Tool
Food Storage Calculator
Enter your household and how many days you want to cover. The calculator converts people and days into total calories, then into pounds of staples, freeze-dried servings, and 5-gallon buckets, using the same category split our one-year guide recommends.
Your household
Assumptions, printed because hidden assumptions are how kits mislead: grains at about 1,600 kcal/lb dry, beans at 1,550 kcal/lb, fats and oils at 1,900 kcal/lb, freeze-dried meals at 450 kcal per serving. Split: 50% grains, 20% legumes, 15% freeze-dried meals, 15% fats and other.
Your numbers
Do not forget the other half of the plan: dry food needs water and heat to become dinner. Run the water calculator next, and read the one-year supply guide for storage layout and rotation.
How to shop against these numbers
Compare every kit and bucket by cost per 1,000 calories delivered, not by servings. A kit that looks cheap per serving is often expensive per calorie. The staple pounds above are the cheapest layer: bulk rice, oats, and beans packed in Mylar, covered step by step in our buckets and Mylar guide. The freeze-dried servings are the convenience layer for the days when cooking from scratch is not happening.