A Week Living Off Rations

[ForgeCorvus]

Key thing here is everything was edible and you had some flavour variety.


Pilchards and Sardines are the same fish (I didn't know until recently) and can be cooked any way suitable for oily fish.
I once had battered sardines.... Now I'm wondering if I can batter tinned pilchards.

[jennyjj01]

Key thing here is everything was edible and you had some flavour variety.

Indeed. Though Hotdogs and pilchards are pretty crappy, they would not be repeated every week, where I'd switch in tuna or salmon and chicken or bacon grill. I also rotated in pasta, spuds and rice for the morale boost, though we might think that any one would be ok.

Were tinned ready meals a cop-out? I don't think so. They're a nod to normality, just as the bread and trifle were. I saw no reason to live off gruel.

Anyhow, I'm getting ahead of myself Can't wait to reveal todays fare.

Pilchards and Sardines are the same fish (I didn't know until recently) and can be cooked any way suitable for oily fish.
I once had battered sardines.... Now I'm wondering if I can batter tinned pilchards.

I've battered sardines, so pilchards should work too. Mine get a bit broken, because the thought of eating the spine disgusts me I ate a whitebait once in a "I'm a celeb" moment

[jennyjj01]

I used to make vegan "burgers" using 50/50 cous cous and peanut butter that worked well. I think the fish cakes would work better with potato mash to hold them together as the cous cous adds texture but not much binding capability.

Cheers. I was truly winging it with these. The couscous was a bit wet and not sticky, which is why I added breadcrumbs ( That, and the fact I had some ). The nutty crunchiness was a really pleasant surprise. I bet they'd be great with a salsa.

[jennyjj01]

Day 7: Woo Hoo

Breakfast: Porridge again with honey. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Estimated 360kCal

Lunch: Ratatouille with Onion Mash
Very simply, half a tin of Ratatouille with Half a sachet of Instant Onion Mash, I actually made up full tin and full sachet, but I could only eat half.
Estimated 280kCal

Dinner: Hotdog Ragu
Ingredient:
2/3 tin of tomatoes, smashed up.
1 Hot Dog Sausage, diced.
20g Dried Carrots, briefly rehydrated.
20g Dried Onions, Briefly rehydrated: These were quite brown and oxidised.
1 Beef Oxo cube. 1 Tsp Mixed herbs.
30ml Olive Oil
Estimated 350kCal

Fry all bar the tomatoes till the water has all boiled off and started to char.
Add tomatoes and simmer 10 mins.
Serve over 70g serving of pasta twirls, prepared as usual.

Estimated 350kCal

Also 5 Mugs Coffee.

Leftovers
~1.75 L milk, 1 Hot Dog Sausage, 2/3 tin Baked Beans, Half Tin Ratatouille, Half Sachet Mashed spuds.

Observations
The ratatouille was disappointing. I haven't had it for a while and have gone off it. But hey-ho, it was vegetables. I was tempted to have it with couscous, but the onions in the mash clinched it.
The ragu was rich and tasty. Carrots gave it 'bite' and the hotdogs took their flavour from the oxo and surrendered their own.Pasta twirls made their debut for the week.

I'll do a complete experiment roundup in a later post.

------

[jennyjj01]

Conclusions from my experiment: A few surprises. The list of rations is below.
TLDR. Need more Flour and Porridge

My diet for the week was pretty casual and I was eating whatever took my fancy from my long life foods. One objective was to see what sort of quantities I should be storing for, say 12 months of acceptable food, compared to what I ACTUALLY store.

Immediately, I recognise that I didn't particularly 'survive' on rice, pasta and baked beans.
Pasta, Rice and Mashed spuds were rotated through and I should adjust the ratios that I store

Far more important than expected was a quantity of flour needed to make weekly bread and batters. I don't store enough flour.

I adopted porridge as my breakfast of choice and I need to store much more of that along with the honey (or jam) to make it very pleasant.

I need to store much more milk powder or UHT as it's a daily essential.

Oil used for cooking never survived for re-use and was effectively soaked up by other food. So I should scale up Oil stores.

As anticipated I drank a LOT of coffee, but I hadn't realised how much water that needed. Probably 9L of water went as coffee.

I ate relatively little pasta and rice: Less than anticipated.

One tin of fish and one tin of 'meat' seemed a decent ration, so long as I augmented with a couple of tinned ready meals. I should buy more ‘Nice’ Tinned Meat and Fish to replace some of the budget stuff I hold. A couple of tinned ready meals per week gave normality.

Dried Onions and Dried Carrots were useful and flexible. I need to top up and replace some degraded onions.

My only fruit was a weekly tin of fruit cocktail, which I spun out over several days by making my trifle portion pots. Other tinned fruits could be similarly used. Need more variety.

My modest beer ration was a real morale booster. Stores do feature beer and wine kits.

Over the course of just a week I couldn't dip into every type of food that I store, such as tinned soup, pulses and soya. I maybe store too many tins of soup and too few tinned ready meals.

Surprisingly, I didn't miss sweets or chocolate, which were on standby.

These rations were incredibly low cost. I haven't costed it properly yet, though.


Oh. And my weight???? I nominally lost 2.5 pounds over the week, but the margin of error on that is about 2 pounds as I do fluctuate a fair bit. I didn't get hungry and I didn't waste away.

Below is a List of what I consumed over the 7 day experiment....

Tins	Baked Beans	2 Tins
	Chicken Curry	1 Tin
	Hot Dog Sausages	1 Tin
	Tomatoes	1 Tin
	Beef Stew	1 Tin
	Ratatoille	1 Tin
	Fruit Cocktail in Juice	1 Tin
	Pilchards in Tomato Sauce	1 Tin
Carbs	Porridge Oats	230g
	Long Grain Rice	180g
	Pasta Twirls	70g
	Instant Mash with Onions	2x80g Sachets
	Flour	625g
	CousCous	25g
	Yum Su Noodles	1 Sachet
	Olive Oil	170ml
	Honey	85g
	Sugar	2tsp
Dried Veg	Carrots	20g
	Onions	40g
	Home Bargain Broth mix	80g
Treats & Drinks	Instant Coffee	65g
	Budweiser 300ml Bottle	3 Bottle
	Milk Powder (Makes 2L)	2 Sachets
	Hot Chocolate	15g
Sundries	Baking Powder	0.5 Tsp
	Beef Oxo	1 Cube
	Chicken Oxo	1 Cube
	Mixed Dried Herbs	2 Tsp
	Mustard	1 Tsp
	Salt	2 Tsp
	Pepper	1 Tsp
	Pilau Flavouring	1 Tsp
	Hartleys Jelly	1 Block
	Custard Powder	1 sachet

Plus 14L Water: Mostly as Coffee

[pseudonym]

Many thanks Jenny.

From your conclusions do you think you really "missed" any one item or meal that you would add in i.e eggs/bacon?

And what nice tinned meals would you buy extra of?

[Frnc]

I don't plan on doing the same, but I do eat most of my prep foods in normal rotation. Not sure I'll be buying more of the mac and cheese snacks in the near future, as they aren't very healthy, and if I have them, I'll be tempted to eat them as snacks. I already have a box of 30 Koka noodles to use up, but have 12 months to do so. Also have a few left of the last box, which are dated Feb 2026.

[jennyjj01]

Many thanks Jenny.

From your conclusions do you think you really "missed" any one item or meal that you would add in i.e eggs/bacon?

And what nice tinned meals would you buy extra of?

Good questions.

Into a SHTF situation, I'd pine for butter for the bread and eggs and cheese. I do have some ghee and powdered eggs but I've never tried or used the ghee, and the eggs are well expired and hard/expensive to replace, so I didn't use any.
I did miss having fresh chicken and other meat to work with.
LOL @ Whole chicken in a can
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p93JJCbFXvE

And I missed chips. We'll be having a chippy tea tonight.

Nice tinned meals? Great question. I'm underwhelmed with the choice and quality. We have some curries and minced beef with onions and a few chunky soups, but we need to explore the options. Maybe explore the veggie options, though not ratatouille

[pseudonym]

Snip> Into a SHTF situation, I'd pine for butter for the bread and eggs and cheese. I do have some ghee and powdered eggs but I've never tried or used the ghee, and the eggs are well expired and hard/expensive to replace, so I didn't use any.
I did miss having fresh chicken and other meat to work with.
LOL @ Whole chicken in a can
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p93JJCbFXvE

Nice tinned meals? Great question. I'm underwhelmed with the choice and quality. We have some curries and minced beef with onions and a few chunky soups, but we need to explore the options. Maybe explore the veggie options, though not ratatouille

Thanks again, one more question in 2 parts if I may?

Oh. And my weight???? I nominally lost 2.5 pounds over the week, but the margin of error on that is about 2 pounds as I do fluctuate a fair bit. I didn't get hungry and I didn't waste away.

1. So the meals were sustainable, do you think your work load decreased or increased and would a SHTF scenario put extra pressure on maintaining weight/muscle and

2. Would a type of weight gain powder assist in any way ( cheats chocolate "milkshake" )

[Arzosah]

This has been so interesting, and I really appreciate the daily updates, as well as your summary analysis at the end.#

Seconding pseudonym's questions here, and I think maybe you've answered it, but is there anything you're looking forward to now you're through?