Hmm.. less that I thought.
Do they taste good enough to rotate?
Or just go with the canned and dry goods?
Here are my thoughts on prepared meals of any kind from MRE to the #10 cans,
Here’s my thoughts on these kits:
I often get asked questions about various 30-60-90 and more food kits, buckets of prepared food that store for years as a quick and easy way to be prepared.
Now I’ve not tried the food in very many of these kits and so I can’t really say if the food is good or bad, but here’s the problem as I see with these prepared meal kits. Say you have a 60 day kit that comes with 10 different dinners six of each dinners A-B-C-D-E-F-G-H-I-J and since you never tasted their food the odds are that there will be 2 to 3 of these meals that you really like 4 or 5 that are ok, 1 or 2 you can choke down if you have too and another 1 or 2 you wouldn’t feed your dog!
That means two things; One: You run the good chance that twenty percent or more of your storage you won’t eat and Two: After a while what you will have left is mostly stuff you don’t like and won’t eat unless forced and that will get OLD very fast.
I think that you are better off storing 100% things you know you will eat and in as much a variety as possible. That’s my thoughts.
MRE’s keep just fine, in the same manner that conventional canned food will. They must be protected from freezing, and high temperatures. The menu selection in recent years has expanded considerably, though the quality in my opinion, is lacking somewhat. That holds true with “civilian” food as well. For old times sake I sampled a few meals from from the 1980s last year and they were absolutely fine. That is, as “fine” as they ever were, which leads me to my next point. While stockpiling a few dozen cases makes sense, MREs and Freeze-Dried are generally expensive and not all that familiar to most.
Grocery store foods offer a better value and taste, if not convenience. That said don’t let shelf life claims dissuade you from military rations, if stored at reasonable temps there is no problem. They are cheaper than Freeze Dried and have more calories.