Emergency Food Supply Guide

A practical 7-day stockpile per adult is roughly 14,000 kcal total (2,000 kcal x 7 days). Translated into a Canadian grocery basket: 14 tins of hearty soup or stew (Habitant, Campbell's, or canned beans with sausages — about 400 kcal each), 4 tins of tuna or salmon (Clover Leaf), 4 tins of fruit in juice, 2 jars of peanut butter, 1 kg of porridge oats (Quaker), 500 g of crackers or crispbreads, 6 cereal bars and a bag of mixed nuts. Add long-life UHT milk for coffee and cereal. For a family of four, multiply by four (roughly 56 tins plus dry goods) — a single grocery cart at No Frills or Costco. During the 2022 Ontario-Quebec derecho, about a million customers lost power for days, so a full week of no-fuss tins is no longer overkill.

Often yes, but follow Health Canada and CFIA rules carefully. A full freezer keeps food safe for around 48 hours if the door stays closed (24 hours if it is half-full). During the 1998 Great Ice Storm, some households in Quebec and Eastern Ontario went without power for weeks, and the guidance is clear: 1) Keep the freezer door shut until you really need to check. 2) If food still has ice crystals or is at 4 °C or below, it can be cooked and eaten or refrozen, though quality may suffer. 3) Throw out any raw meat, fish, dairy, or cooked dishes that have been above 4 °C for more than 2 hours — the risk of salmonella, campylobacter and listeria is not worth it. 4) Pack the freezer with bottles of frozen water in advance; they extend safe time and double as drinking water once thawed. 5) Move sausages, ground meat and ready meals to the top, where you can grab and cook them first on a camping stove.

If your power has failed but you have a gas stovetop, you can often still boil pasta and rice — light it with a match if the igniter is dead. If electricity is off and you have an induction or electric stovetop — common in newer Canadian builds — you need true no-cook options. A practical no-cook menu: Breakfast: overnight oats with UHT milk, bananas, cereal bars, crackers with peanut butter. Lunch: tinned tuna or sardines on crispbread, hummus and crackers, cheese (lasts 2 to 3 days unrefrigerated in winter) with crackers, tinned baked beans straight from the tin. Dinner: tinned chilli, ravioli or stew eaten cold or warmed on a camping stove, tinned mixed bean salad with olive oil, foil-wrapped potatoes in dying barbecue embers. Snacks: nuts, dried fruit, energy bars, cookies, chocolate. Keep a butane camping stove and two gas cartridges in the cupboard — they cost about $25 and unlock hot drinks, which keep morale up.

The Government of Canada's GetPrepared campaign (canada.ca/prepare), run by Public Safety Canada alongside the Alert Ready emergency-alert system, asks households to keep enough non-perishable food and bottled water for at least 72 hours. Specifically it suggests: tinned meat and fish, tinned vegetables and fruit, baked beans, tinned soup, long-life UHT milk, crackers, instant oatmeal, dried pasta and rice, peanut butter, energy or cereal bars, pet food, baby formula and food if needed, plus a manual tin opener. The guidance also flags special needs — celiac, halal, kosher, diabetic, baby and pet — and recommends rotating stock and using a "first in, first out" cupboard. The Canadian Red Cross adds a flashlight, battery radio, acetaminophen, prescription medicines and a power bank to round out a 72-hour kit. Build the basics first, then extend to 7 days, then add specialist items.

You have several safe options. 1) Butane camping stove (Coleman, Campingaz) — single-burner stoves cost $20 to $40 from Canadian Tire, MEC or Amazon; a single cartridge boils a kettle in 4 to 5 minutes. 2) Gas stovetop — if you have a piped gas range, it usually works in a power cut because the burner needs no mains power; light it with a match if the spark fails. 3) Wood-burning stove or barbecue (outdoors only) — never bring a barbecue or generator indoors, the carbon monoxide can kill silently. Health Canada and fire services warn every year about CO poisoning linked to indoor camping stoves and barbecues. 4) Alcohol or Trangia-style stove — favoured by backcountry hikers and Scout leaders; slow but very stable. Always cook outside or in a well-ventilated space, keep a working CO alarm running, and store no more than the safe limit of butane cartridges indoors.