Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

After researching a number of vendors, we decided to purchase this product as one aspect of our emergency food supply. Here are some of the factors we considered, and how this product compared: TASTE: We bought a few of the Wise freeze-dried meals and tried them, and we found that they're not bad tasting... not like a home-cooked meal, but not bad. We figured if we had to live off them for a month, there's enough variety and they taste good enough that we wouldn't find it difficult to endure. (See my review of Mountain House food for a comparison.) SHELF LIFE: The meals come in individual packets, which are in turn sealed in plastic tubs. This gives them an advertised shelf life of 25 years. Since we're not regular hikers or campers who will use the food up on a routine basis, we wanted it to last a long time between replacement. This certainly meets that criterion! WEIGHT: We wanted to be able to take our food with us in case we had to leave on foot. These tubs are compact enough that their contents could be easily be distributed in a standard ruck sack or backpack. The biggest down side to this product is the low calorie count per meal. So if you're doing anything other than sitting around waiting for help, plan on the food being consumed at about twice the rate you'd expect (i.e., two servings per actual meal). Each serving is about 200-250 calories (it varies depending on what the entree is), so the 240-serving package will last one person about 30-40 days at 1500 calories per day. Since, on average, men require 2500 calories per day and women require 2000 per day, you can see that you'll be losing weight or using the food up even faster. So plan accordingly based on calorie count, rather than number of servings.