Why do emergency kits list 1,200 calories a day?

Emergency rations are deliberately low in calories because they're built to be eaten with no water and no cooking. Kits built around pouched meals carry more food, but only help if you have water stored to prepare them.

If you've compared kits, you've probably seen that number and wondered whether it's enough. It's a fair question. Emergency rations and everyday food are built to solve different problems.

The SOS ration bars in kits like the Guardian supply 1,200 calories per person per day. That's deliberately below a normal day's eating, and the trade buys three things: no water needed to prepare them, no cooking, and a low-sodium formulation so they don't make you thirsty. When water is the thing you're most likely to run short of, food that spends none of it is worth more than food with a higher calorie count. Here's how those rations are built and what to check on the label.

Pouched meals work the other way around. Our one-person SureStep carries 5,520 calories across 36 servings, nearer 1,840 a day for one person over three days. But every meal needs about two cups of water added and a way to heat it. More food, more conditions attached.

Neither one is better. They answer different questions:

• Sheltering at home with water stored alongside the kit? Pouched meals give you more food and something hot, which matters more on day two than most people expect.
• Might you be leaving, or not sure about water? Rations are the safer choice. They work with nothing.

Either way, the kit is a floor and not a ceiling. What's in your pantry still counts on day one. The kit is what's there when the pantry thins out, or the power has been off long enough that the fridge isn't part of the plan.

If you opened your kit tonight, would you have water to spare for cooking, or would you want food that doesn't ask for any?