How To Feed Your Family Lunch After A Disaster

It’s day two of my series on how to feed your family lunch after a disaster.  Last year was a brutal winter for many communities worldwide. We had record snowfalls and it looks like we are heading that way again this year. This is a good reason to make sure our pantry is packed with a few extra items in case traveling due to the ice and the snow is impossible. Last year I remember several people sending me emails about running out of milk or bread when the roads were iced over.

Please keep in mind these are only suggestions. We all have favorite foods, and many can’t eat certain food items. I would love to say I will run out to my garden and pick some fresh tomatoes. Everything in the garden is cleaned out waiting to be replanted next year. So the food products in my pantry, freezer or refrigerator will be my only choices when it comes to feeding my family if the roads are iced over or we have a power outage that goes on for days or weeks. I need to be able to open the pantry at least and scrounge for some items. Here is my post about breakfast meals from yesterday. So here we go with lunch.

Lunch #1 Idea:

The two containers below are freeze-dried celery and onions. Here’s the deal, freeze-dried foods do not have to be rehydrated like dehydrated food. You can add these to any recipe and make a sandwich or a salad with mayonnaise stirred into it. You would need to be able to boil water to cook the bow-tie macaroni, but a $30.00 butane stove works great inside your home. Just crack a window to ventilate the room a little. Use wise judgment when using one. I used to teach classes in stores that provided these stoves for me to cook things during my cooking classes. They work great. If you have a gas stove you can use a match to light a burner to cook on as well, unless of course there is a gas line break in the neighborhood. If you have crackers, take some canned chicken or tuna, add some relish, and mayonnaise, and lunch is ready in no time at all. Camp Chef Butane 1 Burner Stove with Camping Case and 12 Butane Fuel GasOne Canisters for Portable Camping Stoves

Lunch #Two:

Here again, if you have a butane stove you can make some chili if you have canned beans, tomatoes, and corn. Add some freeze-dried vegetables like onion and celery and you have a hearty soup. Grab your favorite spices to spice up the chili, and add some crackers…another lunch is ready in a pinch. If you have some canned fruit serve it as a side dish. Please remember, you need a can opener. I keep several can openers in my emergency buckets. If one wears out or falls apart…no worries, I have more can openers ready to do the job.

Lunch #3:

Here is lunch number three to add to your emergency meals. This one is good old Snack Ramen with some dehydrated veggies I made from frozen vegetables. Add some canned chicken and some canned fruit and you have another great lunch. I realize Snack Ramen is probably not the most healthy food item, but I also must be realistic. I’m thinking I might have a few neighbors that only have food for one or two days in their kitchen. I can at least share some quick hot soup with them for a day or two.

Lunch #4:

This is lunch number four, complete with my old standby peanut butter and jelly. Add some crackers if you are out of bread, and your emergency meal is complete by adding some fruit. The fruit above is my grandkid’s favorite, freeze-dried pineapple. Oh, another thing that is awesome is freeze-dried corn (not in the picture) you can eat it right out of the can as well. Yummy! Now if you have some bread in the freezer you can always pull a loaf out and thaw it. I am trying to keep from opening the freezer, if at all possible, so I store a few boxes of crackers in my pantry for emergency meals. No, crackers do not have a long shelf life, but they can be substituted to make sandwiches.

Thanks again to my friend Julene, at Prepare Today who wrote a similar post back in October 2012. Please look in your pantry or food storage area in your home to see how many days you can feed your family. Please start with one week, then two weeks, and then a month. Keep adding food that you can rotate and your family will eat reasonably well. We can’t waste our money on food that our family won’t enjoy. Thanks again for being prepared for the unexpected. If you are wondering if I’m going to bug out in the mountains after a disaster, nope, that’s not happening. If we have an earthquake where I live and my house is destroyed, I will leave my home, but I’m not going to a bug-out location. We do need to be prepared with an evacuation plan. My book tells you how to do this: Prepare Your Family for Survival: How to Be Ready for Any Emergency or Disaster Situation Please be prepared in your home. God bless you and your family.

Dinner Ideas

My Favorite things:

OXO SteeL Can Opener

Augason Farms 30-Day Emergency Food Storage Supply Pail

Mountain House, Just In Case… Classic Bucket

Kirkland Signature chicken breast, packed in water, premium chunk, 6 12.5-ounce cans

Dixie Paper Plates, 8-1/2 Inch, 48 Count, (Pack of 10)(Product size may vary)