Hi,<br><br>Are the 3600 calorie SOS Food rations adequate for something like being stuck on the road, or for earthquake stuck-at-home use?<br><br>I understand that some survival kits use the bare bare minimum, so I want to know if 1200 calories a day are adequate.

Hey Skunkabilly,<br><br>I've eaten SOS & Mainstay food rations. I like them. They're great for kits that will be put away for a while. I keep some in my Jeep, my NERT/CERT bag and my Bug Out Bag. For shorter hikes, I'll typically carry some sort of snacks, if I plan to be gone more than a couple of hours. For longer hikes, I'll typically add some ration bars, just in case. For overnight hiking and/or camping, I prefer something more substantial. For home, since space is not such an issue, I keep canned and other prepackaged foods that need neither refrigeration to keep nor cooking to eat. I also have heated up certain canned goods at my hearth with my Esbit stove. I also like to keep a supply of MREs at home, again because space is not at such a premium.<br><br>My girlfriend loves ration bars; especially when she's sick or feeling bad. She'll eat them even when the thought of any other foods makes her queasy. She also keeps some at her office for times when the stuff hits the fan and she ends up staying late without any real good time for grabbing a meal somewhere. She thinks they're the greatest thing since take-out.<br><br>She prefers Mainstay brand; she likes the feel of them. They're smoother, while SOS brand is more crumbly. I prefer SOS brand, since each bar is individually wrapped inside the outer foil packaging. I don't like the fact that, once you open a Mainstay package, you expose all the blocks inside to air. She doesn't care; she just pops the whole thing in a ziplock bag after opening.<br><br>As for whether 1200cal/day is adequate to live on, yeah, for a while. Keep it up for long, and you'll start to slim down nicely. Keep it up for too long, and you'll start to slim down not so nicely.

The answer is "it depends."<br><br>You don't really need any food for the first several days.<br><br>Additionally, the amount of food that you need to maintain your body weight is directly related to your body weight, your activity level, and the environmental conditions.<br><br>In a cold environment, you will need more food than in warm, but if you wear a t-shirt and shorts and are caught in a blizzard with no shelter, you can't eat enough (really can't process what you eat fast enough) to maintain your body temperature.<br><br>If you are in an earthquake, stuck-at-home, and you stay in bed all day, 1200 calories will be more than adequate.<br><br>If you are doing SAR on the collapsed building next door, doing hard physical work for 24 hours straight, 3600 calories won't be enough.