What Michael Moore calls a 72 hr supply...

[Cybrludite]

Leave it to Sam's Club to bring the bulk...

[moose42]

Wow that's a big kit.

Some of the not so Michael Moore sized kits aren't too bad. I think it would make more sense to buy a $60 kit once a month.

[Denis]

Hmm. Why no meat protein? Is that for the preparedness hippies?

[moose42]

Meat doesn't store well, and it's expensive. That's what your shotgun and few thousand shells are for.

[SeekHer]

You firstly dry out the meat--a la smoked ham or beef jerky or worse yet, as pemmican (horrid stuff--you won't die of protein starvation (aka Rabbit Disease) if you eat it, maybe by committing suicide for having to eat it); secondly; by canning it like Spam or Hereford's Corned Beef (actually my sister's recipe is quite tasty—kinda/sorta like a Tex-Mex meatloaf in a tomato sauce--we serve it over broad egg noodles or brown rice) or lastly and the easiest, freeze it with a separate backup generator attached to the freezer unit(s), just in case….Actually the same methods are used for fish, fowl and fruits and vegetables as well…The first two methods have been used since Australopithecus africanus became Erectus in one form or another—fruit preserves, jams, jellies and such were prized by the earliest Pharaohs...There's this hieroglyph of Pharaoh Arseleicher munching away on his PB&J sandwich and tossing back a brewski.

Couple of years ago one of my neighbours found an 8' x 22' (2.438m x 6.705m) "reefer" truck box with a nearly new freezer unit that the cabin etc. got totalled in a smash-up...belonged to a going out of business meat packer...I believe he paid $1,200 for it at the auto wreckers auction...He used a backhoe to dig a nice sloping hole in the ground for it to rest in, back filled the soil back in place around the box, placed a two 50 gal barrel fuel reservoir on top of the soil pile in an "X" bracket...I got him some wooden shipping pallets to line the walkway down (didn’t bother with pea gravel or sand under layer for the walkway)with and they hang their beef, pork and wild game sides in that...It came with a stainless steel channelled floor and walls with shelves along one side (Health Law) for package meat storage...great little work area and he was able to find a really cheap, used, meat band saw in great condition (IIRC $90) and a 8' and a 6' stainless steel work tables ($150 the pair)--from the same meat packer actually--so making steaks and chops and ribs is so much easier and I have an old industrial sized motorized meat grinder that we just leave there so hamburger and sausage making is a snap...Winter he just shuts the reefer motor down and opens the entry door part way--covered in wire screening against the animals and an old tarp against blowing snow.

Half dozen or so of us will get together and process our kills after supper or on say a Sunday afternoon and with one or two on the saw, two working with knives, one tying, wrapping and labelling and one schlepping (hauling stuff) it takes us no time to do up a couple of 800 lb moose or six 300 lb Whitetails...We all chip in to buy the paper, string, markers, tape but we process all of our kills, keeping our own meat or dividing the animal up by a method that works for us and when they go away for two and a half to three months in the winter, I get to feed their fish and turtles and their ferret goes to another of us "butchers" for the holiday period...Our (my daughter's) cat and their ferret have resolved a mutual hatred pact with banshee screaming and hissing and guaranteed breakage of something dear to my wife's heart and our mutual pocketbooks from the ensuing melee so they got separated after the third day of their first short lived visit.

He did the same thing with an 8' x 15' (x 4.572m law won’t allow anything wider then a 8.5’/2.59m trailer) cooler (not freezer) truck box, mounted steel 16” deep shelves from a salvaged warehouse building and buried it in the same manner but much deeper and he uses that for all his canned goods--preserves, veggies, fruits etc, bulk grains and nuts and in winter he runs the reefer to warm the space to about 45F/7C but it is so highly insulated that the reefer hardly clicks in...He covers the door with hays bales and one long side is butted up to his wooden basement wall so there is some transference (convection) going on between the two structures especially since he placed an intake and outflow ducts through the existing walls...He wants to shut off the door side (except for the reefer and put an insulated 30" wide synthetic material door (old bathroom size) between them since the area it butts up against is their indoor bulk and canning storage area and wants to move the freezer unit up against the other side with another door -- strictly for convenience but the freezer will help cool down the canned bulk goods box during summer.

***I'm reading this very interesting book called "The Civilization of the Middle Ages" by Norman F. Cantor and I'm at the part where he describes the ascension of the Christian church from the Judean and he writes that during the Passover Seder (celebrated as the Last Supper) we start the prayers and story telling by saying "Slaves were we unto Pharaoh in Egypt" but he goes on and says "SO WHAT" so were nearly everyone else except the few chosen elite--family, priests and others of that ilk and even their lives where at his discretion--disposable.

[308Mike]

Wow that's a big kit.

Some of the not so Michael Moore sized kits aren't too bad. I think it would make more sense to buy a $60 kit once a month.

Gotta' make DAMN SURE you have enough water!! Of course, that's water you can use. If you're in that kind of situation and have all that food but little water, you're kinda' screwed. But if you don't have potable water available to use, you're kinda' screwed anyway. Better get cranking on making all those solar stills! Trust me, dehydrated food is not fun to chew down when you don't have the water to make it normally.

Even so, I don't think it would be as bad as having the "Marine Dinner" which has become famous web lore (although no doubt true) - although for some, either a SPEW ALERT or LAUGH ALERT for those in cubicle settings might be in order - this is now an oldie but goodie!! ENJOY:

[center]MRE Dinner Date[/center]

The following is a true story....told from the point of view of a Marine ...

I had a date the other night at my place. On the phone the day before, the girl asked me to "Cook her something she's never had before" for dinner. After many minutes of scratching my head over what to make, I finally settled on something she has DEFINITELY never eaten.

I got out my trusty case of MRE's. Meal, Ready-to-Eat. Field rations that when eaten in their entirety contain 3000+ calories. Here's what I made:

• * I took three of the Ham Slices out of their plastic packets, took out three of the Pork Chops, three packets of Chicken-a-la-King, and eight packets of dehydrated butter noodles and some dehydrated/rehydrated rice. I cooked the Ham Slices and Pork Chops in one pan, sauteed in shaved garlic and olive oil.
  
  * In another pot, I blended the Chicken a-la-king, noodles, and rice together to make a sort of mush that looked suspiciously like succotash.
  I added some spices, and blended everything together in a glass pan that I then cooked in the oven for about 35 minutes at 450 degrees.
  
  * When I took it out, it looked like, well, ham slices, pork chops, and a bed of yellow poop. I covered the tops of the meat in the MRE cheese (kinda like velveeta) and added some green sprinkly thingys from one of my spice cans (hey, if it's got green sprinkly thingys on it, it looks fancy right?)
  
  * For dessert, I took four MRE Pound Cakes, mashed 'em up, added five packets of cocoa powder, powdered coffee cream, and some water. I heated it up and stirred it until it looked like a sort of chunky gelatinous organism, and I sprinkled powdered sugar on top of it.
  Voila--Ranger Pudding.
  
  * For alcoholic drinks, I took the rest of my bottle of Military Special Vodka (yes, they DO make a type of liquor named "Military Special"--it sells for $4.35 per fifth at the Class Six ) and mixed in four packets of "Electrolytes - 1 each - Cherry flavored" (I swear, the packet says that). It looked like an eerie kool-aid with sparkles in it (that was the electrolytes I guess... could've been leftover sand from Egypt).

I lit two candles, put a vase of wildflowers in the middle, and set the table with my best set of Ralph Lauren Academy-series China (that shit is EXPENSIVE... my set of 8 place settings cost me over $600 on sale at the Lejeune PX ), and put the alcoholic drink in a crystal wine decanter.

She came over, and I had some appetizers already made, of MRE spaghetti-with-meatballs, set in small cups. She saw the dinner, saw the food, and said "This looks INCREDIBLE!!!"

We dug in, and she was loving the food. Throughout the meal, she kept asking me how long it took me to make it, and kept remarking that I obviously knew a thing or two about cooking fine meals. She kind of balked at the makeshift "wine" I had set out, but after she tried it I guess she liked it because she drank four glasses during dinner.

At the end of the main course, when I served the dessert, she squealed with delight at the "Chocolate mousse" I had made. Huh? Chocolate what? Okay... yeah... it's Chocolate Moose. Took me HOURS to make... yup.

Later on, as we were watching a movie, she excused herself to use my restroom. While she was in there, I heard her say softly to herself "uh oh" and a resounding but petite fart punctuated her utterance of dismay.

Let the games begin.

She sprayed about half a can of air freshener (Air Freshener, 1 each, Orange scent. Yup. The military even makes smellgood) and returned to the couch, this time with an obvious pained look.

After 10 more minutes she excused herself again, and retreated to the bathroom for the second time, I could hear her say "What the hell is WRONG with me???" as she again send flatulent shockwaves into the porcelain bowl. This time, they sounded kinda wet, and I heard the toilet paper roll being employed, and again, LOTS more air freshener.

Back to the couch. She smiles meekly as she decides to sit on the chair instead of next to me. She sits on my chair, knees pulled up to her chest, kind of rocking back and forth slightly. Suddenly, without a word, she ROCKETED up and FLEW to the bathroom, slammed the door, and didn't come out for 30 minutes.

I turned the movie up because I didn't want her to hear me laughing so hard that tears were streaming down my cheeks.

She came out with a slightly gray palor to her face, and said "I am SOOOOOO sorry. I have NO idea what is wrong with me. I am so embarrassed, I can't believe I keep running to your bathroom!!" I gave her an Immodium AD, and she finally settled down and relaxed.

Later on, she asked me again what I had made for dinner, because she had enjoyed it so much. I calmly took her into the kitchen and showed her all the used MRE bags and packets in the trash can.

After explaining to her that she had eaten roughly 9,000 calories of "Marine Corps Field Rations" she turned stark white, looked at me incredulously, and said "I ate 9,000 calories of dehydrated food that was made 3 years ago?" After I concurred, she grabbed her coat and keys, and took off without a word.

She called me yesterday. Seems she couldn't shit for 5 days, and when she finally did, the smell was so bad, her roommate could smell it from down the hall. She also told me she had been working out nonstop to combat the high caloric intake, and that she never wanted me to cook dinner for her again, unless she was PERSONALLY there to inspect the food beforehand.

It was a fun date. She laughed about it eventually and said that that was the first time she'd ever crapped in a guy's house on a date. She'd been so upset by it she was in tears in the bathroom while I had been in tears on the couch.

I know ... I'm an Asshole, but it was still a funny night.

Should I repost this again in Humor?