iBagel said:Canned whole chicken
that's good eat'n
They last for years too, a man ate one 50 years after he bought it: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/4693520.stm
Dayum ... eating a 50 yr old chicken from a can?
You realise there'd be something like 35-40 generations between that chicken and the ones clucking away today ? I wonder just how different they'd be ... not much really I guess ... but at least you wouldn't grow manboobs from a chicken packed in the 1950s as it wouldn't be packed with hormones. Shit ... might even be healthier than a fresh one.
As far as survival foods go, a good, cheap, and reasonably long-lived survival foods:
peanuts
honey
plain white flour
WATER
If you're not allergic anyway (in which case they'll kill ya).
Peanuts last for ages (and even when food goes off you can still basically eat it as long as you keep it in an airtight container - it just goes a bit funky). Peanuts have heaps of energy and if you're looking at a disaster of 1-2 months (a short apocalypse, I know) you'd be fully stocked for less than A$50. Peanuts can be added to all kinds of things to make `em tastier too. Honey likewise. And honey, due to antiseptic qualities therein, will NEVER go bad. EVER. Mix the honey and nuts with flour and make what are actually quite tasty snacks.
The white flour will last for centuries if stored correctly. Possibly longer. The lack of the husks (where oils and acids are kept) in white flour means that there's not really anything that can kick-start fermentation/decomposition. Mix with water until dry and somewhat elastic (like pizza dough). Sit on a piece of aluminium foil and bake in the ashes of a fire. Not very tasty, but this is basically hardtack. It will keep you alive. There's hardtack in museums that is hundreds of years old and looks exactly the same as the day it was baked. Probably tastes just as bad as well (although honestly, I quite like hardtack. But I have good teeth). My wife despises 'hard' hardtack though. She'd rather it still have a little moisture in it - but it will deteriorate if still moist. Bake it hard and dry and it'll last for, literally, centuries.
EDIT: Bingo ... here's some back up for the peanuts thing. Just pasta from wikipedia:
"...While peanuts are nutritional as an everyday food, during expeditions on foot into the wilderness, especially regions of sub-zero temperatures like the South and North Poles, having peanuts has been the deciding factor between life and death. After learning from the mistakes of other adventurers, especially the tragically ill-prepared Discovery and Terra Nova expeditions to the South Pole led by Captain Robert Falcon Scott and Captain Oates from 1901 to 1912 (during which the majority of the expedition died), where starvation and lack of the proper amount of calories needed to keep from freezing were a constant danger, adventurers had to decide on a type of food that was dense, portable, high in protein and calories and could be eaten at any time without preparation. Subsequent expeditions thus settled on peanut butter as the ideal foodstuff, freeing explorers from the transport and kindling of cooking fuel (a near-impossibility in the frigid polar winds), and high enough in protein and calories to fuel the party and keep them from freezing to death in the harsh weather and freezing nighttime temperatures. Peanut butter was further favored for speed and ease of use because it could be eaten while walking if necessary..."
I believe in Africa for dangerously malnourished children, they use a peanut butter-based goop to bring them rapidly back to healthy weight.
Of course, don't eat too many. You only need a handful and that's enough calories for a regular meal.
