Our basic argument is that in an emergency situation, where you probably don't have access to a working fridge/freezer and with limited water - the best idea for emergency food is food that is either in cans or jars or packets built specifically for a relatively long shelf-life.
Unlike many in the 'Prepper' community, we don't believe that you need 20 year's supply dehydrated trail mix to survive. Just a week's worth of tins, jars and packets and this can be just more than survival.
The trouble we found from our personal experience, when we got a bit 'Preppy' during the start of Covid-19, was that British tinned food seems, in the main, to be tailored to a particular demographic who hanker after a life under rationing and have a preference for the most blandest of food available. Given that in non-emergency life, our supermarket shelves and fridges are stocked full of the freshest of foods with a massive variety, it is no wonder that the makers of canned food in the UK seem to specialise for very niche tastes. In some cases they do seem to be leveraging off their expertise in making pet food!
The solution is to go international.
While food in cans or jars from any country will never be as good as fresh food, we have found tins and jars from around the world to be either far superior or so exotic, we have no baseline to know if its good or not! In both cases, its made cooking and eating these foods more of an adventure, a veritable journey for our tastebuds, than just heating up some spaghetti hoops or having some tomato soup. Don't get us wrong, if you find some firm favourites or just blasts from the past on the supermarket shelves, please do indulge yourselves. The role of food in an emergency is not just to provide much needed sustenance but to improve your morale. As with many things in life, old favourites can be just as beneficial as the novelty of the new. So, its down to you to mix it up as you see fit.
All we advise is a bit of forethought, leaving it too late limits what's available and increases its cost. Trust us, as soon as the public gets a whiff of an imminent emergency, toilet paper, dried pasta and tins of tuna will fly off those shelves and the remaining few tins and jars will double in price.
We recommend that you buy enough long-shelf life food to feed you and your loved ones for 7 days and store them somewhere safe. If you're a member of Slightly Anxious, you can let us know the expiry dates and we will remind you when its time to refresh your store, because hopefully there won't have been a crisis. You can just eat the expiring food or give it to a food bank, that way you can guarantee someone will enjoy it.
We would have loved to have been able to sell you your emergency food store via the website, but when we looked into it, we couldn't make the numbers work unless we made you pay more than if you had just bought it from online suppliers yourself, so this is what we suggest you do.
What we do provide you with is some sample recipes in our Curated food article. And, if you become a Slightly Anxious member, for a small fee, you can access our recipe curator that has a hundred recipes from around the world, categorised by meal type and number of people and even provides you with a shopping list. Give it a whirl if you want to make your crisis time an excuse for a culinary adventure.
At the very least we suggest that you have a look on what's on offer at these online stores:
French food:
Spanish food:
Italian food:
German food:
German Foods.Shop
Other European food:
Rodyna (Slavic & Baltic) Use the code: B4A39KR4V0ZY to get 10% at the checkout
Asian food:
Disclaimers:
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This is not a list of all available online grocery stores available to UK customers, do use a search engine or AI
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We understand that many countries have cuisines that could be used in crisis situations and should have their online stores listed here, educate us and we will add them to the list!
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We can take no responsibility or liability for anything that you order via these online stores.
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Please do carefully check delivery charges as some websites listed are not UK based.
As you will have read in our Curated food article, look for interesting food in tins or cans so all they need is a bit of heating up. Pasta and rice need a lot of water and heat, so prepared meals are best. Snacks in packets can be a good meal replacement or just a way of feeding those who havent had enough - plus remember boredom does cause some to snack - a crisis means all diets are put on hold!
Asian food stores have ramen noodles that need some boiling water but are simple to make and require little clean up. Self-heating meal kits also require a little water but come with their own heat source so these are excellent for an emergency situation, we have tried them (and obviously tons of ramen) and they are surprisingly good.
We recommend the novelty of trying new cuisines and cooking methods as a way of distracting people from the gloom of a disaster scenario. There is a big difference from having tuna in pasta sauce on rigatoni and reminiscing about your student empoverishment to having something unpronounouceable from a country you've never been to that will take your tastebuds to another dimension. Equally, if tuna pasta is what makes you feel warm and secure go for that.
Remember, if you become a Slightly Anxious member, one of the perks is being able to use our recipe curator, which not only gives you recipes from around the world, but tailors them to the meal types and numbers of people and produces a shopping list with price estimate to make you almost wish for a crisis to happen so you can try the meals. Go and join up as a member: