes in store what you already eat and eat what you already store.

There's much to be said for the food storage mantra "store what you eat and eat what you store". I store mostly beans and grains, because I eat mostly beans and grains. I don't store much canned food because I don't eat much of it. But I do store a lot of dehydrated veggies. Both purchased and homemade. Since they're affordable, they're easy to put into the daily diet. Something that doesn't work well with freeze dried because of the cost.

This is important for many reasons. Not just for keeping the food rotated. But especially because your body is used to it. During times of stress is no time to be making drastic changes to the diet. It also gives you the time to learn to cook with those foods so you can create appetizing meals from them.

For example, I'm always seeing posts about eating plain beans and white rice. There is absolutely NO excuse in the world for eating such boring foods unless you simply like them that way. Not when there is a world of cuisines out there based on those same staples.

It took me a while to learn to cook with dehydrated foods. I'm glad I did, because I can cook meals with them now that I'd be proud to serve guests.

When I started prepping in earnest, I took a different approach than some people take. Rather that stocking up on "survival" food. I started looking at how old world cultures existed. What foods they stored, how they preserved them, and how they cooked them. I didn't focus on a particular society, but instead looked into various cultures around the world. Each of them had things to contribute. From smoked and cured meats and saurkraut in Europe, to dried fish and veggies, to fermented veggies like kimchee from korea. The early settlers dried apples and make all sorts of dishes with them. In fact, they had apple pie at nearly every meal. The real survivors are those who came before us. They turned "existing" into an artform and their cuisines reflected that.

Cooking itself is a basic life skill. It's a critical one to master to best utilize the foods we store. More importantly, it helps avoid appetite fatigue, which can be fatal.

 

[Optimist]

Olympic swimmers burn 5000 calories a day. What do you think you're going to be doing?

You ever have to bury a connex by hand?

 

[Survivalguy72]

Am I going to be burying a connex on a regular basis?

 

[Perkolady]

Commercially pouched foods don't generally keep as long as those dried and placed into cans.

One nice thing about having separate ingredients in cans is that you can use them in many ways. Regular everyday cooking needs, or you can make your own pouch meals for heading into the wilds.

I really like dehydrating my own foods because I can control the salt. Many commercially sold freeze-dried and dehydrated foods are rather high in salt.

I usually purchase freeze-dried things I don't (or can't) make myself, such as eggs, etc.

 

[Cryptkeeper]

Freeze dried lasts 25 years or so. Dehydrated is close behind. Many of the dehydrated foods were conservatively rated low, years ago. But as new info and testing on old dehydrated foods have come out, they're showing far longer storage lives than was predicted. I can personally verify that, as I'm eating dehydrated foods that were stored in a metal shed in the hot Texas sunshine for 11-12 years and they're just fine, even the powdered milk and eggs.

MREs tend to be heat sensitive. They last a long time when kept cool, but can go bad in just a few short years in the heat. I've gotten entire cases that were inedible, despite being only 3 years old, because they were stored in tents out in the desert.

Personally, I tend to prefer most dehydrated foods. It's a better value, stores more compactly, and cooks up fine. I also prefer it because it's an old technology, and reproduceable. Which means we can continue to make our own dehydrated foods to replace what we use. Also, there are a LOT of old world recipes that use the ingredients.

I ate my way through a year supply of freeze dried once (and part way through a second) and thought I'd die before I finished it. The seperate ingredients are superb. But the entrees get tiring very fast when that's all your eating. It wasn't long before I started having to choke down foods that earlier, I thought I liked. TOO repetitious and bland! They also make it hard to add the fats that is missing in such a diet. Whereas cooking with basic dehydrated ingredients, the fats are part of the recipe.

I keep some freeze dried entrees around, but mostly for camping or short term use. There are times they come in handy, but to me, they just don't make sense for the bulk of a long term storage food supply. If for no other reason that the cost. You can get the same amount of dehydrated food for about 1/2 to 1/3 the cost.

As for packaging, cans are superior O2 barriers to even the best pouches. Dried foods stay fresh for a very long time after opening, so a can full is not a worry. You'll finish it in time. It also tends to be cheaper per serving that way.

:wow: i didnt know dehydrated foods would hold up to the summer heat ... lol most things dont. but thats great info :thumb:

was the dehydrated food store bought or was it home made ? if it was home made how was it store?

 

[Cryptkeeper]

Commercially pouched foods don't generally keep as long as those dried and placed into cans.

One nice thing about having separate ingredients in cans is that you can use them in many ways. Regular everyday cooking needs, or you can make your own pouch meals for heading into the wilds.

I really like dehydrating my own foods because I can control the salt. Many commercially sold freeze-dried and dehydrated foods are rather high in salt.

I usually purchase freeze-dried things I don't (or can't) make myself, such as eggs, etc.

you can dehydrate eggs

http://www.survivalistboards.com/showthread.php?t=146939

 

[Scoundrel]

What do you guys think of the 5-gallon bucket of dehydrated foods you can buy at Costco.com?


http://www.costco.com/Browse/Produc...741&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&lang=en-US&Sp=C

 

[Scoundrel]

...and is this stuff crazy talk, or a good idea?

http://www.costco.com/Browse/Produc...=1&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Nty=1&topnav=&s=1

 

[JeanneLynn]

What do you guys think of the 5-gallon bucket of dehydrated foods you can buy at Costco.com?


http://www.costco.com/Browse/Produc...741&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&lang=en-US&Sp=C

I have a couple of these in my closet. I haven't tried any of the food yet, but it's a neat concept and fits well in a corner. I paid more for mine; I see they are on sale now! I think it's a good deal. I may taste test some of my pouches and get a few more buckets while they are on sale. The reviews at Costco are generally positive, although some people complained that the food had high sodium content.

I do prefer freeze dried food to dehydrated. I bought some freeze dried fruits and my kids gobbled them all up and begged me to order more. The problem is the price.

 

[MikeK]

:wow: i didnt know dehydrated foods would hold up to the summer heat ... lol most things dont. but thats great info :thumb:

was the dehydrated food store bought or was it home made ? if it was home made how was it store?

I didn't either! I was hesitant when I started to open them. But since they seemed ok, I started rotating through them. I'm still eating from them and they're all fine.

Most of it was from Walton Feed. I received a partial order just as I moved, so I put it in the shed temporarily then forgot about it. When I was cleaning out the shed years later, I discovered them in the back.

The only thing that went off was baking mix. The baking powder offgassed and bulged the can. I'm sure I could have added fresh baking powder and cooked with it. But I just tossed the cans.

The biggest surprise was a bucket of powdered milk. I had bought it at Smith's food stores right before Y2K. They handled survival foods for a short while. It was just packed in the bucket with an O2 absorber. No mylar! It was fine too, though it had picked up a slightly musty smell that went away overnight in the fridge. In all fairness, I had never tried that brand before, so it may have smelled that way when it was new too, I don't know for sure.

Reports are showing that most dehydrated foods last 15-20 years or more when stored properly. Which I now definately believe!

 

[MikeK]

What do you guys think of the 5-gallon bucket of dehydrated foods you can buy at Costco.com?


http://www.costco.com/Browse/Produc...741&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&lang=en-US&Sp=C

I think they're a very bad deal, personally. If you look at the calories per serving, you quickly realize that there are not nearly as many "meals" in the bucket as they say there is. And if you look at the ingredients, you find that most of the calories comes from starches used to thicken soups rather than actual food ingredients in those soups.

You really have to look closely at any "survival food". The industry is really bad about exaggerating how much food you're getting. Most of the "year supplies" are really only about a 6-8 month supply when you consider calories. And they pad the calorie count with cans of sugar and sweet drink mixes.

I only count food calories when I'm researching something like that. Because food is all you really want to be paying for. So I subtract sugar and drink mix calories. Then figure how many actual meals are left.

 

[MikeK]

you can dehydrate eggs

http://www.survivalistboards.com/showthread.php?t=146939

Big difference between actual powdered eggs and "dehydrated scrambled eggs" though.