In a previous post, I shared suggestions for storing adequate food to ensure readiness if faced with an emergency that leaves you without electricity, but where you are able to stay in your home. Today’s post is focused on stocking a food supply that you can take with you easily if you have to vacate your home.
Some of the food staples will be the same whether you are able to stay in your home or you have to leave your home. The following items can easily be taken with you and will provide sustenance as you seek shelter:
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Nutrient dense snacks. Stock lots of high quality snacks such as nuts, nut butters, protein bars (e.g., Clif Bar), crackers, and jerky (e.g., Lucky brand). Concentrate on foods that will supply you with at least 3 grams of protein per serving. - Potable water. As I shared in my previous post, we buy cases of bottles and multiple gallons of water vs. storing water in large multi-gallon storage containers. This ensures we can take our water with us easily if we need to leave our home. If you need to implement your emergency plan, fill your vehicle with as much bottled water as possible. You are able to survive much longer without food than you are without water. The actual duration you can survive without food and water depends on a lot of factors including your overall health, the climate, body fat, etc., however, on average, a human can only survive 3-5 days without water. A hunger strike by members of the Irish Republican Army imprisoned in England provides a documented case of a human lasting 73 days without food (reference).
Mobile-specific food and supplies:
- Freeze-dried or Meals Ready to Eat (MRE) food. There are a lot of suppliers who make food for emergencies (see resources below). The two basic types of emergency food are either a) freeze dried food – some of which have a shelf life of decades (20-30 years), or b) MREs. I recommend that your emergency kit include some of each type. While not as tasty without heat, most MREs can be consumed without cooking, whereas you can’t generally eat the freeze-dried meals without first adding boiling water or cooking the entire entrée.
- Mobile cooking device. There are a lot of choices here, including a traditional camp stove using propane gas, a small cooking pot using a non-combustible heating source (e.g., stove in a can), a multi-fuel collapsible grill (e.g., Volcano), or a solar oven (e.g., Global Sun Oven®)
- Fuel and fire starters. Wood, propane, charcoal, instafire, all weather firestarters, etc.
Following are links to some resources to get you started. Caveat: I have not used all of these items, nor do I personally endorse any of the following. Please do your own research and determine what best meets your needs.
Those are my suggestions. Please share your perspective below.