Last Updated on December 22, 2019 by Lisa Vargas
When I first started learning about prepping I quickly found out how important building up food reserves was. It seemed easy enough to buy those big emergency food kits and store them in my garage. But what I didn’t learn about until later was the emergency ration bars that also play a vital role in your food prep due to their convenience and massive calorie count per bar.
Today we are going to look at the best emergency ration bars on the market and look at the various qualities in each of them. I even had a little fund with these food bars as I did a little taste test comparison between four of the different brands. You can watch that below if you feel like it.
Emergency Food Rations
Let’s go ahead and look at some of the more popular food ration bars on the market today. All of these bars have a 5-year shelf life and have a non-thirst provoking formula. Several of these high calorie food bars I have personally tested myself, so you may want to buy a few single-sized emergency food ration bars like I did and decide which one tastes best to you.
Keep in mind as you go through these, many of these bars come in one big piece that is about 1.5″ thick and they are extremely hard. They are scored to break into six pieces typically but you need to have a knife on hand in order to cut the smaller 400-calorie scored pieces off.
If you have weak or bad teeth, don’t try and bite into these too quickly. Again, they are very hard. You can watch my video on how I had to bite pieces off – and I have great teeth!
Also, if you have gluten allergies, these emergency ration bars won’t be for you. The first ingredient on the list of most of these food bars is enriched wheat wheat flour.
1. Grizzly Gear Emergency Food Rations
You can view the ingredients above in the image, but one thing that is nice is you can see that there are actually quite a few vitamins and minerals in these food rations. From the image above you can see there is Vitamin A, Calcium, Vitamin D, Iron, and several other important things to keep your body nourished during times without food.
- 9 (400 calorie) bars total to equal 3600 calories total
- 5 year shelf life
- Manufacturer: Survivor Industries Inc.
- Lemon flavored
- Withstands extreme conditions and temperatures (-22F to 149F)
- Net Weight: 1 lb. 8 oz.
These 400 calorie bars are not individually packaged so you will need to store them in an air-tight container once you open them. The only drawback with this ration bar was that it seemed “oily” to me compared with the other food bars.
The lemon flavor wasn’t that pronounced either, so I wouldn’t count on these if you are a lemon-flavor lover. But maybe that’s a good thing because the Grizzly Gear food ration bars have one of the lowest sugar contents of all of emergency bars on this list.
2. S.O.S. Emergency Food Ration Review
What I like about this food ration emergency bar is that it has 8 grams of protein per serving which is one of the highest protein contents on this list. The sugar content is a little high at 31 grams per serving, but that makes sense since they are so sweet.
It will just depend on what you personally prefer in terms of sweetness. These food bars will definitely help to curb your hunger and get you through until the next day.
- 3600 calories = 9 x 400 calorie bars
- 5-year shelf-life
- Comes in both cinnamon and coconut flavors
- Made in the USA
- Net Weight: 1.60 lbs.
3. UST Emergency Food Ration Bars
I didn’t get a chance to taste these UST Emergency Food Ration Bars but from the Amazon reviews people really like the flavor! These emergency food bars come three in a case, so you will actually be getting three (2400 calorie bars). These emergency survival food bars provide high energy, and will keep you satisfied in an emergency situation for quite some time.
- 2400 Calories = 6 x 400 calorie bars
- Flavor: Apple-Cinnamon
- Weight: 18 oz.
- Made in the USA
- 5-year shelf life
If you’re going for flavor, this emergency food will absolutely satisfy your taste buds. Keep in mind it’s only 2400 calories versus a 3600 calorie food bar, therefore it will technically only last you two days instead of three. This is possibly why they sell these in a pack of three instead of just a single bar?
4. Datrex Emergency Food Ration Bars
The Datrex 2400 Emergency Food Ration Bars are a little different than most because they only contain 200 calories per square, they are individually wrapped, and have 12 bars per individual vacuum-sealed pack.
These emergency food bars are soft and chewy, compared to the other emergency bars. At the same time, the one complaint that these bars have is that when you open the wrapper, much of the bar crumbles instantly because it’s so soft.
- 2400 calories
- Made in the USA
- Soft and chewy
- Individually wrapped
- Low sugar content per bar
Something interesting you will notice on the Datrex packaging of these food is that it says not to drink water for 24 hours. This is to put your body in a state of deprivation so that you can fully enjoy the satisfaction that these emergency rations provide.
5. IRPRUS RUSSIAN Survival Food Bars
Irprus Russian army original emergency food bars aren’t the most recognizable brand I admit, primarily because they are made in Russia, but I wanted to cover them quickly because you will see them on Amazon floating around with a 4 out of 5-star review, which isn’t too shabby.
Each pack comes with three bars. Each bar is approximately 267 calories a piece and this emergency food set comes with three of those packs. Hopefully that makes sense.
- 1 pack (3 bars) = 800 calories (3 packs in the set equals the 2400 calories)
- Weight: 1 lb. 1oz.
- Made and factory delivered from in Russia
- Taste: A little on the sweeter side
- 5 year shelf life
Some of the main ingredients in this produce include wheat flour – 32%, sugar – 30%, vegetable fat – 28%, and oat flakes – 10%.
6. MayDay Food Bars
The Mayday Emergency Food Bars were one of my favorites during my own little taste test. The texture was perfect and the flavor was wonderful. Not too sweet, but just right to get me through a few days if need be. These ended up being my number one pick on this list!
These are highly nutritious and would work great to throw into a bug out bag or your bug out vehicle. They are perfect for putting into emergency survival kits, and after this taste taste I just did, I’m going with May Day no doubt.
- 2400 food ration bar
- Can be purchased in four different calorie counts (400 cal, 1200 cal, 2400 cal, or 3600 cal)
- 5 year shelf life (start times based on time stamped on package)
- Made in the USA
- Great tasting and great texture
These Mayday food ration bars also come in a variety of other sizes such as the individually wrapped 400 calorie emergency bars and the larger 3600 calorie-sized bars in a case of 20 bars per case. On the package it states that this product can withstand temperatures between -22 degrees and 149 degrees Fahrenheit.
7. ER Emergency Ration Bar
Last, but not least, on the list today is the ER Bar Emergency Ration Food Bar by Quake Kare. This ended up being one of the poorer tasting of the group that I tested in my YouTube video below. You can actually see my reaction when I first bite into it. LOL!
All kidding aside, when it comes to starving or eating this emergency food bar, you would think you were sitting at a banquet table. These bars are so nutritionally dense, that you can feel it as soon as you are done eating them. You will full and satisfied for sure after eating these food bars.
- 72 hour food supply (based on 1200 calories/day)
- 5 year shelf life
- Approved by the US Coast Guard
- Also comes in 2400 calorie bars.
- Each packet contains 9 x 410 calorie bars
Bonus: Emergency Food Ration Review Video
Here’s the emergency food ration review video I spoke about earlier. I wanted to have some fun with it and taste some of these products to help you out with making some of these decisions on your own.
I know it can be a little tough determining which food bars to buy, so hopefully this video ads a litlte more information to your search!
Last Minute Thoughts
After going through all of these emergency bars, I can fully admit they aren’t anything special when it comes to flavor. You aren’t going to be thrilled by the taste either, but you have to remember it’s either these bars or starving to death.