By The Ready Store

Previously on the blog, we covered how to compare food storage supplies. We highlighted how you should assess calories, variety, shipping costs, packaging types and more. We also highlighted some things that weren’t very important when comparing food storage supplies.

We have prepared this easy-to-use checklist to help you out! Easily compare two long-term food storage kits, place a check mark in the column next to the kit with the better offering. The kit with the most check marks wins!

Example:      READYprep 2000 | 12 month		Example:     Another’s 12-month kit
Name of Supply Kit		Name of Supply Kit
Calories Per Day		Calories Per Day
Cost:    $		Cost:     $
Shipping Cost:    $		Shipping Cost:    $
Total Cost (Cost + Shipping)    $		Total Cost (Cost + Shipping)    $
Cost Per Cal. (Total Cost/Cal)		Cost Per Cal. (Total Cost/Cal)
# of Foods (Not # of Cans)		# of Foods (Not # of Cans)
Freeze-dried or Dehydrated		Freeze-dried or Dehydrated
Packaging Type (Circle One) Cans Buckets Pouches		Packaging Type (Circle One) Cans Buckets Pouches
Winner:

You can also print off the PDF version of this chart to use again and again!

By The Ready Store

What is a READYpack? These 6-can collections are a great way to test out new products while still getting the bulk savings!

READYpacks are collections of 6-can food storage items that are typically bundled with like items. So for example, the Gourmet Vegetable READYpack includes 1 can of Diced Broccoli Florets, 2 cans of Potato Chunks, 1 can of Zucchini Slices, Cauliflower Pearls and Asparagus.

If you were to purchase all of these items separately, you’d pay a little more than $116. However, if you purchased them together in the READYpack, you’d save $11!

We have a wide variety of READYpacks including collections of fruits, vegetables, just-add-water meals, meats, dairy products, breakfasts and more!

You can typically save 8 – 10 percent when purchasing READYpacks instead of cans individually.

Take a look at some of our selection of READYpacks here.

If you have any questions, please let us know! We’ll try and answer the question as quickly as possible!

By The Ready Store

Many times people want to prepare with food storage but, like most of us, are going through some economic hard times. There are a number of things you can do to continue your food storage goals even when you’re on a tight budget or just starting.

We’ve shared some tips below and we’d love to hear from you! What recommendations do you have?

Gather little bits of money
A lot of people think they have to purchase all of their food storage at the same time. While some people might have the means to do that, many need to make smaller purchases.

Save up you extra pennies. Save the few extra bucks you have after buying groceries each week and it adds up. After a month you’ll probably even have some money to buy a #10 can of food. Save those few dollars for a few months and you could buy a six-can ReadyPack.

Bulk deals
Buying in bulk is a great way to get ahead of your food storage goals. With our ReadyPacks, you can save $10 – $30 just by buying in bulk instead of each can individually. With larger long term kits like the 3-, 6- or 12-month kits, you can save 13 – 20 % buy buying in bulk instead of separately.

The Ready Store conveniently displays the bulk savings price next to each product. Whenever you see this gray badge next to the product it means that you can receive bulk savings. We also list the money you’ll save below the price.

Make a list
Yes, I know this sounds tedious but it helps. Know what food storage items you have and which ones you lack. This will help you know which items you should be saving for.

Keep an eye out for sales
You can save money by getting on the mailing lists for food storage supply companies. Stores will have sales periodically. Check out our weekly sales and daily deal tabs to see if there is anything that you’ve been keeping an eye on.

Split the cost with friends
A great idea is to place orders with friends. Find something that you can split, like a 6-month food storage supply, and then split the cost. That way you can save on shipping costs and get savings on bulk food!

Package your own food
A lot of people will  purchase large quantities of basic staple foods like grains and legumes in buckets. You can take these items and seal them with Mylar bags and oxygen absorbers to keep them safe.

Be consistent
The most important thing is to be consistent with your food storage goals. You’ll be surprised at how quickly small things can add up. Be consistent and add to your food storage when you can!

What advice do you have?
Comment below and share your advice! How can you keep preparing on a tight budget?

By The Ready Store

While many of us are excited for the hot weather of summer, others are worried about another type of heat: Wildfires!

Groups like the Westcoast Wildland Strike Teams, based in Portland, Ore., spend weeks on end camping out fighting wildfires across the coast.

And while fighting fires to protect our communities, who do the Westcoast Wildland Strike Teams depend on? The Ready Store!

We were so excited to receive this letter last week from Kevin Hawke, Engine Boss and Emergency Medical Technician for the WWST.

Dear The Ready Store,

On behalf of Westcoast Wildland Strike Teams from Portland, Oregon, I would like to extend a big “thank you!” for providing us with such great products for our busy fire seasons.

While out fighting forest fires all summer my engine crew is often “spike camped,” which means we must stay out in the woods for several weeks at a time, and we are in charge of our own food and water supply. Proper nutrition is vital while working 20 hour shifts, and we appreciate an easily prepared hot meal to keep us going strong.

The MRE’s, #10 cans, and freeze-dried food pouches store perfectly in our engine compartments, and can withstand the bumpy conditions of our engines driving up and over bumpy logging roads all day.

While covered from head to toe with black ash, and nodding off from exhaustion, the last thing I want to think about is how to prepare food for up to 16 firefighters. The MRE’s, the freeze-dried food in #10 cans, and the pouches are considered delicacies out there compared to the “food” we are given by the commanding agency.

We also have a few vegetarians in our company, so we appreciate the vegetarian options available.

We will continue to use The Ready Store exclusively as our food and water supplier!

Once again we extend a big THANK YOU, and we will continue to use your products while we are protecting life, property, and the environment. Have a great day!

Kevin Hawke
Engine Boss & Emergency Medical Technician
Westcoast Wildland Strike Teams

Thank you Kevin for protecting us! We hope to continue making good products that your strike team will enjoy!

If you’d like to send us an e-mail about our products, you can e-mail customerservice@thereadystore.com. You can also review a specific product by clicking on “Add Your Review” next to the product photo after logging into your account.

You can also receive 50 ReadyRewards points for each review you do! (Limit 10 reviews per day.)

The Ready Store is excited to announce that we now have a library!

You can now order books that will help you with your food storage and emergency preparations. Choose from books like “Cookin’ with Home Storage,” “Food Storage 101 – Where Do I Begin?” and “Cookin’ with Powdered Milk.”

These books are packed full of recipes, conversion charts, tips and tricks! We hope these books will provide you with a great resource on how to use your food storage and giving you ideas of dishes to make!

One book in our library contains 100 recipes using food storage items! Another holds 550! These recipes and books will save you time and money.

Besides recipes, these books also contain water storage ideas, storage recommendations, menu plans, shelving options and do-it-yourself tips!

Keep checking back to see new additions to our library and other surprises!

By The Ready Store

One of the most important aspects of emergency preparations is plans for your emotional health! Disasters and emergencies can have a large impact on your stress levels. This is especially true if you’ve experienced a disaster previously.

Here are some tips on how to take care of your emotional health during a disaster or emergency.

What you feel during a disaster

You may feel a wide variety of emotions during a stressful event. Try to remember in the moment, that these emotions are temporary. Try to be patient with yourself and your emotions and be helpful towards your family and neighbors.

These are all common responses in an emergency situation:

• Feeling physically weak and mentally tired. Many times, people feel tired, sad, numb, lonely or worried.
• Difficulty making decisions or focusing
• Frequently becoming frustrated. Also feeling frustrated more quickly.
• Experiencing changes in appetite or sleep patterns.

How to get your emotional health back on track

One of the best things you can do to get back on track is to establish a routine. The emergency will have disrupted your daily routine and getting back into that will help you emotionally. Remember that this might take some time.

Basic necessities. Try to find a place to evaluate your situations. Find a safe location to assess your physical needs.

Eat healthy. During times of high stress, you’ll want to make sure that you are eating well. You’ll feel better than if you eat junk food. That is why it’s so important to have a healthy balance to your food storage supply. Read our previous post on steps to choosing a food storage kit.

Adequate rest. Be sure to get enough sleep and rest for your needs. This might be hard when your routine has changed so rapidly. However, rest will help you overcome your stress.

Be patient and loving. While many people are feeling frustrated, they can get moody. Be sure to be patient with others and yourself. However, this doesn’t mean that you can just go off by yourself. Staying connected, talking, with others can help you cope and feel support. Feeling others care and love is an important part of emotional health.

Make plans. During an emergency, you’ll find difficulty staying focused. For this reason, it’s important to gather information and set priorities on what you need to do. Have something to write down your list so that you can remember what you need to do. It’s also helpful to keep your family and friends involved with your plans so they can remind you what you need to do.

If depression continues

Most people will feel better after a few days. However, there are some that can’t seem to overcome their emotional stress. If you find yourself or others experiencing these symptoms, two weeks or more after an event, consider reaching out for additional help.

• Bursts of anger
• Difficulty sleeping
• Loss of appetite
• Emotional outbursts
• Headaches and stomachaches
• Fatigue
• Feelings of guilt, helplessness or hopelessness
• Avoiding the presence of loved ones

Your recommendations

What do you think? What plans have you made to take care of your emotional health during a disaster? We’d love to hear from you. Please share your tips below!

By The Ready Store

Pain can be caused by many different things and one easy way to lower your pain levels is through your diet.

There are a number of things that you can eat that will help relieve inflammation, joint pains and aches. Take a look at our list of foods that can help you fight the pain!

What other foods have you found relieve your pain? Let us know and comment below!

Metalized bags, or Mylar bags, offer a great solution to sealing your own food. Mylar bags help keep moisture, sunlight and oxygen out of your food – extending your food’s shelf-life!

Here is a step-by-step tutorial on how to seal your own Mylar bags.

What you’ll need

First, be sure to round up all of your supplies. It’s recommended that you seal more than one Mylar bag in a sitting because the oxygen absorbers that you place in the bags can only stay out in the open for a few hours. So, you can’t really open the O2 absorber bag and then use the absorbers later.

Be sure to gather:

• Your food
• A bucket (doesn’t need to be food-grade)
• A lid
• Mylar bags for each bucket
• An oxygen absorber for each bucket
• A heat source like a clothes iron or a hair straightener

Step 1 – Put the Mylar bags in the buckets

Be sure to spread the bag out along the bottom of the bucket as much as possible. This will help you food settle to the bottom as much as possible.

Step 2 – Pour the food into the Mylar bag

Step 3 – Lift the Mylar bag to settle

Take the Mylar bag and lift it up inside the bucket. Don’t take it out. Shake the bag to make sure that all the contents are settled to the bottom. This will help the food fill into the pockets of air in the bag so you can get more food into the bag.

Step 4 – Throw in an oxygen absorber

You don’t have to bury it or anything. You can just throw it on the top.
You’ll want to press the sides of the bag so the part you’ll be sealing stands straight. This is a good time to push out the remaining air.

Step 5 – Seal the bag

Use a clothes iron or hair straightener to seal the top of the bag. If you use a clothes iron, make sure that it’s not on a steam setting. The heat source should be at a high setting to seal the bag correctly.

When using a clothes iron, it is sometimes helpful to use a piece of wood to iron against. You can wrap the top of the bag around the wood and push against it to iron.

Start heating from the middle of the bag and move your way to the outside. This will help the seal lay more evenly.

We’ve seen a lot of videos where people leave a slot at the top of the seal, quickly vacuum out the remaining air and then seal the rest of the bag. This isn’t necessary. If you have a good oxygen absorber, it will take out the remaining oxygen from the bag. You might notice there is still some space in the bag due to nitrogen in the air, which doesn’t harm the food.

A 2000cc oxygen absorber is potent enough that if you were to inflate the entire Mylar bag with air and seal it with the absorber, it would take all the oxygen out, leaving only nitrogen and traces of other gases (less than 1 percent) that are not going to harm your food.

Step 6 – Place a lid on top

Fold over the Mylar bag and then place a lid on top. You’re done!

What other tips do you have? What have you found to be effective? Comment below and let us know.

By The Ready Store

Dehydrating can be a very fun activity and save you space and money! While dehydrating isn’t an exact science, there are a few tips and tricks that you can use to dehydrate your food in the best way possible.

Take a look at our list and add your tips too! Comment below to tell us your tips and tricks!

General

1. Dehydrating foods can result in a loss of some nutrients, although the foods will still be nutritious. Vitamin C is most commonly destroyed by heat.
2. The fiber content of fruits usually remains the same after dehydration. Take this into consideration when choosing what to preserve.
3. Humid air can slow down the dehydration process.
4. Dehydrated fruits and vegetables are lower in fat than regular produce. However, their calories are higher per serving because of their density. For example, you would receive the same amount of calories from 1 cup of fresh apples and ½ cup of dehydrated apples.

Preparation

1. When dehydrating food, you should always start with fresh, good quality food. Bruised and old foods don’t tend to yield good results.
2. You can dip your apples in a bath of lemon juice and cold water. This will keep the apples from discoloring when dehydrating. You can also dip fruits in orange or pineapple juice.
3. Although it’s not necessary every time, blanching or dipping your food before dehydration can prevent against bacteria.
4. Try and slice all of your foods to the same size. This will help all the food dehydrate at the same rate.
5. Cook potatoes before dehydrating. If not, they will turn black in the dehydrator. You can also put potatoes in the fridge the night before dehydration to make it easier to peel, cut or shred them.
6. Steam low-acid foods before you dehydrate them. These include things like beets, corn, peas, beans, broccoli, pumpkins, etc.
7. You can ask your butcher to slice your beef for dehydration. They will usually cut it to ¼-inch thick.

Dehydrating

1. Try to dehydrate the food as quickly as possible. The higher the temperature the better. However, if you make the temperature too high, the food will become hard on the outside and soft on the inside. Be aware of the temperature at which you are dehydrating and be sure to follow the manufacturer’s guidelines.
2. Many fruits and can be pureed or blended beforehand to be made into fruit strips or rolls. Instead of adding sugar to the mix, add honey or corn syrup.

After

1. Be sure to cool all the food before you store it.
2. Store the dehydrated food in airtight containers or plastic bags to keep out moisture.
3. It’s recommended that you freeze your dehydrated meat. Many times, dehydrated meats can still go rancid.

Just for fun

1. You can dehydrate tomato sauce from a jar! It will look similiar to a fruit roll-up. They can then be easily rehydrated with water! It’s a great way to bring sauces on camping trips without having to pack in heavy, bulky jars!

Summary
We’ve also created this awesome cheat sheet that you can use. You can also print off the PDF and keep it with your dehydrator for reference.

You can also print this cheatsheet off to keep with your dehydrator. Click here. (PDF)

*Please note that these numbers do not apply to our American Harvest Snackmaster Express. With the Snackmaster, you can dehydrate food faster and easier.

So, what tips and tricks do you have? Comment below!

By The Ready Store

We’re excited to tell you that The Ready Store will be participating in the Great Utah ShakeOut on April 17th at 10:15 am!

The ShakeOut is a state-wide earthquake drill planned to help businesses, organizations, families and individuals prepare for an earthquake in Utah!

On Feb. 7, 2012, nine states in the Midwest participated in one of the largest earthquake drills ever in the area. Over 2.4 million people registered for the event in Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi.

Similar drills have occurred in other areas of the United States. Now, the ShakeOut drills are spreading across the nation to states like Utah, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon. They also have drills planned internationally in Tokyo, New Zealand, British Columbia and more!

Here is a video that Be Ready Utah put together for the event. The video explains the effects of the earthquake would have on the state of Utah.

If you are a Utah resident and would like to participate in the drill, visit Shakeout.org/Utah to register.

They also supply videos, manuals and other resources that you can use to prepare and train those around you!