I want to briefly outline for you the different types of food storage and make you aware of their pros and cons.The term “food storage” is used rather loosely in the emergency preparedness industry.Depending on who is sharing the information it can mean anything from a pail of beans to the canned food in your pantry

Food in your pantry
This is the starting point for your food storage. Depending on your family size, having enough food to last you at least two weeks in your pantry is one of the most cost effective ways to have food stored. I came from a large family, so we had a large room where we stored many weeks worth of food. It worked great for the family because my mom rarely had to run to the grocery store in a hurry. She would use our storage room as her grocery store and then restock that when she went shopping. I strongly recommend having a well stocked pantry with food that you are eating and will eat.

Here are a couple things to keep in mind:
* Make sure you buy food that you eat – I see people make the mistake of buying canned food at a case lot sale, but it is food they never want to eat. So even though the food was a great price, the food just sat in their pantry.
*Shelf Life- The best rule of thumb is that your canned food will last at least two years but I do know a lot of canned foods can last up to five years. If the canned food is past the expiration date, you should carefully inspect the food (the sniff test) and then make your best determination whether it is still safe to eat also for your foods that are high in acid content such as tomatoes and fruits will be closer to the 2 year range.

Once your pantry is stocked and you feel comfortable there, you need to consider more long term food storage products. These fall into three main categories:
1. Dry bulk food items
2. Dehydrated foods
3. Freeze-dried foods

Dry bulk food items
With dry bulk food items they are typically stored in cans or buckets. Most common products to find include wheat, beans, rice, rolled oats, sugar and other staples.These items can be good to have around, but here are a few things to keep in mind:
* Preparation- With cooking the dry bulk items you will need to take 3 things into consideration.You will need wheat grinders, lots of fuel (to cook these items into something edible)and additional ingredients to make the food usable. It is difficult to turn these dry bulk food items items into something edible. If you are going to store food in this way, then you have to go all the way.Just the fuel alone will be difficult to store and in the quantities you will need. So just remember, you have to go all in with this approach or you won’t be able to use it when you need it.

* Shelf life – most of these items will store for a very long time. If stored properly, the wheat, beans, rice and oats will store for many, many years and probably many decades.

*Taste & Nutrition - Typically with dealing with dry bulk storage foods you will get an excellent nutrition from the goods. As for taste, that depends on how good you can cook the goods, a pot of beans or oats without some basic ingredients added it will taste very bland & boring.

Dehydrated Food
The process of Dehydrating the food requires using high heat & it will remove the moisture from the food wish will allow it to have an extended shelf life. The two things that really affect dehydrated foods are oxygen & moisture and here are a few things to take into consideration with dehydrated food:

* Shelf life – because of how the food is processed, the shelf life for most dehydrated items is 5-10 years. A few items might be a couple years longer and a few items might be a couple years shorter (such as dairy). So all that being said, dehydrated food is on the shorter end of the spectrum for long term shelf life.

*Taste & Nutrition - You will find with dehydrated food that it just won’t taste quite as good (sometimes it will taste awful!) and the food will look a little off. Because of how the food is processed using high heat, it actually damages the food and removes nutritional value as well as flavor.

* Preparation – most dehydrated food requires that you add and cook it. This requires fuel and a stove to be able to do so. It is easy to prepare, but it does take time. For example, dehydrated soup mixes will require cooking for up to 30 minutes. Over time that will use a lot of fuel.

Freeze-dried food
Freeze-dried food uses a 3 system process and rather than using high heat like dehydrated food, it uses a low heat in a chamber that is slowly vacuuming the moisture from the food. Because of the process that is performed on the food it will retain nearly 100% of nutrients, enzymes and especially the taste. Freeze-dried food hands down is my choice for long term “food storage” out of all 3 categories, here are a few things to consider with freeze-dried food:

*Shelf life – freeze-dried food will give you the longest shelf life. You will get at least 25 years and more than likely much longer. I have heard of 40 year old freeze-dried food being tested and it has lost very little taste or nutritional value.

* Taste and Nutrition – This is another outstanding quality of freeze-dried food. It tastes like fresh food. The entrees, fruits and vegetables taste fresh and not processed. The flavor isn’t muted or dull. It will also retain the same texture, color and look of the fresh food. Because it is processed in low heat, the food retains 99% of all the fresh vitamins, nutrients and enzymes of the fresh food. This food tastes so good that I eat it regularly for my lunches and I know many other people that do the same.

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