Rolled oats are one of the greatest prep foods ever, and they are an important part of our food storage program. Easy to prepare, filling, healthy, gluten free… what’s not to love?
Rolled Oats: A Prepper’s Secret Weapon
- If you’re into gluten-free foods, you win. Oats don’t have that particular protein, so they’re gluten-free without having undergone any weird chemical manipulations. Lightweight. 1/2 cup dry expands to 1/2 cup cooked; and the dry oats are light.
- Shelf stable. It doesn’t mind hot or cold, doesn’t spoil when kept dry. It can get bug infested, but that’s rare and doesn’t tend to happen unless it’s been open quite a while.
- No cook, or easy to cook, depending on your taste.
- Easy to pack. The commercial envelopes are ok if you keep them dry. Ziplock bags work great for bulk oats. They don’t mind being squished, either.
- Sticks with you. Although most of the calories are from carbohydrates (27g per half cup vs. 5 g protein and 3 g fat), it’s carbs of the slower to digest, slower to absorb kind that keeps fueling you for longer after a meal.
- Versatile. Some ideas are shown below.
- Cheap. 42 oz for $2.50 is common; and it’s one of the cheapest things to buy in the 5 gal buckets for long-term storage.
- Nice nutritional profile. Not much on vitamins, except thiamine, but it has a good selection of minerals, including some that are hard to find elsewhere (more than 75% of a day’s worth of manganese). Some protein, good fiber, and nothing objectionable like trans fats. If you like simple ingredient lists, Oats is Your Food!
Want a budget prep? At 42 oz dry for $2.50, practically anyone can afford to add this prep to a grocery list.
Some things you can do with rolled oats
Making oatmeal (or gruel, as Salty calls it) is known to pretty much everyone. I use old fashioned rolled oats; 7/8 cup water to 1/2 cup oats, add in a palmful of crushed walnuts, a generous sprinkle of cinnamon, and whatever dried or fresh fruit is to hand. I boil the water first and either heat it just a Little more after adding the boiling water, or cover it in an insulated bowl and let it sit. The texture’s not quite as good the second way, but it’s way convenient. Steel cut oats need more cooking; the ‘old fashioned’ label means they’ve been pre-steamed and rolled.
‘Overnight oats’ are all the rage lately. You mix oats, water, and some add-ins of your choice in a jar, shake it up, and leave it in the fridge overnight. They can be eaten cold or reheated in the morning. So long as the add-ins weren’t very prone to spoilage (such as dairy products), I would feel safe eating them without the refrigeration after an overnight soak. A ziplock would work as well as a jar, although I might double-bag for safety.
You can buy these cute little pre-mixed jars of overnight oats…or take three minutes and make your own.
You don’t even need water
It makes a good dry cereal too. You can follow any of the million granola recipes on the web; but I’m not much into added oils and sweets first thing in the morning, so I just toast a tray of oats with some chopped nuts and cinnamon, add some dried fruit, and pack it away. Pour some milk on it (could be rehydrated from the powder that comes in every ’emergency food supply’ bucket I’ve ever seen) or eat it dry by the handful as a snack while on the move.
I dry extra apples after sprinkling them with cinnamon. They’re a good snack by their own, or an addition to oats as gruel or dry cereal.
All those emergency food supplies, and many prepper’s cabinets, rely a lot on soups. Your mileage may differ, but I find just soup a pretty unsatisfying meal. A handful of oats makes it much more satisfying.
Oats can also be used to make more textured and flavorful bread or pancakes. Just swap out some of the wheat or pancake mix.
They’re a core ingredient for a bunch of different home-made energy bars. Their durability makes them a good choice here. Again, lots of recipes on the web, and I don’t have a favorite as I don’t use these much. I do notice though that most of the ingredients on ones I’ve tried are things often in a prepper pantry, such as honey and dried fruit.
Pro tip: Cinnamon. It really brings out the flavor; I put it in everything with oats in it or it seems too bland to me. That means I always have a couple of shakers in the stores and rotate them as I use up one and buy more.
Oats are sad and lonely without cinnamon. Save them by stocking both!
Here are a couple of relevant previous posts you can go to for more information:
Review: Augason Farms Regular Rolled Oats 20lb Long Term Storage Pail
Yes the cinnamon. When I store more oats in the future I will also store cinnamon and sugar with it, in different Mylar bags, because plain oats leave much to be desired especially over time.
Oats are great esp. if you add coffee and peanut butter to them. In the army that was my go to for midnight operations. White rice can be subbed for oats for a sugar and cinnamon breakfast. I try to keep carbs and protein together as I last longer when working outside.
A couple of suggestions if ya don’t mind?
Rolled Oats can be purchased at any Grain Store, 50 pounds for around $30. So right around 60% of those fancy boxed Oats. Oats can be stored in about any Food Safe Bucket, add a stick of Spearmint Gum and poof, no bugs.
Also Cinnamon, I buy it online in the 1 pound Mylar Bags, it will store for a very long time.
I also like to add a little Nutmeg, Cloves and Honey… yummmm.
I chatted with my Tractor Supply friends who feed their animals Farmers Pride rolled and plain oats and they told me it has a lot of oat hulls in it. Animals don’t mind but eating it for breakfast would be a HIGH Fiber diet. Maybe others can point out a better feed brand for human eating? TS Feed oats and rolled oats have the same amount of chaff and hulls in it. Maybe you could figure out how to remove the hulls?
Salty and Spice have you ever heard of FAMEAL? That is the thin gruel I’ve dished out to starving people overseas. By varying the amount of water you can bake bread and muffins out of it. Tastes “Foody” Sugar and such help a lot. We’ve used animal grade corn and wheat ground up to make it as long as it’s not moldy and you screen it for rocks (Hard on the Grinder) it works very well. I’ve eaten a lot of FAMEAL when mission trips overseas.
I hadn’t heard of Fameal until you brought it up, Michael. I see why they use it where resources are limited; easy to acquire ingredients and easy cooking, plus more protein than plain bread. Looks a lot easier to make than, say, a good cornbread.
As for the bulk oats, our local Mennonite and Amish groceries tend to stock human-consumption grade rolled oats in big (40-50 lb) bags. It’s about the same price as NRP was quoting for the animal feed product, and with the human grade they’re a little more careful about inclusions. I’m not tempted to buy the animal version when the human-grade is that cheap.
Spice I’ve had no luck finding human consumption grade rolled oats in the big cheaper bags you and NPR have mentioned. All I’ve found are 55-58 dollars for a 40-50 pound bag before adding shipping. Help?
One of the reasons I mentioned Fameal is as an history buff I was amazed to find out during the Irish Potato Famine researchers found in the barns of the villages literally tons of Feed Corn, Feed Oats and Field Peas. The starving Irish ate their animals but did not “See” animal food as food. Clean non moldy animal feeds can be ground into Fameal and eaten. Also older beans that will not cook up well are just fine ground into Fameal. Fameal recipe is Corn or Wheat 60-70% plus Beans and about 5% cooking oils mixed in. Various seasonings and such can be added. A thin gruel or thicker as bread, muffins, pancakes.
I’m not sure if my method of finding food grade oats in bulk transfers to wherever you live… We just stop by the stores in the rural areas run by Mennonites, and serving a lot of Mennonite and Amish families along with the rest of us. They tend to have bulk food sections at extremely reasonable prices. It’s pretty funny, actually; as the ‘health food’ they see as being ‘normal’ (meaning the Mennonite families eat a lot of it) are dead cheap, while the ‘healthy food’ like certified organics they don’t themselves eat but buy to sell to others tends to be priced very high.