How much

An adult needs about 2,000 kilocalories a day, children and heavy workers differ. For a month for one adult that is roughly: 10 kg rice or flour, 3 kg dried beans or lentils, 2 litres of cooking oil, salt, sugar, and whatever fats, vegetables and spices your household really eats. Store what you already cook, so nothing is new in a crisis.

What keeps

• Years: white rice, dried beans, lentils, salt, sugar, honey, dried pasta, oats, vacuum-sealed or tinned food (check cans for swelling and rust).
• Months: flour, whole grains, cooking oil (cool and dark), nuts.
• Keep food off the floor, dry, cool, sealed against rodents and insects. Rotate: eat the oldest first and buy new.

Preserve without power

• Drying (sun or low heat): fruit, herbs, thin-sliced meat or fish with salt. Dry until brittle.
• Salting and fermenting: cabbage and vegetables in brine, 2 to 3% salt by weight, kept under the brine.
• Smoking and pickling extend life, but need care.
• Canning: acidic foods (jam, pickles, fruit) can be water-bath canned. Low-acid foods (meat, beans, vegetables) must be pressure-canned. Home canning them any other way can cause botulism, which is often fatal.

Cook safely

Cook thoroughly, keep raw and cooked apart, wash hands and surfaces. Do not cook indoors on open fires or charcoal without strong ventilation.

Grow

1. Start now, with what grows where you live. Learn two or three reliable calorie crops (potatoes, beans, squash, grains, root vegetables) and a few vegetables for vitamins.
2. Keep seed. Buy open-pollinated ("heirloom") varieties: seed saved from them grows true. Seed from F1 hybrids does not.
3. Store seed dry, cool and dark, in labelled paper envelopes in a sealed jar. Most keep for several years; test before you rely on it.
4. Feed the soil: compost, crop rotation, beans in the rotation. Poor soil, not poor seed, is the usual reason for small harvests.
5. Water wisely: water early, mulch to keep moisture, collect rain.

Rebuilding food knowledge

The offline kit includes gardening, home improvement and farming material (Appropedia, Stack Exchange archives); see Downloads.