# Something we missed!



## kejmack (May 17, 2011)

Periodically we do practice weekends to find out where the holes are in our preps. My daughter and I discovered a critical item we failed to store... CHOCOLATE!!! We pillaged the semi-sweet chocolate chips to get us through, but I feel it is important to point this necessary item out so that others will not make the same mistake. I shudder to think what might have happened if we did not have those chocolate chips.


----------



## CrackbottomLouis (May 20, 2012)

I buy dark hot chocolate for that.


----------



## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

I have a 3 gallon bucket of M&M's that the DD's dont know about. To make sure they dont "accidentally" find it, I put it inside a 5 gallon bucket of corn.


----------



## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

Cocoa powder lasts forever, doesn't it?


----------



## Freyadog (Jan 27, 2010)

We always shop the day after holidays and load up. Last night had a chocolate frenzy going and nabbed a Valentine's Day heart and got my chocolate fix. Thumper would walk forever to get me a chocolate fix.


----------



## ComputerGuy (Dec 10, 2010)

WOW. Candy would be a great thing to store. I wonder if O2 packs and Mylar bags would work?


----------



## Sentry18 (Aug 5, 2012)

In the early 1990's we responded to a bomb threat at a very old but large office building. While clearing the basement I entered a large storage room, in the far back of the room I came this this massive reinforced steel door with a fallout shelter sign on it. It took me some time to get it open but when I did the first thing I found were these 3 gallon cardboard & metal buckets of hard candy. There must have been a dozen of them. While it was not chocolate, apparently someone realized that they needed some survival treats in the fallout shelter. That and metal bucket toilets.


----------



## kejmack (May 17, 2011)

Davarm's idea is golden! I got 2 one-gallon jars and filled them with different kinds of chocolate and put them inside 5 gallon buckets of rice.


----------



## brightstar (Apr 24, 2012)

I have oven canned hot chocolate and vacuum sealed m&m's


----------



## pawpaw (Dec 21, 2011)

Thanks for posting it, Davarm!
It's just too easy to pull a rabbit out of a hat for a loved one - potentially in the middle of extremely grave conditions. It just oozes, "Who loves y'all?"..


----------



## JayJay (Nov 23, 2010)

tsrwivey said:


> Cocoa powder lasts forever, doesn't it?


I hope---I buy when I'm out and about.


----------



## JayJay (Nov 23, 2010)

kejmack said:


> Davarm's idea is golden! I got 2 one-gallon jars and filled them with different kinds of chocolate and put them inside 5 gallon buckets of rice.


Great idea..fill pint jars, put inside other buckets...and just forget which ones!!


----------



## Homegrowngirl (Apr 19, 2011)

I have cocoa powder, but never thought to put away candy. I wonder how long it would last before going stale, it never lasts long enough around here to find that out.


----------



## Lake Windsong (Nov 27, 2009)

Hard candies last years. After Christmas sales are a good time to stock up. Old fashioned caramels, candies, taffy, and homemade cough drops are pretty easy to make from basic cooking ingredients.


----------



## UncleJoe (Jan 11, 2009)

CrackbottomLouis said:


> I buy dark hot chocolate for that.


Dark chocolate seems to keep well when vacuum packed. I opened a one year old bar last December and it looked and tasted like it just came off the shelf. In 2 months I'll be opening another to see how it held up at the 2 year mark. I packed 3 lbs of M&M's at the same time but haven't opened it yet to see the results. Maybe I'll do that in Dec. as well.


----------



## CrackbottomLouis (May 20, 2012)

Lake Windsong said:


> Hard candies last years. After Christmas sales are a good time to stock up. Old fashioned caramels, candies, taffy, and homemade cough drops are pretty easy to make from basic cooking ingredients.


In basic training no hard candy was allowed but cough drops were. They were a gold ticket item and we loved the guy with 'em.


----------



## emilnon (May 8, 2012)

CrackbottomLouis said:


> In basic training no hard candy was allowed but cough drops were. They were a gold ticket item and we loved the guy with 'em.


Yes! And chapstick- cherry flavored from the px! Man that was like crack for us


----------



## pawpaw (Dec 21, 2011)

I won't be vac-sealing anything, so the following is a valid question: Has anyone here opened & eaten, say, M&M's or milk chocolate candy bars when they were discovered behind something in the cabinet after a year? 
I think I have my own answer : MILK chocolate. I was just wanting any first-hand accounts, or just stick with the semi-sweet & dark stuff....
(I'm not asking about the ones found along with the cheerios when you pulled the fridge out for cleaning. Lethargic kids move fast when they spot those, don't they?!) vract:


----------



## valannb22 (Jan 6, 2012)

UncleJoe said:


> Dark chocolate seems to keep well when vacuum packed. I opened a one year old bar last December and it looked and tasted like it just came off the shelf. In 2 months I'll be opening another to see how it held up at the 2 year mark. I packed 3 lbs of M&M's at the same time but haven't opened it yet to see the results. Maybe I'll do that in Dec. as well.


Good to know, dark chocolate is my favorite!


----------



## FrankW (Mar 10, 2012)

I love candy and have areal sweet tooth.
But in the absence of dental care it would be risky to eat candy..

You pretty much have to rbush your teeth after every time if you dont have dantal support.

And I have only so much toothbrush, toothpaste, mouthwash prepped.....


----------



## jsriley5 (Sep 22, 2012)

Candy and esp chocolate is already on my list and I planned on getting to it as soon as the holloween candy goes on sale in a few days. I want to do a whole bucket but might just divide it into several since it's not like we will live on it for a month and so would have to re seal it anyway. definitely planniing to vac some quarts of chips GF is a wonderful baker and needs her supplies. 

As for the question about old chocolate if not sealed well it does not keep all that well and I had some kind of larvae get into some of mine I had left over after a hunting season and just tossed into a drawer in the factory bag. Those were the little hersheys mini bars assortment with like the goodbars, krackle, special dark regular mini bars. So I"d want them vac packed and at the very least sealed in a jar.


----------



## Jimmy24 (Apr 20, 2011)

Need to do more research, folks. Chocolate has a lot of fat in it. It has a chemical added to slow that down, but that Hersey Bar may not be so good if you don't keep in ideal conditions. 

It can have sugar and/or fat blooms. Not good for you.

Jimmy


----------



## PennyPincher (Dec 5, 2011)

Oh thanks! Just what I need. An excuse to go buy chocolate! Dang you!


----------



## Dakine (Sep 4, 2012)

BlueZ said:


> I love candy and have areal sweet tooth.
> But in the absence of dental care it would be risky to eat candy..
> 
> You pretty much have to rbush your teeth after every time if you dont have dantal support.
> ...


A Kroger Food4Less store near me used to run 10 for $10 combo packs of a brush + tube of colgate. obviously this is NOT your Oral-B uber brushomatic-3000 with the self spinning plaque buster foam jets... but they are very good for packing away in case the event comes they are needed.

$10 well spent if you ask me!


----------



## musketjim (Dec 7, 2011)

Sentry18 said:


> In the early 1990's we responded to a bomb threat at a very old but large office building. While clearing the basement I entered a large storage room, in the far back of the room I came this this massive reinforced steel door with a fallout shelter sign on it. It took me some time to get it open but when I did the first thing I found were these 3 gallon cardboard & metal buckets of hard candy. There must have been a dozen of them. While it was not chocolate, apparently someone realized that they needed some survival treats in the fallout shelter. That and metal bucket toilets.


I remember our high school had an old fallout shelter that some friends and I found in the 70's. don't remember how we found it but it had a lot of that hard lemon candy in there too. Tasted like crap.


----------



## kejmack (May 17, 2011)

Jimmy24 said:


> Need to do more research, folks. Chocolate has a lot of fat in it. It has a chemical added to slow that down, but that Hersey Bar may not be so good if you don't keep in ideal conditions.
> 
> It can have sugar and/or fat blooms. Not good for you.


Ah ha! If you "rotate" your chocolate and never let it get old, then you will not have this problem.  Now I have the perfect excuse! :laugh:


----------



## thenance007 (Oct 8, 2012)

Bluez, you obviously are not a chocoholic--you don't need teeth to eat chocolate! It was one of the first things that went in to my preps--with other candies. I have vacuum sealed some quart and pint jars of them, and like to tuck them into my cases of canned stuff--imagine the joy when somebody finds a jar of goodies when they open a case of stewed tomatoes or pickles, or whatever!

I think that in some cases it is the other ingredients, i.e. peanut M&Ms or peanut butter Reeses, that would limit the shelf life more than the chocolate.


----------

