I came up with a cool thing I use the freeze pops, popcicles in the plastic cylinders that you freeze in my packs and mre's for a little treat drink. You get flavor and water that's light weight and a little sugar boost and don't have to worry about finding water. A real moral booster. Especially for my kids. Ty for all you do.
I make my own MRE's with a vacuum sealer too. One thing I've found that helps protect the contents. I only remove about half the air before sealing it. It helps keep the contents from getting crushed and damaged. Just thought I'd share.
In a survival/grid down scenario, calories are essential. The more calories, the better. Military MRE’s are packed with around 3500 calories per meal. In the Army, we broke our MRE’s down to last us for 3 days per MRE, so we’d pack 3-4 MRE’s per soldier. The reason we did this, is because we never knew if we’d get resupplied on extended missions.
Store what you EAT. EAT-WHAT-YOU-STORE! ROTATE your food supplies. Once I get our families stocks where I feel they need to be, I will CONTINUE to buy our weekly groceries. The plan I've laid out is simple: Pull you week's worth of food from the store room; go to the shopping center and buy another week's worth of food, and rotate THAT into the store room. This way, you always have a full food storage setup, AND always have fresh food.
dude I have being prepping for years and watching videos for different ideas. dam! thank you I never thought of this. i'm fixing to be all over this thanks to you. very appreciated
Just something about those 'Ready Meals' you might find interesting. You don't have to dump them out in a pan to heat them. When I first saw them two or three years ago I wondered if they might be good for camping, etc. when I might not want to have to wash a cooking vessel. My thought was that if they can be heated in a microwave then they should be able to be heated by sitting them - bag and all - in a pot of hot water. Sort of a sous vide method, I suppose. I kind of had that idea because when I was a kid - before microwaves were quite so common - Swanson had little, frozen entrees that were packaged in plastic bags and were intended to be heated by putting them in a pot of hot water. I decided to try it (at home) and it worked well. I just opened the bag a tiny bit in case it needed to vent pressure, brought some water to a boil, removed it from the heat and stood the bag in the pot of hot water. Let it sit a few minutes, stirring it a couple of times and it heated up just fine. I'm thinking that in a grid down situation there is a good chance you would have to boil water to make it safe to drink, anyhow. My thought is I could heat the water, heat the meal then put the water back on the heat just long enough to bring it back to a boil to make sure that anything that might have gotten into the water from the outside of the bag is killed. I wouldn't want those to be my only source of food but the couple I have tried were pretty good and as you said they are not very expensive. Further, I haven't tried it but I have read that you can heat the Hormel meals the same way, just by putting the container in warm/hot water.
I will have to try that out. Swanson, there is a name I have not heard in ages.. I remember their tv dinners when I was a kid. Next time I do a home made MRE vid, I will test out boiling them in water and see if they hold up!
Not sure if anyone else has mentioned this, but we collect our sauce packs from various restaurants and have noticed that the sauces will eventually start to eat through the packaging. We have seen this happen with both ketchup from McDonald's/Wendy's and hot sauce from Del Taco. Not sure how old they were. We just kept them in a zippy that we added to and took from as necessary. It was an eye-opener that we need to get more organized with our sauce packet storage and figure out how to keep them organized by date.
Iridium242, you have the nicest ideas! you've shown me several things that I've never seen in a grocery store, probably because I'm just not looking for them. It's not on my regular grocery list. So thank you for educating me and giving me all these choices.
If you packed a sardine can or tuna can, even though they are not space friendly, you could make a stove out of either one to reheat the items if one felt it necessary! Love the video btw!
I have a pantry full of those Hormelthings. They are absolutely wonderful, already fully cooked, taste fantastic, and can be eaten cold. However, I do have a Coleman/ Sterno stove and at least three other kinds of backpack and camping stoves to heat things with.
I talked to an Indonesian x-guerilla fighter years ago. He said that they existed for weeks by putting raw rice in their mouths. Saliva would soften the rice before swallowing.
what I especially love about the Hormel foods is that it's everything in one package, like the mountain house or other already put together meals. There's no opening a lot of different cans or bags. Just one thing to deal with. Very very easy.
One idea I had would be to take a Ramen Packet, (You can also buy the Velveeta Plain OR Jalapeno Cheese Packets on Sale at Walmart for .79), add some freeze dried (Rehydrate them, lol!) Bacon Bits, and have a similar meal for about the sme or even less money in total. I LOVE YOUR CHANNEL!!!
Tuna pouches are $1. You can buy applesauce in pouches too. Also, some baby food pouches are good. I like the fruit cups. I just am not sure how long they are good. Mandarin oranges, pears, peaches, pineapples. In cups. I like these ideas!!! You’re practicable & that’s refreshing.
Yeah I would check the fruit cups more often because of the acidic content of the fruit. They do last a good long time but they can go bad quicker or eat thought the packaging.
I make MREs too. I have a VACUUM sealer. Dehydrated beans, potato's and Ramen are included in mine. Also, the tetra packs of ready to heat rice is great too, Tuna pacs, Etc...Good video. Like my grandfather, being frugal and creative will do you well. Everything's a resource.
If you live in the SE and have a Publix, you can get packets of red wine vinegar and an olive oil/canola oil mix that are meant to go with their deli subs.
ogr8bearded1 supposedly, you can get those at Subway as well, but when I asked for some they put the EVOO, and vinegar in the plastic cups with lids. Worth checking out as well though -and I need to check out the salad bar area at the grocery.
you always have the best ideas!! I made up a few mre's with the tuna pouches and uncle ben ready rice. I also found individual packs of jif peanut butter and threw them in with a spoon! also a koolaid single packet and instant coffee packet.
Thank you for your great ideas! You are so smart! Hope you don’t mind, I just copy what I see you do and it works GREAT! Thank you again for all the hard work you put in to help so many of us! God bless you AND your family!!!!! In Christ Jesus Love! 🙏
Excellent ideas especially for power outages. We get them all winter. Love that rice! Absolutely will pick up. Soo many possibilities!! Even canned veg and meats with soy. Yum. Ty!
Just an idea. To save on mess you could put your food in a freezer quart ziplock bag and heat it up in a pot of hot water. Hot water for coffee or coco
Another good food you could add to that is tuna creations, taste great and you can get them at the dollar store for cheap! you can eat straight out of the bag! Good video!
Starkist tuna in bags like spam. Great ideas, thank you for sharing. I just repacked the battery charger that I won in one of your giveaways, lol, into the kit that we are moving back to Florida with. Thanks again.
Take 2 paper napkins, roll a plastic forks, spoon and knife in the napkins and put in a quart size double zip freezer bag. Add 2 tubes each instant coffee, Kool aide, tea bags, salt, pepper and hot sauce or soy sauce. Add to bag. Add 4 eye glass cleaners, several band aids and put in bag. Seal bag. Just like the extra stuff in an MRE. i also make a ladies sanitary bag as well as a babies and a mans bag. The little extras mean a lot.
That’s so wise. I watched a good video recently about how impractical a lot of thinking is regarding prepping big out bags. It got me thinking and breaking it down to more practical life. Things like you shared are important. And passports, special photos, etc too. I think it’s good to make a list of what we absolutely can’t part with. It can’t be a lot, of course. But after we make the list then make a plan for grabbing those things up in a hurry.
@@KMWeir an evacuation suitcase is way more practical than a bug out bag. Pack for a weeklong trip, then add what you would want save if your house was going to burn down, make one for each person/pets. Then make a kitchen kit with food for a week if you were staying in a no kitchen hotel. (Bring a camp stove) lastly make a medical emergency kit.
Wonderful video, love the suggestions! Any time I see a freebie I like to get it. When I travel and stay in a hotel I get the complementary tea bags, toiletries, etc. that I can use in my future travels. I also like to get Sugar in the Raw brand turbinato sugar packets when I'm at a coffee shop. When I go to chick-fil-a, I like to get the honey, jam (Smuckers Naturals, no bad ingredients), hand sanitizing wipes and tasty dipping sauces. All for my little travel food pack or a lunch bag. But ironically I hadn't really thought of putting the freebie stuff in to supplement the foods I get for my bug out or short term bag. I always seem to be focused on getting the smallest size of products instead like the little single serving size products.
Do not throw away those expired canned vegetables. 8 years ago I made vegetable soup from veggies that had expired 5 years earlier. I boiled a ham hock for flavoring and made 24 mason jar, quarts of soup. We had one just last week and it was just as good as fresh.
If you want to use the original container instead of transferring food to your pot, you can also boil water in the pot and put the container over it and be purifying water at the same time.
Fantastic idea also if you collect the large drinking straws from say dunking donuts or conveyance stores/gas stations like I do you can cut them to size and seal one end and fill with extra virgin olive oil or regular virgin olive oil and seal the other end so that you can open and use for cooking it is an idea also and I have used it in my bush craft meals for over night meals so it should work. Mite be something to try
Great idea! I can real butter (not USDA approved, but who gives a shit if it works!) But not everyone wants to grab a couple of glass jars to lug around, especially in an emergency situation. I tend to put things like pre-measured s/p for recipes, Neosporin, etc. in straws.
Really enjoying these DIY MRE videos, i cant believe i never thought of this.i think there are some DIY MRE food warmers you might want to check that out and make a video on that
I know it’s a sad story but I know about a little girl who was left by her parents at their home. I think she may have even had a toddler sibling. I bring the story up because the two survived off ketchup for many days. I can’t remember how many but it was amazing they hadn’t starved.
I like to warn the stuff in their packs in boiling water of a canteen cup. Then no dishes after you eat, and when your food is warm, you have accompanying hot water for coffee or tea. Great video.
Mres by the case from Amazon...5 - 7 bucks each. Plus they have the sides, entrees, heaters. Yours are great, I'm just saying. Don't forget the powdered tea, or grape energy for breakfast. The old completes had instructions for camping, basically boil it in pack for 5 min. Don't forget the dollar cereal bags at Dollar General, the bags are made of mylar so you can eat them right out of the bag. I'll hush now.
I have done Spam single and pork ramen and canned chicken and ramen and add a coffee and juice packet and a granola bar for meals my vacuum packer is second hand so it took me a while to figure it out and don't know if it works the Best but seems ok
Just check about every month to see if things are still sealed. I purchased seal a meal generic roll.( plastic ) And found my rice had air inside. . No fun. Spend the little xtra and get the real Seal A Meal roll of plastic . My Seal A Meal mchg. Is also second hand.
Best investment for a kitchen. = Seal A Meal. w/ real Seal a Meal roll of plastic . ( generic brand plastic roll. Comes open w/ time ) Found out the hard way. AND Power Air Fryer. As Seen on TV. Lasted 3 1/2 yrs. with daily use. For family of 4 or more get the 4.5 qt. Not the 3.4 qt. Size. ( more for 2 people ) while we have electric. Never use oven in Fl. From May- Sept. Just too hot. And Air Fryer. No oil. Way less time cooking. Can cook frozen fish square in 9 min. - would take 25 min. In oven. Good video. Great info. Ty. 🌹
The Hormel Compleats are a pretty good value and very dense with calories. They're obviously not health food. Good item when you're looking at a lot of calories in a small space.
You want to up your ramen game? add a Sushi Chef miso soup packet to your ramen and it will blow your mind... Sushi Chef is the brand name, comes in red and white miso. turns cheap ramen into outstanding ramen. if you have ever eaten real Japanese ramen, this will impress you..
I found your channel through your video on taste testing your homemade mre. I love your take on things and the different types of things you talk about on your channel. Just subscribed! Thanks for sharing your tips with us 😊😊
Thank you for your videos and reviews I do Walmart they have Knorr brand side dish meals rice dishes and noodle dishes I will take a rice dish cost $1 that will be one meal for one man for one day there is enough seasoning in that same meal to add 1 to 2 cups of rice during the cooking process and you can make a meal for a family of four for $1.08 that's cheap then you take a 1 lb canned ham 299 that's enough protein for the family of four for two days feed your family $4.07 for one day is pretty good you can also substitute the canned ham for a squirrel or rabbit great Channel brother thank you for your knowledge and expertise and reviews
I wonder if you could cook these over a fire in one of those disposable aluminum baking pans. If so then you could just put the MRE contents into a small disposable baking pan and then put that in a vacuum sealed bag. No cleanup necessary afterward and no need to bring anything extra to cook it/eat it in. You could even include matches in the MRE to start a fire with. Include an extra aluminum pan and you could even have the fire inside one of them and angle the other on top for cooking the food. The pans might help protect the MRE contents during storage also and reduce the chance of the vacuum seal bag from getting punctured by the contents' sharp edges and such.
Canned goods and all these microwavable items can be heated up by boiling water in like a large pot or bucket over a fire. Just let the items float around (or sink) for 5 or 10 minutes and you have a hot item with no extra pans / plates to wash. Cover the cans when you crack them open in case the contents have expanded a little.
At dollar tree my daughter bought velveta cheese sauce. I think a 2 pack of 3 packs. The cheese would be great for a lot of things. Even the ready past.and my kids do things with Raman noodles and don’t use the seasoning packets. I think that’s a good idea for pasta or rice.
Re: butter packets, Ghee (clarified butter) has a very long shelf life. I make my own packets of Ghee, using a smoothie or boba drink straw. Seal one end of straw with soldering iron fill with warmed ghee and seal, as close to liquid as to eliminate air. I do the same with maple syrup. I pack and store MRF meals that's meals ready to fix. Allows me to carry pancakes, dehydrated eggs and potatoes. Not much fixing but sure expands the menu.
Most people don't realize that the "Compleats" / Dinty Moore plastic tubs *ARE* MRE's - the Army's technology research back in the late 1980's on T-rations (AKA Tray Packs) was the direct ancestor of these consumer "long term shelf stable" meals. I see what look identical to standard MRE entrees in consumer packaging now in "Ocean State Job Lots", except that they're mostly Indian cuisine.
The bowls that the Hormel food comes in and the envelopes let the ready meals come in are boil in bag put them directly into boiling water they are meant to take the Heat you can also leave them on your dashboard directional light for 1 hour and they will be warm
Good ideas George. The Velveeta products look tasty and high energy. Have you experimented with cold soaking? It's rehydrating dry food, while on the move, with cold water and time (30-90 min for most) instead of heat. It's not the most pleasant experience but it is a way to minimize down time if necessary. Some hikers do it.
I have them in a to go kit made out of litter buckets for my self and family ii have 3 of them set up for us they are 100 hr kits three meals a day for for days
Good video. recipes and "food for thought": (yes, they aren't "ready to eat," but they are "just add hot water") Instant beef soup: freeze dried veggies, a beef bouillon cube, a chunk of beef summer sausage, and a bit of water and heat. Instant tomato soup: 1 can of tomato paste, hot water. (optional milk powder since some people prefer the creamy tomato soup, also, herbs & spices to taste.) Instant ramen soup: 1 brick instant ramen noodles (discard the seasoning packet, it's mostly just salt and even a bouillon cube is less salt, and better flavor), 1 pouch tuna/chicken/spam/whatever, handful of freeze dried veggies, soup base (rather than a powder, it's a paste, comes in all the classic flavors), water, Heat. Or, you can just buy a better quality of ramen soup package (You get what you pay for...). Instant chili: 1 can tomato paste, 1 handful freeze dried beef chunks, 1 handful freeze dried sausage crumbles, 1 handful dried mushrooms, dried onions, 1 DIY packet chili seasonings, water, heat. Better Instant Oatmeal: 1 packet instant oatmeal, freeze dried fruit of choice, water to preference, heat. Instant Broccoli-Cheese soup: freeze dried broccoli, freeze dried cheese sauce, water, heat. (you'll have to play with your ratios on this one, I haven't actually tried it yet, but no reason it won't work.) There really are a whole lot more options for people willing to spend a few minutes cooking their food themselves. Summer Sausage is shelf stable, calorie and nutrient dense, typically comes in beef and pork, though beef is far more common, and you can slice or dice it however you want to add it to just about anything. This is one of my favorite BOB food staples. Retort pouches are great, as you mentioned, and come in a wide variety of other meats, beef, pork, crab, turkey, goat, salmon, etc. Of course, you can DIY this for whatever other meats you choose, like venison or pheasant. DIY Popsicle bags are great items. 5"x2"= about 3oz. That's 3oz rice or barley, or 3oz freeze dried veggies, or whatever. Another of my favorite BOB food staples. Mylar retort pouches, come in all the conceivable sizes of heat-seal-able and even resealable, and you get to choose what to put in them. You can order those ketchup packet type things on Amazon, 50 packets for $8-12 usually, and you can choose exactly what you want in case your local fast food joint doesn't carry what you want, or you want to make bulk meal kits. (In the "grocery & gourmet food" section, search for "packets". Yes, you can even get sriracha and those tiny Tabasco bottles. One might be surprised by what all can be had in packets.) Don't forget your herbs and spices. Bland food is a terrible experience in the best of times and can be a real downer in emergencies. However, a few herbs and spices can make a world of difference to keeping morale high. There's a lot more we can endure if we can at least get a tasty meal. Learn the edible plants in your area that just grow wild, and you'll never run out of veggies to eat. Learn to use a sling and you can hunt squirrels and rabbits, and you'll never run out of meat. Learn to trap and you don't have to be a good hunter. Plus, it's something that's passive so you can be out collecting plants to eat while your traps are out collecting your meat to eat. Less work for you to do means you survive longer. (every 11 traps set equals one captured critter to eat per day, on average) If you are going to make your own retort pouches, remember that you need to heat them to 250f internal temperature to make them shelf stable, so whatever you're making has to survive being heated to that high a temperature. In theory, you should be able to get a to-go order of Orange Chicken from your favorite chinese shop, dump it into a Retort pouch, seal it, process it, and you're good to go. Don't know how well that theory works out in real life though, haven't tried it yet, but damn, now I'm curious. One that really is MRE, are Curry retort pouches. They come in a wide variety of flavors and spice levels.
Ohhh, those pouches, you can do a two for one, boil water and heat thsoe pouches up in boiling water, rice, Psata, those campbells ones. And foods in those pouches. I say two for one because you have no mess in a pot/pan to clean and you just purified water to filter....or just keep the water in the pot on the stove and boil each dinner meal time. That is my camping microwave a pot of water i can boil over and over...it takes about as long to heat up those bags in boiling water as it does a microwave.
Fun fact/FYI the Velveeta “mre type” containers don’t taste anything like the box or the big container of cheese you can buy separately. I found it has a kind of weird “off” taste vs buying your own cheese and own Mac. They are still okay thou
Don't forget the utensils... If you get fast food or to go food, ask for utensils and extra condiments. In my homemade mre's i also put pouches of sugar, and individual drink mixes. You can fit enough food, utesils, and condiments (for 2 people) 3 meals and a snack in a gallon baggie.
another way to heat the ready meals like the rice / mac / hormel without dirtying you pan is heat water up in the pan and place the packets in the water and place a lid on it and let it warm up.. can heat multiple things using nothing more then water.. Maybe a problem for prepping if water is short.. but great for the backpackers
We have had complaints with the Prego Ready Meals. All the other packs have been ok. I have been making homemade MREs for the homeless who come into my bookstore thinking we are part of the food bank that is also on our campus.
Spam is good in instant noodles, so is Tuna, either from cans or flat packets. Chicken in packets are good. Cheesy bowls rock. Chef boy r dee Mac & cheese in a can is okay. Chili or soup, in a can is good, but any can is heavy to carry.
I realize in a crisis you might not have electricity but for everyday eating you can just pop those in the microwave for 60 or 90 seconds. I've bought them and I think they're very good.
I'd avoid mayo based sauce packs for long term storage. We had a whole baggie of Long Johns tarter sauce we had to toss and it was just under a year old. Soy sauce, mustard, hotsauce, that kind of stuff has a much longer life span.
I came up with a cool thing I use the freeze pops, popcicles in the plastic cylinders that you freeze in my packs and mre's for a little treat drink. You get flavor and water that's light weight and a little sugar boost and don't have to worry about finding water. A real moral booster. Especially for my kids. Ty for all you do.
I love that you include options that are more cost effective rather than only showing the most expensive options
I like having on hand the butter buds packets. These can easily be added you your MRE pack to give things a butter flavor where necessary. flavor
I make my own MRE's with a vacuum sealer too. One thing I've found that helps protect the contents. I only remove about half the air before sealing it. It helps keep the contents from getting crushed and damaged. Just thought I'd share.
In a survival/grid down scenario, calories are essential. The more calories, the better. Military MRE’s are packed with around 3500 calories per meal. In the Army, we broke our MRE’s down to last us for 3 days per MRE, so we’d pack 3-4 MRE’s per soldier. The reason we did this, is because we never knew if we’d get resupplied on extended missions.
Store what you EAT.
EAT-WHAT-YOU-STORE! ROTATE your food supplies. Once I get our families stocks where I feel they need to be, I will CONTINUE to buy our weekly groceries. The plan I've laid out is simple:
Pull you week's worth of food from the store room; go to the shopping center and buy another week's worth of food, and rotate THAT into the store room. This way, you always have a full food storage setup, AND always have fresh food.
Yes. FIFO. #1 rule for keeping anything from becoming "OLD" .
Glad you said that because something so simple can be missed so easily when your mind is set on trying to plan out.
dude I have being prepping for years and watching videos for different ideas. dam! thank you I never thought of this. i'm fixing to be all over this thanks to you. very appreciated
Just something about those 'Ready Meals' you might find interesting. You don't have to dump them out in a pan to heat them. When I first saw them two or three years ago I wondered if they might be good for camping, etc. when I might not want to have to wash a cooking vessel. My thought was that if they can be heated in a microwave then they should be able to be heated by sitting them - bag and all - in a pot of hot water. Sort of a sous vide method, I suppose. I kind of had that idea because when I was a kid - before microwaves were quite so common - Swanson had little, frozen entrees that were packaged in plastic bags and were intended to be heated by putting them in a pot of hot water. I decided to try it (at home) and it worked well. I just opened the bag a tiny bit in case it needed to vent pressure, brought some water to a boil, removed it from the heat and stood the bag in the pot of hot water. Let it sit a few minutes, stirring it a couple of times and it heated up just fine. I'm thinking that in a grid down situation there is a good chance you would have to boil water to make it safe to drink, anyhow. My thought is I could heat the water, heat the meal then put the water back on the heat just long enough to bring it back to a boil to make sure that anything that might have gotten into the water from the outside of the bag is killed. I wouldn't want those to be my only source of food but the couple I have tried were pretty good and as you said they are not very expensive. Further, I haven't tried it but I have read that you can heat the Hormel meals the same way, just by putting the container in warm/hot water.
I will have to try that out. Swanson, there is a name I have not heard in ages.. I remember their tv dinners when I was a kid. Next time I do a home made MRE vid, I will test out boiling them in water and see if they hold up!
Not sure if anyone else has mentioned this, but we collect our sauce packs from various restaurants and have noticed that the sauces will eventually start to eat through the packaging. We have seen this happen with both ketchup from McDonald's/Wendy's and hot sauce from Del Taco. Not sure how old they were. We just kept them in a zippy that we added to and took from as necessary. It was an eye-opener that we need to get more organized with our sauce packet storage and figure out how to keep them organized by date.
A sandwich size ziplok with the month/ year on it. Rotate with the date
Buying MRE's has gotten SO expensive, this is a great option! I'd love to see an updated video in 2023! 😊
Iridium242, you have the nicest ideas! you've shown me several things that I've never seen in a grocery store, probably because I'm just not looking for them. It's not on my regular grocery list. So thank you for educating me and giving me all these choices.
If you packed a sardine can or tuna can, even though they are not space friendly, you could make a stove out of either one to reheat the items if one felt it necessary! Love the video btw!
I have a pantry full of those Hormelthings. They are absolutely wonderful, already fully cooked, taste fantastic, and can be eaten cold. However, I do have a Coleman/ Sterno stove and at least three other kinds of backpack and camping stoves to heat things with.
instablaster.
The great thing about homemade MRE’s is that you can really get creative. And they’re def cheaper. Great ideas!
I talked to an Indonesian x-guerilla fighter years ago. He said that they existed for weeks by putting raw rice in their mouths. Saliva would soften the rice before swallowing.
Im Indonesian, and that sounds absolutely badass!! I've eaten raw ramen, but rice?!? Hardcore.
Daisy Fields
Our boys did it over in Nam, the special forces guys talk about it a lot.
That's insane!!
what I especially love about the Hormel foods is that it's everything in one package, like the mountain house or other already put together meals. There's no opening a lot of different cans or bags. Just one thing to deal with. Very very easy.
I purchased the Hornell pasta and chicken all the time as a backup for dinner.
One idea I had would be to take a Ramen Packet, (You can also buy the Velveeta Plain OR Jalapeno Cheese Packets on Sale at Walmart for .79), add some freeze dried (Rehydrate them, lol!) Bacon Bits, and have a similar meal for about the sme or even less money in total.
I LOVE YOUR CHANNEL!!!
Tuna pouches are $1. You can buy applesauce in pouches too. Also, some baby food pouches are good. I like the fruit cups. I just am not sure how long they are good. Mandarin oranges, pears, peaches, pineapples. In cups. I like these ideas!!! You’re practicable & that’s refreshing.
Yeah I would check the fruit cups more often because of the acidic content of the fruit. They do last a good long time but they can go bad quicker or eat thought the packaging.
Iridium242 Thanks. 😊
I make MREs too. I have a VACUUM sealer. Dehydrated beans, potato's and Ramen are included in mine. Also, the tetra packs of ready to heat rice is great too, Tuna pacs, Etc...Good video. Like my grandfather, being frugal and creative will do you well. Everything's a resource.
I like that...everything is a resource.
If you live in the SE and have a Publix, you can get packets of red wine vinegar and an olive oil/canola oil mix that are meant to go with their deli subs.
ogr8bearded1 supposedly, you can get those at Subway as well, but when I asked for some they put the EVOO, and vinegar in the plastic cups with lids. Worth checking out as well though -and I need to check out the salad bar area at the grocery.
you always have the best ideas!! I made up a few mre's with the tuna pouches and uncle ben ready rice. I also found individual packs of jif peanut butter and threw them in with a spoon! also a koolaid single packet and instant coffee packet.
Bennington76 Wow Great idea!!
Try throwing in a bag of peanuts, dried fruit and a packet of hot chocolate.
Thank you for your great ideas! You are so smart! Hope you don’t mind, I just copy what I see you do and it works GREAT! Thank you again for all the hard work you put in to help so many of us! God bless you AND your family!!!!! In Christ Jesus Love! 🙏
Excellent ideas especially for power outages. We get them all winter. Love that rice! Absolutely will pick up. Soo many possibilities!! Even canned veg and meats with soy. Yum. Ty!
Just an idea. To save on mess you could put your food in a freezer quart ziplock bag and heat it up in a pot of hot water. Hot water for coffee or coco
it never occurred to me to make my own MREs. What a great way to save a lot of money and construct the perfect MRE according to your taste.
Another good food you could add to that is tuna creations, taste great and you can get them at the dollar store for cheap! you can eat straight out of the bag! Good video!
Starkist tuna in bags like spam.
Great ideas, thank you for sharing.
I just repacked the battery charger that I won in one of your giveaways, lol, into the kit that we are moving back to Florida with.
Thanks again.
Take 2 paper napkins, roll a plastic forks, spoon and knife in the napkins and put in a quart size double zip freezer bag. Add 2 tubes each instant coffee, Kool aide, tea bags, salt, pepper and hot sauce or soy sauce. Add to bag. Add 4 eye glass cleaners, several band aids and put in bag. Seal bag. Just like the extra stuff in an MRE. i also make a ladies sanitary bag as well as a babies and a mans bag. The little extras mean a lot.
That’s so wise. I watched a good video recently about how impractical a lot of thinking is regarding prepping big out bags. It got me thinking and breaking it down to more practical life. Things like you shared are important. And passports, special photos, etc too. I think it’s good to make a list of what we absolutely can’t part with. It can’t be a lot, of course. But after we make the list then make a plan for grabbing those things up in a hurry.
Dont forget the condom!! You can even boil water in them.
Great idea for a blessings bags too!
I would love to know what you put in the child and woman's bag?
Thank you 😌
@@KMWeir an evacuation suitcase is way more practical than a bug out bag. Pack for a weeklong trip, then add what you would want save if your house was going to burn down, make one for each person/pets. Then make a kitchen kit with food for a week if you were staying in a no kitchen hotel. (Bring a camp stove) lastly make a medical emergency kit.
That was pretty cool man. Never thought of doing that before. Thanks for the video.
Great idea!! I need to update my shopping list... for the next time.
Cool video. I just happened across it. Looks like you went through and made sure you got a reasonably well rounded meal.
Wonderful video, love the suggestions! Any time I see a freebie I like to get it. When I travel and stay in a hotel I get the complementary tea bags, toiletries, etc. that I can use in my future travels.
I also like to get Sugar in the Raw brand turbinato sugar packets when I'm at a coffee shop. When I go to chick-fil-a, I like to get the honey, jam (Smuckers Naturals, no bad ingredients), hand sanitizing wipes and tasty dipping sauces. All for my little travel food pack or a lunch bag.
But ironically I hadn't really thought of putting the freebie stuff in to supplement the foods I get for my bug out or short term bag.
I always seem to be focused on getting the smallest size of products instead like the little single serving size products.
Do not throw away those expired canned vegetables. 8 years ago I made vegetable soup from veggies that had expired 5 years earlier. I boiled a ham hock for flavoring and made 24 mason jar, quarts of soup. We had one just last week and it was just as good as fresh.
oh we used them, did not toss them out
A small tip, if I may....
MANY restaurants, if you ask them politely will simply GIVE you a handful of the little Butter, Ketchup & Mayo Packets.
Just go inside and take as many as you want.
If you want to use the original container instead of transferring food to your pot, you can also boil water in the pot and put the container over it and be purifying water at the same time.
Don Brown just be careful not to melt the plastic of the container because melted plastic creates toxic fumes
@@Sarah_Kinz education.seattlepi.com/hot-water-melt-plastic-3626.html
Fantastic idea also if you collect the large drinking straws from say dunking donuts or conveyance stores/gas stations like I do you can cut them to size and seal one end and fill with extra virgin olive oil or regular virgin olive oil and seal the other end so that you can open and use for cooking it is an idea also and I have used it in my bush craft meals for over night meals so it should work. Mite be something to try
Great idea! I can real butter (not USDA approved, but who gives a shit if it works!) But not everyone wants to grab a couple of glass jars to lug around, especially in an emergency situation.
I tend to put things like pre-measured s/p for recipes, Neosporin, etc. in straws.
But how do you deal the ends?
Seal
Use a pair if he did the needle nose pliers work’s used to seal the first end and put your stuff in it and seal the other end.
@@zolozek3327 with a lighter to melt the plastic. I saw it on another video, I think
If your Bug Out van can support a 12v fridge and Solar, sausage patties are a good source of meaty flavor to add to you MREs...
Thank you, George.
Really enjoying these DIY MRE videos, i cant believe i never thought of this.i think there are some DIY MRE food warmers you might want to check that out and make a video on that
Dollar Tree and other Dollar stores sell dried foods now. Perfect for MRE.
Thanks, will check them out and do a video on what I can find.
They sell "2/3" sized spam too. I like spam, but can't finish a whole can in one sitting. The $1 pricetag ain't bad either.
I alway”squirrel” away condiments. They can come in so hand.
I’m starting to now. We have a family of 8. 4 of us working & grabbing lunch out several times weekly. It’s such a good idea.
I know it’s a sad story but I know about a little girl who was left by her parents at their home. I think she may have even had a toddler sibling. I bring the story up because the two survived off ketchup for many days. I can’t remember how many but it was amazing they hadn’t starved.
I had a drawer full, my ex dumped them. I hope she starves to death while I'm enjoying my new stash of sauces alone.
(Dang I'm pathetic)😢
Not only condiments but also napkins.
My wife doesn't understand when I do that and throws them ... I get so mad quietly 😒 😂
I keep a lot of mustard. Also BBQ and your favorite hot sauce for Vienna Sausage,that’s why I buy plain Vienna Sausage.
Walmart had 4 kinds of precooked rice servings. Dollar tree sells a two pack mac cheese. Great video keep them up.
Great, well informed video. Thanks!
Awesome! Thank you for sharing
Spam is a great addition to rice. Instant mashed potatoes are good also. I have a boogie box - grab and go.
Good items to store. I always need salt for everything so maybe through in some salt and pepper packets and tea or coffee. Great video George!
throw*
I nick the packets of salt from McDonalds.
Lot a salt in pre packaged food.
I like to warn the stuff in their packs in boiling water of a canteen cup. Then no dishes after you eat, and when your food is warm, you have accompanying hot water for coffee or tea. Great video.
Mres by the case from Amazon...5 - 7 bucks each. Plus they have the sides, entrees, heaters. Yours are great, I'm just saying. Don't forget the powdered tea, or grape energy for breakfast. The old completes had instructions for camping, basically boil it in pack for 5 min. Don't forget the dollar cereal bags at Dollar General, the bags are made of mylar so you can eat them right out of the bag. I'll hush now.
Great ideas! It's good to have a variety! Thanks for the tips.
I have done Spam single and pork ramen and canned chicken and ramen and add a coffee and juice packet and a granola bar for meals my vacuum packer is second hand so it took me a while to figure it out and don't know if it works the Best but seems ok
Just check about every month to see if things are still sealed. I purchased seal a meal generic roll.( plastic ) And found my rice had air inside. . No fun. Spend the little xtra and get the real Seal A Meal roll of plastic . My Seal A Meal mchg. Is also second hand.
Not bad ideas. Theres tons of stuff. I need to make up some up for easy grab items
Best investment for a kitchen. = Seal A Meal. w/ real Seal a Meal roll of plastic . ( generic brand plastic roll. Comes open w/ time ) Found out the hard way. AND Power Air Fryer. As Seen on TV. Lasted 3 1/2 yrs. with daily use. For family of 4 or more get the 4.5 qt. Not the 3.4 qt. Size. ( more for 2 people ) while we have electric. Never use oven in Fl. From May- Sept. Just too hot. And Air Fryer. No oil. Way less time cooking. Can cook frozen fish square in 9 min. - would take 25 min. In oven. Good video. Great info. Ty. 🌹
This is so genius. Thanks!!!
The Hormel Compleats are a pretty good value and very dense with calories. They're obviously not health food. Good item when you're looking at a lot of calories in a small space.
You want to up your ramen game? add a Sushi Chef miso soup packet to your ramen and it will blow your mind... Sushi Chef is the brand name, comes in red and white miso. turns cheap ramen into outstanding ramen. if you have ever eaten real Japanese ramen, this will impress you..
I will look for that, sounds good too!
I found your channel through your video on taste testing your homemade mre. I love your take on things and the different types of things you talk about on your channel. Just subscribed! Thanks for sharing your tips with us 😊😊
Awesome, thanks!
Best way to heat these style meal sets is to bring water to boil and leat them set for 5 min
Knorr Sides, or store brand. Usually a dollar or less.
Personally those suck and you have to cook I have sum in the truck i tried three or four flavors just can't
Good video and normal down to earth tone and explanation I subbed and will search for more Thanks
Taco Bell also loves to give out their sauce packets seemingly by the pound when you go there. I have a gallon bag full of Taco Bell sauces.
Thank you for your videos and reviews I do Walmart they have Knorr brand side dish meals rice dishes and noodle dishes I will take a rice dish cost $1 that will be one meal for one man for one day there is enough seasoning in that same meal to add 1 to 2 cups of rice during the cooking process and you can make a meal for a family of four for $1.08 that's cheap then you take a 1 lb canned ham 299 that's enough protein for the family of four for two days feed your family $4.07 for one day is pretty good you can also substitute the canned ham for a squirrel or rabbit great Channel brother thank you for your knowledge and expertise and reviews
I wonder if you could cook these over a fire in one of those disposable aluminum baking pans. If so then you could just put the MRE contents into a small disposable baking pan and then put that in a vacuum sealed bag.
No cleanup necessary afterward and no need to bring anything extra to cook it/eat it in. You could even include matches in the MRE to start a fire with. Include an extra aluminum pan and you could even have the fire inside one of them and angle the other on top for cooking the food. The pans might help protect the MRE contents during storage also and reduce the chance of the vacuum seal bag from getting punctured by the contents' sharp edges and such.
When I grew up we was eating for survival not to impress anyone👍
💓
Canned goods and all these microwavable items can be heated up by boiling water in like a large pot or bucket over a fire. Just let the items float around (or sink) for 5 or 10 minutes and you have a hot item with no extra pans / plates to wash. Cover the cans when you crack them open in case the contents have expanded a little.
Good video, great idea, been doing this since they come out. Good stuff. Smart buying and prepping
At dollar tree my daughter bought velveta cheese sauce. I think a 2 pack of 3 packs. The cheese would be great for a lot of things. Even the ready past.and my kids do things with Raman noodles and don’t use the seasoning packets. I think that’s a good idea for pasta or rice.
Re: butter packets, Ghee (clarified butter) has a very long shelf life. I make my own packets of Ghee, using a smoothie or boba drink straw. Seal one end of straw with soldering iron fill with warmed ghee and seal, as close to liquid as to eliminate air. I do the same with maple syrup. I pack and store MRF meals that's meals ready to fix. Allows me to carry pancakes, dehydrated eggs and potatoes. Not much fixing but sure expands the menu.
Most people don't realize that the "Compleats" / Dinty Moore plastic tubs *ARE* MRE's - the Army's technology research back in the late 1980's on T-rations (AKA Tray Packs) was the direct ancestor of these consumer "long term shelf stable" meals.
I see what look identical to standard MRE entrees in consumer packaging now in "Ocean State Job Lots", except that they're mostly Indian cuisine.
The bowls that the Hormel food comes in and the envelopes let the ready meals come in are boil in bag put them directly into boiling water they are meant to take the Heat you can also leave them on your dashboard directional light for 1 hour and they will be warm
And in winter?
You can also buy flameless ration heaters online
Winter...try a hand warmer.
@@Megasigggg if there's sun, it warm or cook food....just like with a solar oven.
Thanks for the taste test.have never seen the mac meals.they look good.i will try. Trying to watch all your vids. Thank you!
great idea. thanks
Good ideas George. The Velveeta products look tasty and high energy. Have you experimented with cold soaking? It's rehydrating dry food, while on the move, with cold water and time (30-90 min for most) instead of heat. It's not the most pleasant experience but it is a way to minimize down time if necessary. Some hikers do it.
SPAM singles great you can also get Salmon singles awesome video thanks for sharing
I have them in a to go kit made out of litter buckets for my self and family ii have 3 of them set up for us they are 100 hr kits three meals a day for for days
Good video. recipes and "food for thought": (yes, they aren't "ready to eat," but they are "just add hot water")
Instant beef soup: freeze dried veggies, a beef bouillon cube, a chunk of beef summer sausage, and a bit of water and heat.
Instant tomato soup: 1 can of tomato paste, hot water. (optional milk powder since some people prefer the creamy tomato soup, also, herbs & spices to taste.)
Instant ramen soup: 1 brick instant ramen noodles (discard the seasoning packet, it's mostly just salt and even a bouillon cube is less salt, and better flavor), 1 pouch tuna/chicken/spam/whatever, handful of freeze dried veggies, soup base (rather than a powder, it's a paste, comes in all the classic flavors), water, Heat. Or, you can just buy a better quality of ramen soup package (You get what you pay for...).
Instant chili: 1 can tomato paste, 1 handful freeze dried beef chunks, 1 handful freeze dried sausage crumbles, 1 handful dried mushrooms, dried onions, 1 DIY packet chili seasonings, water, heat.
Better Instant Oatmeal: 1 packet instant oatmeal, freeze dried fruit of choice, water to preference, heat.
Instant Broccoli-Cheese soup: freeze dried broccoli, freeze dried cheese sauce, water, heat. (you'll have to play with your ratios on this one, I haven't actually tried it yet, but no reason it won't work.)
There really are a whole lot more options for people willing to spend a few minutes cooking their food themselves.
Summer Sausage is shelf stable, calorie and nutrient dense, typically comes in beef and pork, though beef is far more common, and you can slice or dice it however you want to add it to just about anything. This is one of my favorite BOB food staples.
Retort pouches are great, as you mentioned, and come in a wide variety of other meats, beef, pork, crab, turkey, goat, salmon, etc. Of course, you can DIY this for whatever other meats you choose, like venison or pheasant.
DIY Popsicle bags are great items. 5"x2"= about 3oz. That's 3oz rice or barley, or 3oz freeze dried veggies, or whatever. Another of my favorite BOB food staples.
Mylar retort pouches, come in all the conceivable sizes of heat-seal-able and even resealable, and you get to choose what to put in them.
You can order those ketchup packet type things on Amazon, 50 packets for $8-12 usually, and you can choose exactly what you want in case your local fast food joint doesn't carry what you want, or you want to make bulk meal kits. (In the "grocery & gourmet food" section, search for "packets". Yes, you can even get sriracha and those tiny Tabasco bottles. One might be surprised by what all can be had in packets.)
Don't forget your herbs and spices. Bland food is a terrible experience in the best of times and can be a real downer in emergencies. However, a few herbs and spices can make a world of difference to keeping morale high. There's a lot more we can endure if we can at least get a tasty meal.
Learn the edible plants in your area that just grow wild, and you'll never run out of veggies to eat.
Learn to use a sling and you can hunt squirrels and rabbits, and you'll never run out of meat.
Learn to trap and you don't have to be a good hunter. Plus, it's something that's passive so you can be out collecting plants to eat while your traps are out collecting your meat to eat. Less work for you to do means you survive longer. (every 11 traps set equals one captured critter to eat per day, on average)
If you are going to make your own retort pouches, remember that you need to heat them to 250f internal temperature to make them shelf stable, so whatever you're making has to survive being heated to that high a temperature. In theory, you should be able to get a to-go order of Orange Chicken from your favorite chinese shop, dump it into a Retort pouch, seal it, process it, and you're good to go. Don't know how well that theory works out in real life though, haven't tried it yet, but damn, now I'm curious.
One that really is MRE, are Curry retort pouches. They come in a wide variety of flavors and spice levels.
Ohhh, those pouches, you can do a two for one, boil water and heat thsoe pouches up in boiling water, rice, Psata, those campbells ones. And foods in those pouches. I say two for one because you have no mess in a pot/pan to clean and you just purified water to filter....or just keep the water in the pot on the stove and boil each dinner meal time. That is my camping microwave a pot of water i can boil over and over...it takes about as long to heat up those bags in boiling water as it does a microwave.
Fun fact/FYI the Velveeta “mre type” containers don’t taste anything like the box or the big container of cheese you can buy separately. I found it has a kind of weird “off” taste vs buying your own cheese and own Mac.
They are still okay thou
Nice stuff. Thank you.
good review of what you used before and must look for though Velveeta meals they looked good
Don't forget the utensils... If you get fast food or to go food, ask for utensils and extra condiments. In my homemade mre's i also put pouches of sugar, and individual drink mixes. You can fit enough food, utesils, and condiments (for 2 people) 3 meals and a snack in a gallon baggie.
Very nice tips. I've been looking at MRE foods, but I have a food saver at home. I'll try it out.
I for one vacuum seal everything and straight to the basement, it just last longer, 3-4 yrs never anything bad . . .
Hey for a snack or great you could put m&ms in as they don't really melt
You can use the KFC Buttery Spread as a flame extender when trying to light a camp or cooking fire.
That's really thinking outside the box. Thanks
@@aprilangeles5953 It's not real butter. Just smear it on some paper or cotton cloth and light it up
If you use the seasoning packet from the noodles and a pack of powdered eggs you can make a soup with hot water
another way to heat the ready meals like the rice / mac / hormel without dirtying you pan is heat water up in the pan and place the packets in the water and place a lid on it and let it warm up.. can heat multiple things using nothing more then water.. Maybe a problem for prepping if water is short.. but great for the backpackers
Great, informative video. Thanks
We have had complaints with the Prego Ready Meals. All the other packs have been ok. I have been making homemade MREs for the homeless who come into my bookstore thinking we are part of the food bank that is also on our campus.
The sauce packs from Panda Express that come with the teriyaki chicken is good on hot or cold salmon.
Spam is good in instant noodles, so is Tuna, either from cans or flat packets. Chicken in packets are good. Cheesy bowls rock. Chef boy r dee Mac & cheese in a can is okay. Chili or soup, in a can is good, but any can is heavy to carry.
I realize in a crisis you might not have electricity but for everyday eating you can just pop those in the microwave for 60 or 90 seconds. I've bought them and I think they're very good.
Cold Spam is A-OK. Some of that stuff looks good enough for everyday. I wish we could get some of that stuff up here. Thank you for the video, George
Looks real good. And like you said. Survival food.
Vee tee are delicious, especially the Thai lime
Excellent content
If you need to rotate & are not eating give away to shelters, organizations with Food Pantrys for the needy etc!
Great advice, I never mention it but I have done it in the past. Some places wont take stuff they think is "expired" but most will.
You can get single servings of cooked vegetables in shelf-stable containers to add to your MRE's.
I can 8 oz jars for emergencies and they are all pressure canned😊
I'd avoid mayo based sauce packs for long term storage. We had a whole baggie of Long Johns tarter sauce we had to toss and it was just under a year old. Soy sauce, mustard, hotsauce, that kind of stuff has a much longer life span.