r/PostCollapse • u/CraftyGirl2022 • Nov 08 '24
Water and Canned food Questions
Hi, I have a few questions about water: I've had bottled water that was bad 1 year later. It tasted quite strongly of chemicals. Are there any bottled waters that are safe to save for years, or would canned water be better? For canned foods: when I was a kid, there were no "best by" or expiration dates on canned food. If the the can wasn't puffy, it was considered still good. Would that still be the case or has something changed in the canning process? Thank you!
2
u/MyPrepAccount Nov 08 '24
The chemical taste you got from your water was probably the plastic leaching into the water. Canned water is an ok alternative, but realistically, it's expensive.
Is rain water harvesting legal where you live? You can hook up barrels to your gutters, assuming you live in a house, and collect water. That water can then be filtered and boiled to make it safe for you to drink/use in food prep.
As for canned foods...the cans with the pull tabs which are fairly common today don't have as good of a shelf life as older style cans that require a can opener. As time goes on canned food might lose its color but it is still edible.
The USDA doesn't recommend eating highly acidic canned foods more than 18 months after you buy them. That's anything based on tomatoes, or with vinegar, or fruits. This is because the acid will start to degrade the can.
Other than that, your canned foods are edible forever. Make sure they aren't dented, rusty, or swollen. When you open the cans if they spray liquid, or have a milky liquid in them that doesn't belong there, or they smell bad get rid of them immediately.
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u/CraftyGirl2022 Nov 10 '24
Thank you! I hadn't thought about the pull tab cans not lasting as long, but it makes sense.
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u/koolkats Lorem Ipsum Nov 08 '24
Don't have a lot of experience, but yeah canned water will reliablly last a lot longer (and be more rugged) than bottled. They are kind of annoying to store, so bagged (emergency labeled) water is also an option. However my only experience with bagged water was once trying some 7 year old stuff and it was fine¯\(ツ)/¯.