Freeze Dried & MRE - Survival Food

You may look at freeze dried food, even when it is a lowly $2.90 per meal as an expensive luxury.

After all, for $1000 to $1200 you can purchase bulk food in 5 gallon pails of either staples or dehydrated food that will last an individual one year or a family of four for 3 months.

Compare that to the “expensive” $3150 (about $2.88 per meal) for a “Platinum Food Reserve” of freeze dried food.

Obviously the bulk food is a better deal.

Or is it?

Consider the preparation time and effort if you cook bulk food from scratch for 4 people for 3 months. This time could be extremely valuable, in a disaster, that could be used on other tasks that may be much more critical.

Cooking for 3 months using staples and dehydrated food works out to an extra 364 hours (see note at bottom) over using freeze dried food. Divide the $2000 difference in cost, and it works out that your effort is worth $5.63 per hour.

Is that $5.63 you save today on your food reserve worth the priceless hours you may put to better use?

But hold on, it gets even worse for the canned staples and dehydrated route. You will either have to use that food regularly with associated preparation effort in order to keep your food reserve fresh, or you have to accept throwing out your canned bulk food reserve after a few years and replacing it. Freeze dried food on the other hand can store for 25 years according to Mountain House.

In the end if you include this likely replacement cost, your extra 364 hours effort could be valued at less than $1 per hour, does that sound like the better deal now?

You decide.

(NOTE: For cooking using staples and dehydrated foods; If you spend 1 hour cooking and cleaning up for breakfast,  1.5 hours for lunch and 2 hours for dinner or 4.5 hours per day, 7 days a week for 13 weeks that will total 409.5 hours. Subtract the 30 minutes total a day on the other hand that you will spend preparing meals with freeze dried food, so you get the difference of 364 hours)

Often when people first think of what food would be good to store for disaster preparedness, they think of dehydrated food.

But is dehydrated food really a good choice for survival food?

Let’s consider 3 factors; preparation, taste, and shelf life.

Dehydrated food requires a lot preparation to be consumed. In order to use dehydrated food it needs to be hydrated so you need to soak it. You still need to prepare, mix and cook it. To cook you will need cooking equipment and fuel. You will have to clean up after the cooking.

Compare this to freeze dried food.

For a hot meal using freeze dried food you need heated water, just add it and wait a few minutes. If you have to, you can use unheated water but still no cooking is required. This is huge convenience, not to be undervalued for disaster preparedness. There likely will be times in a disaster when you do not have time and energy to cook using dehydrated foods.

You may like the taste of dehydrated foods you have consumed as a snack or specialty food. However if you are eating for weeks or months meals made from dehydrated food as a base, you may have difficulty consuming healthy amounts of food.

You should never underestimate the importance of being able to enjoy the food you are eating, there are examples in history of people starving even though there was edible food available.

It is of great benefit to lower stress wherever possible in a disaster situation, lower stress results in people dealing more effectively with problems in any situation. Having good tasting hot meals regularly tends to lower stress. Freeze dried food retains the original taste and freshness when re-hydrated to a high degree.

Finally there is the shelf-life to consider. The likelihood of a experiencing a disaster is greater over a longer period. The longer the shelf-life of your survival food, the less the often you will be replacing it. Even worse, would be discovering you have rancid food when you need it most. Dehydrated food shelf life is usually rated 8-10 years. Freeze dried food can keep it’s flavor, appearance and nutritional value for 25 years.

While you may save a little with dehydrated food in the up front cost, the long run costs will be much higher than if you choose freeze dried food. The added benefits of taste and less time to prepare to eat make freeze dried food a much better choice than dehydrated food.