We’re all familiar with Campbell’s Soup, right? Red and white can thats been around for a zillion years. You know the brand.
What I did not know was that for a few years, back in the sixties, they sold some of their soups in freeze dried form.
What we have here is a video of a couple guys opening up, reconstituting, and eating 55-year-old freeze dried soup. TL;DR – it was good.
This is unsurprising but still a good reminder that as long as the packaging is in good condition, freeze-drieds will pretty much last your lifetime. Does he nutritional value degrade? Probably. But I doubt it degrades to zero, which means that 55-year-old freeze drieds beats starving to death.
For those of you who missed it the first time, a Friend Of Gun Jesus did his own taste test on some old Mountain House and his results were pretty encouraging.
The point here is that if you include freeze drieds as part of your storage food program, and you protect the packaging from damage, your food should be just fine for pretty much the rest of your life.
My 15 year old freeze dried food in #10 cans failed that test. The seals were intact, zero rust or dents and stored in cool/dry conditions, yet the cans started bulging. Apparently the manufacturer had several bad lots and replaced them without hesitation. Check your cans folks.
One very surprising discovery for me regarding freeze dried foods is that rodents will chew through the packaging and eat them.
So, pack them well.
Also most ‘meat’ in FD entrees is actually TVP or other faux foods….judge for yourself.
My #10 cans are immune from rodent damage. Also, my freeze dried steaks, chops and chicken are all USDA inspected meat, not TVP or ?
I had a MH disaster bucket (20 asst meals, in a plastic bucket?) stored in a trailer in an out of the way location. Never opened the bucket, and after a few years the rodents had gotten into it.
Cans are the way to go.
I’ve gone heavy on freeze dried foods and since I don’t have much longer everything should be OK.
If I do run out plan B is to turn cannibal.
Not sure there’s anything wrong with cannibalism as long as youre not killing people to do it.
you get creutzfeld-jacob disease and die.
Stay away from the CNS
I am a big believer in avoiding “diet fatigue” and I try to store a wide variety of food. I have read umpteen articles that stress the avoidance of diet fatigue, and that seems to be the mantra on the vast majority of survivalist sites, e.g., “Eat rice and beans for two weeks straight and it will keep you alive, but you will simply wish you were dead.”
Then, maybe three months ago, I read something that, I believe, Michael Yon said. Yon, a former Special Forces soldier, says that he is the most experienced war correspondent in the world. He said that diet fatigue does not exist, and that it is a “First World” notion. When a person is driven by hunger pains, all he can think of is food (which was borne out by the famous/infamous “Minnesota Hunger Project.”) He said that he has been in countless Third World countries where food is scarce, and that people are accustomed to eating the same food, day in and day out.
Yon says that when these people feel compelled to offer their visitor some of their meager fare, they will say, “Is good, no?”
Fortunately, like most people reading this article, I have never known abject hunger, but Yon’s comments make sense to me.
You can read more about how humans actually react to serious and lengthy food deprivation here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_Starvation_Experiment#:~:text=The%20Minnesota%20Starvation%20Experiment%2C%20also%20known%20as%20the,restriction%20and%20the%20effectiveness%20of%20dietary%20rehabilitation%20strategies.Minnesota Hunger Project.”
Bet’cha can’t do that with Ramen noodles.
In the ’90s I had invested heavily in Mountain House Freeze-Dried in the Mylar Packages sold for Hiking/Camping. These were similar to what the Army had called “LURPS” from the late ’70s. I think those may have been made by Mountain House, but there never were many of them make it to the Surplus Market. Anyway, I had stored them in those Airtight, Aluminum Shipping Containers used in Military and Commercial Aviation. Paid no attention to them until a Move in 2009, out of curiosity I opened a few,and found the Mylar Packaging was disintegrating and the contents turned to Sawdust. Went through all the Containers, found a few Packages that looked Undamaged, but on opening them, the contents had degraded and smelled… odd.
Since then, I only store “Canned Goods” and have stayed away from “Freeze-Dried” (do have some) in favor of regular Canned Veggies, Fruits and Meats. Rotation does not keep up with Stocking (still need several Month’s more to have a Year of stuff) but I have been starting to use Cans that are 10 Years old, and other than tasting a little ‘Stale’, they are fine.
It is worth pointing out that the Mountain House is available in #10 cans as well, but I’m sure you know that.
Also, to be fair, packaging materials and technologies has changed since the’70s so modern packaged product may fare better in the long term.