Instant Soups for Emergency Kits

Over the years of building and reworking our emergency kits to serve us better, we've made numerous changes to suit a growing family, reducing waste, and making more room in the kits.  And one of the changes has been getting away from commercial products and their mystery ingredients.  We just feel better when we know what we are eating.

Today we have some recipes for making your own instant soups.  I highly recommend making these up and trying them at home before using them in an emergency.  You might decide one flavor just doesn't work for you, or that you need more or less salt, or something similar.

All of these recipes work really well in zippered bags.  Soups and meals in bags are really popular with backpackers, and you'll find no shortage of recipes all over the web for all kinds of foods.  There's no space wasted in your kit with excess packaging, and the bag serves as your cook container and disposable bowl.

However, what is very often ignored is the fact that freezer bags are not designed to be cooked in.  They shouldn't be used as boiling bags for making eggs while out camping, and they shouldn't have boiling water added to them to cook or heat the contents.  While the bags usually do withstand the heat, they may release chemicals at elevated temperatures, chemicals that we don't necessarily want in our bodies.  Ziploc manufactures a line of bags that may be cooked in; their Zip 'n Steam line comes in medium and large size bags.

However, even these are not supposed to be used for boiling, according to the people at Ziploc.  If they're telling us not to use them for that purpose, and thus losing out on potential sales, there's probably a good reason for it.  So what's the real risk to using regular freezer bags?

I don't know.  The bag manufacturers are going to err on the side of caution, and in a litigious society such as ours, I think they have to.  Here's what we do here, and what we will do in case of a true disaster.

The soups and instant meals all get packaged in regular freezer bags.  They're easy to date, rotate, and re-use.  When we rotate them at home, the soups are just added to mugs or bowls and boiling water is poured on top, so there's no heating the plastic.  Later, the bags get refilled with the same soup mix and re-dated.  If and when there is a need to cook the soups in a disaster, we'll still transfer them to our stainless steel mugs for cooking and heating.  If things are so bad that we have to cook in and eat from the bags, we figure the level of toxic chemical we're being exposed to would be low and not an issue if not done often.  If at all possible, children and those of child-bearing age would not have their food cooked in the bags.  In no case would a pregnant woman have her food cooked in a bag.  But for older people beyond child-bearing age, we wouldn't be so concerned.

Do what works best for your situation.  Yes, heated plastics can be toxic and have long-term effects.  Just as cranky and hungry stressed-out people can have toxic effects on family relationships.

Before making a bunch of these for your family's kits, make just one of each for taste-testing.  The bieggest variable is the chicken bouillon.  Some are heavier on the salt than others, and having too much or too little really affects the flavor.  If you have comments or suggestions for improvement, leave them below so that we can all learn from your experience.

One more time:  Bouillon varies substantially in salt content from one manufacturer to the next.  You may wish to omit any added salt the first time you make these to be sure you don't oversalt.

Cream of Tomato Soup
1/3 cup dry milk
1/4 cup tomato powder
1 tablespoon chicken bouillon
1 teaspoon dried basil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon onion powder
Pinch black pepper

Put all ingredients in a Ziploc freezer bag.  Shake to combine.

To prepare:  Boil 1 3/4 cups water.  Add water to soup bag and stir well to combine.  Seal bag, cover to insulate it, and let soak for 10 minutes.

Chicken Noodle Soup
1/2 cup fine noodles, like angel hair, broken in small pieces
1/4 cup chopped freeze dried chicken
2 tablespoons freeze-dried vegetables, or 1 tablespoon dehydrated vegetables (carrots, celery, peas)
1 tablespoon chicken bouillon
1 teaspoon dehydrated onions
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon onion powder
1/8 teaspoon poultry seasoning
pinch black pepper

Put all ingredients in a Ziploc freezer bag.  Shake to combine.

To prepare:  Boil 1 3/4 cups water.  Add water to the soup bag and stir well to combine.  Seal the bag, cover to insulate it, and let soak for 10 minutes.

Minestrone
1/3 cup dehydrated pasta*
1/3 cup mixed freeze-dried vegetables
1 tablespoon chicken bouillon
2 teaspoons tomato powder
1/4 teaspoon Italian herbs
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon pepper


Put all ingredients in a Ziploc freezer bag.  Shake to combine.

To prepare:  Boil 1 3/4 cups water.  Add water to the soup bag and stir well to combine.  Seal the bag, cover to insulate it, and let soak for 10 minutes.

*To prepare dehydrated pasta, cook pasta according to package directions, rinse, and dehydrate.  This pasta will rehydrate quickly in soups.  Most raw pasta will not cook and soften sufficiently in instant soups.

Bacon-Potato Soup
1/3 cup instant potato flakes
1/4 cup dry milk
2 tablespoons Parmesan cheese
2 teaspoons chicken bouillon
1 tablespoon freeze-dried chives
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon onion powder
Pinch black pepper

In a separate package:
2 tablespoons bacon bits

Put all ingredients in a Ziploc freezer bag.  Shake to combine.

To prepare:  Boil 1 3/4 cups water.  Add water to the soup bag and stir well to combine.  Seal the bag, cover to insulate it, and let soak for 10 minutes.

Links to related posts:
Emergency Kits
Instant Meals

For further reading:
https://www.tripsavvy.com/ziploc-omlets-in-bag-504142
https://www.theyummylife.com/Instant_Dry_Soup_Mixes

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