From time to time, when I see pieces on preparations for long term survival, (especially when it comes to food preparation), I have the following thoughts in more or less the following order.
1.
Pack away an ample supply of cyanide pills. From what I understand, properly packaged and stored, they have an amazing shelf life. While only a supposition, I can foresee a situation where, after some amount of inhumane exposure to what can only be justly viewed as the culinary equivalent of waterboarding, some members of your Ark, as one of their final acts, might wish to posthumously thank me for this idea.
2. If the above suggestion seems too pessimistic in that it telegraphs a certain cancerous defeatism that has to be arrested at any cost, (which, in all truthfulness, might be a legitimate concern given what one would expect to be a high degree of angst or perhaps anxiety for those who would have survived the initial shock and causation of civilization’s descent into dystopia), I have the following recommendation:
Pack away an ample supply of dried spices. Properly applied, spices can assure that any meal becomes a pleasant experience, and on occasion, even a memorable one.
As I think about it, like most pill forms of medicine, spices do not so much as “expire” as they lose their potency over time. That said, I would think that seed based spices, as opposed to say leaf or root based spices, would have a longer shelf life. (I should point out that
my thoughts here are not based upon any evidence, authority, calculation, logical consistency or on anything else expect for the fact that I thought of it. BTW, my wife contends that this is a common detectable theme in many of my arguments or other “Thoughts-of-the-Day”.) Perhaps a brief consultation with a Spice Expert who is versed in the subtleties of these sorts of issues would be prudent.
3. I must congratulate you on providing some degree of specificity with your ingredients. Often when coming across these sorts of pieces of advice, the author often has a very detailed and technical description of, say, how to heat seal a bag, but is very generic with the ingredients: “Any type of rice and beans will do”. Pinto or navy beans with long-grain white rice is a step in the right direction, at least in comparison to most other write-ups.
Even so, I think that you need to go farther.
(Ed Note: On review I was surprised, perhaps distressed, to see how much time I spent thinking about this issue. Also note, I think that this is the first time I have even thought about this issue in anything other than a passing manner. I reserve the right to modify or even withdraw any statement upon review).
(Note: 100g is about 2/3 of a cup)
Not all Beans are created equal:Take for example:
Pinto Beans:
Statistics Report: 16043, Beans, pinto, mature seeds, cooked, boiled, without salt
Energy kcal 143 (per 100g)
http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/4757?fg=&man=&lfacet=&count=&max=&sort=&qlookup=&offset=&format=Stats&new=&measureby=And:
Kidney Beans:
Statistics Report: 11030, Beans, kidney, mature seeds, sprouted, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt
Energy kcal 33 (per 100g)
http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/2875?fg=&man=&lfacet=&count=&max=&sort=&qlookup=&offset=&format=Stats&new=&measureby=Not all Beans within the same family are equal, preparation makes a difference:Look at these beans:
Pinto Beans:
Statistics Report: 11049, Beans, pinto, immature seeds, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt
Energy kcal 162 (per 100g)
http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/2889?fg=&man=&lfacet=&count=&max=&sort=&qlookup=&offset=&format=Stats&new=&measureby=Compare to:
Statistics Report: 16043 above.
On first blush, rice appears to be more influenced by how it is prepared and whether or not it has been enriched or not.Short-Grain White Rice:
Statistics Report: 20053, Rice, white, short-grain, cooked
Energy kcal 130 (per 100g)
Fatty acids, total saturated g 0.051
Fatty acids, total monounsaturated g 0.058
Fatty acids, total polyunsaturated g 0.050
http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/6466?fg=&man=&lfacet=&count=&max=&sort=&qlookup=&offset=&format=Stats&new=&measureby=Long-Grain White Rice Enriched:
Statistics Report: 20045, Rice, white, long-grain, regular, cooked, enriched
Energy kcal 130 (per 100g)
Fatty acids, total saturated g 0.077
Fatty acids, total monounsaturated g 0.088
Fatty acids, total polyunsaturated g 0.076
…
Iron, Fe mg 1.2
Fluoride, F µg 41.1
Thiamin mg 0.163
Niacin mg 1.476
Folate, total µg 58
Folic acid µg 55
Folate, DFE µg 97
http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/6458?fg=&man=&lfacet=&count=&max=&sort=&qlookup=&offset=&format=Stats&new=&measureby=Long-Grain White Rice Unenriched:
Basic Report: 20445, Rice, white, long-grain, regular, cooked, unenriched, without salt
Energy kcal 130
Fatty acids, total saturated g 0.077
Fatty acids, total monounsaturated g 0.088
Fatty acids, total polyunsaturated g 0.076
….
Iron, Fe mg 0.2
Fluoride, F 0
Thiamin mg 0.02
Niacin mg 0.4
Folate, total µg 3
Folic acid µg 0
Folate, DFE µg 3
http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/6569?fg=&man=&lfacet=&count=&max=&sort=&qlookup=&offset=&format=Stats&new=&measureby=As I was thinking about these tables, I was reminded about the standard recommendation from most western nutritionists to not wash your rice before cooking. Their contention is that most of the nutrients on the rice get washed away in the rinsing process.
But I do not know if you have noticed, but many Oriental and most Middle Eastern cook books written by indigenous authors beseech you to “wash your rice at least five times or until the water runs clear” if you are using anything other than American grown and processed rice. And their reasoning is not too obtuse. In villages such as Pakistan, it is not unheard of having the village goat defecate over the rice harvest.
Type, preparation and country of origin seem to be important factors. But I think that is just the start of it. A thought or two below:
I think that these data sets may not capture the vast diversity in rice. See link.
http://www.riceassociation.org.uk/content/1/10/varieties.html“There are more than 40,000 varieties of cultivated rice (the grass species Oryza sativa) said to exist. But the exact figure is uncertain. Over 90,000 samples of cultivated rice and wild species are stored at the International Rice Gene Bank and these are used by researchers all over the world.”
http://www.riceassociation.org.uk/content/1/4/documents.htmlComparison of selected nutrients in brown and white rice (per 100g)
Nutrient Brown rice raw White rice (easy cook) raw
Energy (kcal/kJ) 357 / 1518 383 / 1630
Fat (g) 2.8 3.6
Protein (g) 6.7 7.3
Carbohydrate (g) 76 78
Fibre (as NSP2) (g) 1.9 0.4
Thiamin (mg) 0.59 0.41
Riboflavin (mg) 0.07 0.02
Niacin equivalents (mg) 6.8 5.8
Folate (ug) 49 2
