canned meats work well:
Roast Beef Chicken Breast Tuna Dried Beef (salted)
SPAM (comes in different flavors) Ham Vienna Sausages
Potted Meat Deviled Ham Chili (with or without beans)

There are "C-ration" types such as the before mentioned Dinty Moore Beef Stew but also Sweet Sue has Chicken and Noodles and Chicken and Dumplings and some others. There are also Ravioli, Spaghetti and Meatballs, and other Chef canned products.

I don't doubt that you could...but how long would that starchy water sit before starting to grow on it's own? One might be able to get 2 uses out of one batch of water if you soaked and cooked right after each other (BTW this is not recommended by most standard cook books) but you'd have to either toss or drink (ew?) the water pretty soon after.

I was on the Campbell's site looking at soup. 70-90 calories for a serving of condensed soup? No wonder I never come close to feeling full unless I eat it all...or 2 alls

That's something I've considered. Seems that it's hard to get away from salt in many preserved foods. I have the same issue with freeze dried meals for hiking...some of them have insane levels of salt.

I guess that's score one for dried beans and staples.

Hacksaw.
I don’t know why I didn’t mention this earlier but besides my giant bags of rice I have for long term storage I also store hard tack(hard bread) Being born and raised in NFLD I ate the stuff quite often as it is part of a lot of traditional fish recipes. I will bet my last dollar that you could store it for 20 years or more with no problem (as long as it is kept dry)
I cannot attest to the nutritional value as such but my great grandfather, and many like him who worked on the sealing vessels ate nothing but hard tack and tea for months on end while doing a days work that would break most of us today. Can’t really argue with history I guess.

As for the rice, you can get the HUGE bags of it here in Edmonton at any superstore location in the Asian food isle for as little as 13 bucks. It’s hard to beat that kind of deal. I also store Mr. Noodles by the case and of course, good old KD. (I think pasta stores forever) I don’t know officially how long rice will last but after reading your post last night I boiled up some from my long terms stores today for lunch and it tasted fine. (It been in my storage for over 8 years)

If water supply is not an issue, rice and beans both store well and pprovide together a complete protein. I know white rice can pretty much be stored indefinitely, so long as it remains dry and free of impurities and critters. Dried beans also can be stored a long time. If you used these as your main substance and stored some preserved meats, herbs, onions, etc., you could have a wide variety of meals. Beans are cooked all sorts of different ways by all sorts of cultures.

If you store beans and rice, dried, the key is water supply. But the thing also is is that the weight of the beans and rice will be much elss than any food that diid not need liquid added. And water is not the only liquid you could add. But, anyother liquid could be sued in a pinch, provided it was drinkable. Any other food you might have that is not dried is also going to have lots of water weight, and be heavier to transport.

It appears as if the only store bought canned or 'jarred' foods worth considering for long term nutitionally balanced storage are:

SlimFasts
Tuna
Soup
Dinty Moore Stew
Olives
Honey (jarred)
Peanut Butter (jarred)
OJ (if you can keep it cool, as mentioned)

My only guess here is that there may be just to much money in providing practical food storage enthusiasts with the 'specialized' stuff...instead of having us all simply clip coupons or buy in bulk at the local Sams or Costcos.

I'd certainly buy a book relating to the simpler (and less expensive) means of roating a locally sale sensitive; readily available and commonly consumed food items; yet it appears that there is little interest in this subject matter (as I think the OP alluded to; it sure would make things easier to plan and budget around if there were such a list or even a nutritional review of some commonly produced more 'everyday' products).

I'd love to give Hardtack a try! I've never seen any for sale around here though.

Talking about Hardtack makes me want to try and make my own Pemican.

I keep at least a box or three of watercrackers around because their 'best before' is always at least 6 months out. Put Moose Goo on them...makes a great high energy snack.

I actually drink a can of SlimFast for breakfast and lunch Monday-Friday. One can only supplies 190 calories, which isn't much, especially if you are doing any sort of labor. On the other hand one can supplies about 1/3 of your daily vitamins and minerals. They have about a one-year storage life. From the back of the can:
serving - 1 can/325 mL
calories - 190
fat calories - 50
total fat - 6g (9% rda)
saturated fat - 2.5g (13% RDA)
trans fat - Og
polyunsaturated fat - 0.5g
monunsaturated fat - 3g
cholesterol - 5mg (2% rda)
sodium - 200mg (8% rda)
potassium - 600mg (17% rda)
total carbohydrates - 24g (8%)
dietary fiber - 5g (20%)
sugars - 18g
protein - 10g (20%)
Vit. A - 32%
calcium - 50%
Vit. D - 35%
Riboflavin - 35%
vit. B6 - 35%
Vit. B12 - 35%
pantothenic acid - 35%
iodine - 35%
zinc - 15%
manganese - 35%
molybdenum - 30%
vit. C - 100%
iron - 15%
vit. E - 100%
thiamin - 35%
niacin - 35%
folate - 30%
biotin - 35%
phosphorus - 50%
magnesium - 35%
selenium - 25%
chromium - 35%
rda's based on 2000 calorie diet.
experiation date Nov 2008 (purchased January 2008)

Overall, you are probably better off storing "Ensure" rather than SlimFast so that you get the calories you'll need. I think both are available in powdered form which could store easier but does require water. Another option is SlimFast plus sugar.

A case in the closet for short term emergencies might be okay but overall though I think they are low on the list of long-term survival foods.

-Blast

p.s. Oh hey, welcome to the fire newguy RzrSxS!

BigDaddyTX- you can order traditional hard bread here http://www.tidespoint.com

Hacksaw- there is a store called Waysave on Castledowns road that sells it. As well the Sobey's in the Namao center sells it.(maybe the others do as well) In fact, Any store that sells Newfie products in Edmonton will have it in store. Trust me, you will be dead and gone before this stuff goes bad on you.