Last Updated on April 29, 2023 by Lisa Vargas
You may be wondering what foods you should stockpile for survival. Today we are going to look at that question and break down different survival foods for stockpiling, different time-frames for stockpiling the survival foods, and how much you should stockpile for each person.
So let’s begin!
How Much Food To Stockpile Per Person
The best way to answer the question of how much survival food to stockpile for a person is to simply look at the average calories that one will need each day. For example, the chart below is a great way to determine how many calories you will need depending on age, whether you are a male or female, and activity level.
Keep in mind that during a grid-down situation, for example, life is going to get a lot harder. You may be without clean water out of the top, which makes you thankful for the water storage planning that you did as a prepper.
It might be extra cold outside because you have no heaters, so you’ll have to be out chopping wood, to keep a warm fire stoked.
You may also find yourself needing to do more homesteading type activities such as growing your own vegetables to supplement your food stockpile.
As you can imagine, there is going to be a lot more manual labor going on during any type of disaster, so you’ll probably consider yourself on this chart as an “active” person on the chart above.
Survival Foods With Long Shelf Life
When it comes to survival food stockpiling, you are obviously going to want to find foods that have a long shelf-life. This allows you to continue to add food to your stockpiles over the years without having to rotate your current survival stockpiles you’ve worked so hard for.
Some of the best survival food kits can be found simply by going to Amazon and taking a look around. These food kits make for some of the best survival food and can last up to 25 years on the shelf.
But aside from the survival food kits, there are several other survival food items that work well when stockpiling emergency foods.
Below is a quick outline of some of those other foods that last forever:
- Honey
- Instant Coffee
- Bullion Cubes
- Corn Syrup
- Pure Vanilla Extract
- Pemmican
- Freeze-dried food
- Canned beans
- White rice
- Powdered Milk
- Pasta
- Potato Flakes
- Rolled Oats
- Salt
- Sugar
- Tea
- Apple Cider Vinegar
- Soy Sauce
- Corn Starch
- Alcohol
- Lentils
- Hardtack
- Ghee
- Distilled White Vinegar
You can find out more about each item on the above list by visiting the post titled Foods That Last Forever. The post includes helpful tips on how to use moisture absorbers, air-tight containers, and correct temperature to store all of your survival food.
How To Stockpile Food On A Budget
I often get the question asked about how to stockpile food on a budget. If you’ve been a prepper for any length of time, you may have noticed how quickly stockpiling food can add up. And we are just talking about food!
What about stocking up on water, survival gear, and other items? You need to think of stockpiling survival foods as an investment. Allocate a certain percentage of your monthly income that you can afford to survival foods and prep.
Here’s some quick tips on stockpiling foods on a budget:
- Shop for survival foods on specific holidays if you can so that you can get extra discounts.
- Shop for canned foods as they are some of the cheapest survival foods out there and last a relatively long time.
- Become a coupon clipper – don’t forget to use coupons to buy food products like pasta, white rice, and canned foods.
- Choose generic brands instead of brand names.
- Shop for foods by expiration dates. Grocery stores tend to give discounts on foods to get rid of them as they get closer to expiration dates.
Always remember that stockpiling survival foods isn’t a race. It’s more of a marathon. Budgeting and making smart decisions are the way to go. Having two weeks worth of food and water is probably a good idea.
With that said, let’s look at what a two-week survival food stockpile would look like next.
2 Week Food Supply List
In order not to overwhelm any new preppers reading this, starting with a two-week food supply list is a great place to start. It doesn’t cost you that much money, and gets you involved with the research process of coming up with the perfect survival diet foods.
Therefore, below, I wanted to share with you a two-week food supply list that I have. I always try to stockpile survival foods with a good balance of real foods like canned products from the grocery store, food ration bars, freeze-dried food kits, and homemade canned foods.
- Food Ration Bars – Food ration bars are great if you find yourself in a more extreme survival situation with only the clothes on your back and a backpack. You can quickly throw a food ration bar into your bug out bag and always have it with you.
- 2-week Augason Farms freeze-dried food kit – Augason Farms is one of the more popular brands on Amazon and you can easily purchase one of their two-week survival food kits has wonderful packaged dinner flavors such as Cheesy Broccoli Rice, Spanish Rice, Creamy Potato Soup, and several other flavors.
- Canned foods – Since we are talking about 14 days without food, you should have some canned foods that you enjoy to make sure you don’t get tired of the freeze-dried foods. Canned beans, corn, and vegetables are great to add to your two-week food supply.
- Water Supplies – I know we are talking about stockpiling survival foods, but I wanted to make sure that I don’t forget to mention that you are going to need to have adequate amounts of water. You need to learn how about emergency water storage and the ins and outs of water purification when you don’t have access to clean water, for example.
Food Storage List For 1 Year
Below you will find a list of food to stockpile in emergencies that will last you for one year. This list will be similar to the two-week list, except you are going to have more of it.
If a food that is one this list only has a 6-month shelf-life, for example, I will let you know that you need to get two of that item. So let’s get started!
Survival Food Kits For Stockpile
Survival food kits are very popular among preppers, as mentioned above, and are essentially designed for emergency survival food for disaster situations. They are also very popular among hikers and backpackers because all you need to do is add water and voila, you have an instant meal.
They make for a great survival food to stockpile because you can order them in huge bulk to last you for entire year if need be. These survival kits comes with lots of nutrients to keep your body energized throughout the day.
Keep in mind you are going to calculate the number of calories each person in your family will need. You can refer to the chart above in the beginning of this post.
Canned Food For Survival Stockpiling
Canned foods that you can get at the grocery store are probably one of the cheapest and easily-accessible foods you can get for your stockpiling rations. You can easily gather these the quickest and they will serve you well in a survival situation as there are fruits and vegetables to choose from.
Canned foods help with variety in your diet and provide extra nutrients that you will need during your emergency situation.
long Lasting Foods for The Pantry
When it comes to deciding what to store besides canned food and survival kits you want to shoot for foods that you can easily get in the grocery store, that have a long shelf-life, and add some variety to your meals.
Below is a list of long lasting survival foods to stockpile in addition to the canned foods and freeze-dried foods mentioned above:
- Honey
- White Rice
- Tea
- Instant Coffee
- Pasta
- Powdered Milk
- Rolled Oats
- Salt
- Lentils
- Ghee
Final Thoughts
Any of the food items listed in this post would be fantastic of your survival food stockpiles. Always aim to mix it up, try and keep your survival food items as current as possible by rotating them as needed and your stockpiling efforts will go a long way to keeping you and your family safe during difficult emergency situations.