What canned foods have the longest shelf life., page 2

Shelf life of canned goods is greatly influenced by storage conditions. A basement is actually a really good place to store them assuming it doesn't leak when it rains and you have a dehumidifier running continuously. Cool, dark and dry is the way to go. Basements also tend to experience lesser temperature fluctuations than above ground storage places, but you absolutely have to have some control on the humidity level. Keep canned goods up off the floor and not up against foundation walls. Extreme temperature changes and excessive humidity will greatly decrease shelf life. I don't have a basement so I guess a closet would be my best bet. I stocked grocery store shelves for a couple years when I was younger and I can tell you that I have seen almost anything you can imagine go bad. Most commercially canned food will last for a few years at least, but anomalies do exist within canning batches and certain categories of foods will spoil in fairly predictable, shorter, time frames. As other people have mentioned, I would stay away from foods that are extremely high in acid content or high in natural oil content. I have stated in other threads that peanut butter is a good food to stock up on, but I wouldn't recommend buying a case of it and never touching it. The oils in it will go rancid. My wife and I eat enough of it that we could safely keep maybe 10 jars of it in our home, and we will eat it before that happens. You're going to have a hard time finding canned tomatoes that do not have citric acid added as a preservative. While it may help preserve the contents of the can, it will not help to extend the integrity of the can itself. Many fruits are just naturally high in acid and will likely age similarly. I also would tend to look at the calorie of foods. You want to get the best bang for your buck. Green beans may last a long time, but don't necessarily offer much in the way of potential fuel when you're trying to survive on them. The average American consumes well over 2000 calories per day, we all know it's not difficult to do. That said, you need to kind of have a meal plan as you're buying food you intend on storing for survival scenarios. If you store a bunch of low calorie foods, you going to be hungry all the time, even though you're eating, and you're going to eat up your stash more quickly than you may have planned. The other thing to consider as far as maximizing shelf life is to buy seasonally, at least with fruits and vegetables. Many people may not know this, but most of the canned and frozen supplies of fruits and vegetables come from single harvest seasons, as in, it only happens once a year. They are then stored in warehouses for distribution throughout the rest of the year. You want to be aware that you may be buying canned goods that are already almost a year old. That's not going to add to the amount of time that they will stay good in your cache. My guess would be that manufacturers plan for most canned fruits and vegetables to last at least 2 years on the shelf. I don't think they're planning on most of the supply being on shelves longer than that before it's replaced with newer product. I personally don't plan on storing more than a few months worth of canned goods because I don't normally eat that much stuff out of cans. The canned things that I do eat regularly are the ones that most seem to agree will last the least amount of time. Rotating stock for me might entail donating the oldest stuff to a food bank and buying new replacements. I can't afford to do that with years worth of canned goods. If you're looking for ultra long term, read the posts before me. Other people have listed good products to store.