Emergency Food Supplies On A Budget: A UK Guide

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You don’t need expensive “survival food” to be prepared. A sensible emergency food supply can be built from ordinary supermarket staples over a few weeks, adding a few extra items to each shop. This guide shows you how to build one on a budget – and how to store it so nothing goes to waste.

How much food do you need?

Start with three days of food for everyone in your household, then build up to a week or two if you have space. Choose food that:

keeps for months without a fridge
can be eaten cold or heated with minimal fuel
your household actually likes eating
doesn’t need much water to prepare (water may be scarce too)

The best budget emergency foods

Tins

Beans in tomato sauce, chickpeas, kidney beans and lentils
Tinned fish – tuna, sardines, mackerel
Tinned meat – chilli, stew, corned beef, hot dogs
Soup, tinned vegetables and tinned fruit
Rice pudding and custard

Dry goods

Pasta, rice, noodles and couscous
Porridge oats and breakfast cereal
Crackers, crispbreads and oatcakes
Instant mash and packet sauces
Long-life (UHT) milk or milk powder

Ready-to-eat and treats

Peanut butter, jam and honey (not for babies under 12 months)
Nuts, seeds and dried fruit
Cereal bars and chocolate
Microwave rice pouches – these can be eaten cold

Don’t forget

Salt, pepper, stock cubes and spices
Tea, coffee and sugar
Baby food, formula and pet food
Any special dietary needs – gluten-free, allergy-safe and so on

How to build your supply without breaking the bank

Buy a little extra each week. Adding two or three tins or packets to your normal shop spreads the cost and avoids panic buying.
Choose supermarket own brands. They are usually much cheaper and just as good for store-cupboard staples.
Buy multipacks and look out for offers on items with long best-before dates.
Stick to what you eat anyway, so you can rotate your stock into everyday meals and nothing is wasted.
Cook from scratch with cheap staples – rice, pasta, lentils and oats go a long way.

Best-before dates are about quality, while use-by dates are about safety. Most tins and dry goods are still fine shortly after their best-before date, but never eat food past its use-by date, and throw away any tins that are bulging, leaking, badly dented or rusty.

Store it properly and rotate it

Keep food somewhere cool, dark and dry – a cupboard is better than a garage or shed, where temperature swings, damp and mice can spoil it.
Put new purchases at the back and use the oldest first (first in, first out).
Decant opened dry goods into airtight containers to keep out moisture and pests.
Check your supply every few months.

Cooking without power

Choose foods that can be eaten cold, or that only need boiling water. If you have a gas hob, it may still work in a power cut (light it with a match). Never use a camping stove or BBQ indoors. See our guide to cooking without power.

Useful food storage products

Airtight food storage containers

Best for: keeping opened dry goods fresh

A set of stackable airtight containers keeps rice, pasta, oats and flour dry and pest-free, and makes it easy to see what you have.

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Mylar bags with oxygen absorbers

Best for: long-term storage of rice, beans and oats

For storage measured in years rather than months, seal dry staples in Mylar bags with oxygen absorbers and keep them in a cool, dark place.

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A manual tin opener

Best for: every emergency kit

A tin opener is easy to forget – and essential if your supply is mostly tins. Keep one in your kit, separate from the kitchen drawer.

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Emergency food ration bars

Best for: a grab bag or back-up

Compact, high-calorie bars with a five-year shelf life. Not the tastiest, but cheap per calorie and ideal for a grab bag or car kit.

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ReadyWise emergency food packs

Best for: a long-life back-up supply

Freeze-dried meals with a very long shelf life that just need hot water. More expensive per meal, but a useful long-term back-up. Remember to store extra water to rehydrate them.

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Next steps

Pair your food supply with enough water – see how much emergency water you should store – and the rest of your household emergency kit. For more on long-life foods, read the surprisingly long shelf life of certain foods and our guide to food storage for prepping.

This guide brings together our earlier posts on prepper food supplies and supermarket quick meals for storage.

About The Author

Article by the Prepper Weekly editor. Prepper Weekly covers practical, UK-focused preparedness – from emergency planning, power cuts and flooding to food, water, kit and outdoor skills – without the fear-mongering. Find out more about Prepper Weekly.

Emergency Food Supplies On A Budget: A UK Guide

How much food do you need?

The best budget emergency foods