Datrex Bar vs. Skippy Natural Peanut Butter

Datrex 2400 calorie bar
You get: One package containing twelve 200 calorie individually plastic wrapped pieces

Ingredients: Wheat Flour, Vegetable Shortening, Sugar, Salt, Water

• 2400 kcal per package.
• High energy value. Ready to eat.
• Non thirst provoking.
• Small and lightweight.
• All natural ingredients.
• No preservatives.
• Superior coconut flavor
• Tabletized and subpackaged for ease of rationing.
• USCG, Canadian CoastGuard and EC approved
• 3-5 year shelf life.

$7.50 or more per package plus $5.00 shipping

Skippy Natural Super Chunk 15 oz
You get: 15 oz of chunky peanut butter in a reusable jar

Ingredients: Roasted Peanuts, Sugar, Palm Oil, Salt

• 2470 kcal per package
• High energy value. Ready to eat.
• Non thirst provoking
• Small and weighs 15oz
• All natural ingredients
• Superior peanut flavor
• Tabletized and subpackaged for ease of rationing. Nope, measure it out. Two Tbsp = 1 Datrex segment
• USCG, Canadian CoastGuard and EC approved. Nope, they won’t be there anyway
• 2 year shelf life,real food...rotate it out…make peanut butter s’mores in the good times

$2.00 per package…buy 6 instead

Just my opinion............

Never thought of it that way - Stable tasty food...MMM
Must it be super chunk?

( I'm adding some to the pantry)

I use a factory sealed 1-kg. jar of peanut butter as emergency rations in my vehicles. I should probably double that. You can hardly get a more concentrated food source. And the price point, as the OP notes, can't be beat.

I rotate the PB out of the cars every year and a half. Then, since it's cheapie stuff, it becomes treat food for the hounds. Dogs are crazy after PB.

I frown at the term 'natural' in this particular product since they've removed the peanut oil and replaced it with palm oil. A shelf life thing, perhaps? I'm not certain it's much better for you than hydrogenated vegetable oil. Then again, if I'm desperate enough to eat a lot of peanut butter, I'll be burning every possible calorie and LDL will hardly be a pressing concern.

It has to be smooth, by the way.

UUMMM Rea UUUMMM ly UUUMMM
UUMM Plea UUUMMM se UUUMMM give UUUMMM me UUMMM some UUUMMM water UUUMMM

Pete

You are comparing apples and oranges. Or, maybe, jerky vs. fresh meat. If you don't need long term storage, and rotating stock every two years clearly isn't, and the other attributes it provides, then survival rations, per se, make little sense. It's a product designed for a specific purpose and it fits that purpose well, a purpose that PB doesn't fit well, in the least.

As to PB not being thirst provoking, I'd have to say I definitely will have to disagree with that.

YMMV

Important factors: what are those calories comprised of, and what kind of calories do you need in a survival situation? Just having a full stomach is not the ultimate goal.

A diet of high carbs and low fat/protein is ideal for high energy situations. It is also ideal for times when water is extremely scarce. It sucks water out of your body to digest proteins and fats. In contrast, water is actually RELEASED into your body from the digestion of carbs. This has been very precisely studied and validated by Golden and Tipton in their excellent book "Essentials of Sea Survival".

In very cold conditions the extra energy packed in fats is certainly of great value, but you still need carbs if you're going to do much work, and you need plenty of water to digest the fat. The carbs are also the "kindling" that helps your metabolism burn the "big wood" of the fats. To be sure, native peoples in arctic regions subsist on a very low carb diet, but there is evidence to suggest they have developed genetic adaptations to this diet over many generations.

In most any survival situation, protein itself is the least important type of food. If the ordeal lasts long enough that protein is a factor, then a jar of peanut butter or a box of Datrex will be woefully inadequate anyway. You will have to consider finding a way to live off the land or sea.

I recently finished reading Nathaniel Philbrick's "In the Heart of the Sea" which details the wreck of the Essex in 1820. The survivors sailed in open whaleboats for 93 days and wound up eating their dead cohorts. The survivors said they were so weak they could barely stand, let alone do useful work to improve their lot. The protein & (minimal) fat kept them alive, and it was all they had, but a supply of carbs would have been most welcome. IIRC, Steven Callahan reported similarly.

So let's look at the details of Skippy and Datrex.

Skippy, 1.1 ounce serving:
180 calories - 16g fat, 6g carbs, 7g protein. Of those carbs, only 4g are actually energy; the other 2 are fiber.

Skippy yield, per ounce:
163.6 calories/ounce
14.5g fat/ounce
3.6g energy carbs/ounce
6.4g protein/ounce

The Datrex nutritional label is widely available on the internet but it only lists total carbs, with no breakdown between complex, simple (sugar), and fiber carbs. I called the company and spoke to one of their engineers. He gave me the carb breakdown and said that they are starting to print that breakdown on the labels.

Datrex, 1.48 ounce serving:
200 calories - 9g fat, 27g carbs, 3g protein. Of those carbs, 5g are sugars and approximately 2g are fiber, so you are getting about 25g of energy carbs.

Datrex yield, per ounce:
135.1 calories/ounce
6.1g fat/ounce
16.9g energy carbs/ounce
2.0g protein/ounce

So Datrex gives you a calorie ratio much better suited to an active survival situation, especially if water is scarce. If you are certain that your situation will be cold and stationary, Skippy might be a better choice. But IMO food with a profile similar to Datrex is a better fuel.

Of course you can come up with other foods that offer the calorie profile of Datrex. The value added by Datrex seems to be the tough packaging and long shelf life. I am not strictly a Datrex fan, but I feel there is more to be considered than just calories and cost.

I have no connection with or financial interest in Skippy, Datrex, or Amazon.

This is a very helpful analysis, thanks, Glock-A-Roo!



I tested Datrex, ER Bars and Mainstay before settling on Mainstay for this purpose (food for short-term emergencies) and storage regime (long-term storage, relatively rough handling and extremes of temperature). Mainstay was picked based on my kids and my wife finding it the most palatable of the options, but now I wish I'd done an analysis like yours.

My BoBs both have a one pound jar of peanut butter. Quick, ready to eat, tastes good, can be eaten with a spoon. In a pinch, can use the peanut oil to start a fire.

That and DW is allergic to wheat.

I agree with Doug.
When was the last time you sat down and ate plain P.B. without
needing something to drink !!!!!

Maybe I'm just a weirdo but I love Datrex bars! I'd rather eat them than nearly any candy bar, nutrition aside.