I believe the large discussion regarding FOOD Purchases and Storage in the GD CoronaVirus Thread deserves a dedicated thread in the survival forum.

There is a tremendous amount of knowledgeable people giving great advice and asking great questions and I think it would be more helpful to have a dedicated thread so people wishing to better educated themselves don't have to search through a bunch of noise and unrelated discussion.

I'll be creating CoronaVirus Sub-Topic Threads for other useful topics that I think should be focused on as well, from the GD Thread.

Remember, this is a Tech Forum, NOT GD.  This is not the place for discussions as to whether this is a "nothing burger" or if it makes sense to be prepared.

Please focus on:
Availability
What food stores well and for How Long
- Tier 1 (0-7 Day Shelf Life)
- Tier 2 (1-6 Month Shelf Life)
- Tier 3 (1-5 Year Shelf Life)
- Tier 4 (5-20 Year Shelf Life)
Dietary Concerns
- Calories
- Sodium
- MSG
- Allergies
Methods of increasing shelf life

Link Back to Master-CoronaVirus-Thread-with-Links-to-Sub-Topics-for-the-sake-of-Organizing-and-Focusing-Info

Swung by a place for long term storage stuff yesterday. They commented that they had been unusually busy lately and that more people seem to be stocking up. I did notice that they had much less stock than I am used to seeing in their facility, and it is a very large warehouse.

I have enough dry goods stockpiled, but I have been adding stuff to add flavor to the basics..... seasonings, broths, pastes, etc.

What foods would you recommend for a new prepper, for each of those categories?

- Tier 1 (0-7 Day Shelf Life)
Normal everyday food for basic living
- Tier 2 (1-6 Month Shelf Life)
Can goods, bagged pasta, rice, beans, ect.., condiments
- Tier 3 (1-5 Year Shelf Life)
Died condiments(Ranch) trip to LDS store
- Tier 4 (5-20 Year Shelf Life)
Cargo trailer full of LDS store, mountain house

A new prepper should start by just increasing the quantities of what they already eat and enjoy. I hesitate to make specific recommendations, as everyone has different dietary needs/preferences, and beans & rice is the lazy prepper’s way of phoning it in.

Same here.  Seasoning and spices are essential to being able to stomach a limited range of food stuffs.  However besides the basics don't forget the "feel-good" stuff too.  We just vac sealed some pounds of hard candies and cocoa powder.

Store what you eat, eat what you store

Fifo

Simple.

I just bought a bunch of meat and will be building a garden, with an experienced gardener friend, when the weather breaks in NH.

I preparation for potential loss of power/refrigerator, I also purchased a canning kit with pressure cooker and a 10 rack dehydrator.

If your looking for freeze dried food. These guys are awesome.

https://shop.honeyville.com/shop-by-category/dried-foods.html

They also have these meal pouches on sale
Attached File

10-15 year shelf life

Buy a pressure canner, water bath canner, Dehydrator, and a good mill. Those 4 things can make just about anything shelf stable for a long time without the need for electricity....and the mill can take shelf stable ingredients like wheat berries and beans and turn them into parts of recipes. Those 4 tools and some knowledge can do amazing things.

A lot out of stock

Whatever you decide to do, do it quickly. The supply chain is going to be dry for a while pretty soon. Most of the stuff selling out is produced in the IS, so they’ll be able to flex production up for a while, but if it impacts labor, all bets are off.

The pics below are of areas that are usually wall to wall with bottled water and paper products. The paper products were mostly gone, and the water was moving as fast as they could get it to the floor. And the panic hasn’t even started yet.

Literally, just did this exact thing yesterday.

Question for the food storage experts.

I just hit the 2 Million calorie mark.  That's for a family of 3, soon to be 4.

What is the correct ratio of calories from fat/oil? I made a spreadsheet and 230,000 calories were from vegetable oil, shortening, coconut oil, and lard.

Of the remainder, ~650,000 are Long term LDS/Augason Farms stuff and 1.1 are "everydayish" foods.

Far from an expert....but I’ve been at it awhile. The “experts” tell you during good times that fats/proteins should be 25-30% of your diet, Carbs 25-30%, and fruits, veggies etc should be 50%.

If you’re doing it correctly you will just be eating and storing the stuff you currently eat on a weekly basis. Don’t overthink the percentages. If you are super OCD and are worried about long term fat/oil storage...a can of crisco will last for years

Just added crisco and peanut butter to list.

also store foods that you eat if at all possible. ALready have groaning about the house if I have to get into freeze dried.

Once things settle down, i plan to get a few extra #10 cans and make a meal or add freeze dried sides to regular meal to get household a lil use to eating this type of foods. Not gonna lie, its gonna sux, we make homemade meals 99% of the time.