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What to Know Before You Buy Jim Bakker Morningside Gourmet Meals Time of Trouble
Earlier this year we posted about Jim Bakker and his emergency food offerings (Five Things You Should Know About Jim Bakker Food). Recently, we have seen a new line of products from Jim called Morningside Gourmet Meals. These meals come in square green totes in increments of one, two, and seven years. Here is what you need to know before you purchase, or “donate” one of these products.
It’s Still Food For Health International Emergency Food
Food For Health International (read review) is still the supplier for Jim Bakker. In the past, Food For Health just repackaged meals from its popular Emergency Food Supply 200 Serving Buckets. Now, Food For Health has made some new recipes and packaged the food in the green totes that used to be the hallmark of eFoods Direct. Food For Health purchased eFoods Direct last year.
Food For Health is a very reputable company, and is becoming one of the largest suppliers of emergency food and survival products in the world. The company built a brand-new food processing facility in West Valley, Utah, last year and is aggressively taking market share from competitors.
Watch Out For the Old “Servings Rather Than Calories” Game
The main issue we have with Jim Bakker food supplies is the lack of transparency when it comes to telling the consumer how many calories are in the package. The packages all talk about servings, and cost per serving. We really don’t care about that because too many unscrupulous vendors in the past simply made really small pouches and called them servings. Some servings only had 100-200 calories — hardly enough for a meal or to sustain a human being for a long period of time. That’s why at Food Storage Reviewer we try to give a total number of calories and a “calories per dollar” metric when available.
Our attempts at reaching Jim Bakker operations were futile so we are left to calculate how much food is in a package based on the little information they do give us. Let’s take a closer look at the 7-Year package.
Morningside Seven Year Time of Trouble Totes
The quick overview states you get (14) green totes each full of 550 servings for a total of 7,700 servings. Since we don’t know how many calories that is, let’s do a simple math exercise to see “how big” each serving would be.
- Each tote’s dimensions are: 22″ x 12.75″ x 15″. That equals 4,207 cubic inches per tote. Since those are external measurements, let’s round down to 4,000 cubic interior inches.
- Multiply by (14) totes = 56,000 cubic inches.
- Divide 56,000 cubic inches by 7,700 servings = 7.27 cubic inches per serving. And that’s if each tote is completely full, which is rarely the case.
Each Jim Bakker serving is less than three times smaller than a Rubik’s Cube.
So what does 7.27 cubic inches look like? That’s a little less than a 2″ x 2″ x 2″ cube. For comparison, a Rubik’s cube is 3″ x 3″ x 3″ or 27 cubic inches. That’s right, a Rubik’s cube has over three times the volume of one of these so called servings. Of course, you have to add water to all these meals, but water has zero calories.
I am pretty confident saying each of these servings is less than 200 calories and probably less than 100 calories. But, I would love to be proven wrong, so I call on Jim Bakker to publish the calorie count on all the packages he sells.
Shipping is Expensive
Jim Bakker is still charing $780 flat rate shipping for anywhere in the United States. That’s really expensive and far more than what it would normally cost for FedEx or UPS ground. I have heard that most of this money is being donated to charity, so that’s at least a little redeeming.
Most other food storage providers offer free shipping for orders over a certain amount.
Who is John Shorey?
Jim Bakker was using a guy named John Shorey to market these food packages. A quick internet search shows John Shorey is somewhat of a guest preacher on the Jim Bakker television show and an expert on biblical prophecy. There is a fascinating read here where John uses the Bible to predict end-of-work scenarios.
John Shorey has also published a book, “The Window of the Lord’s Return,” which seeks to pinpoint the exact day of the Second Coming.
Are There Other Options Besides Buying Food From Jim Bakker?
Absolutely. The best option to most closely match what is included in the Morningside Gourmet Meals, without the excessive cost, is the Food For Health 1,000 serving bucket. You can buy them from us for only $524.75. The package comes in 5 buckets and contains 132,500 calories.
At 253 calories per dollar it gets a 90 out of 100 in the Price Category. Overall, this product scores 87 out of 100 making it one of the best options for food storage (read the full review here). And, if you are planning for multiple people just go ahead and buy a few more packages.
And if green totes are your thing, that’s eFoods signature. We’ve reviewed their 1-Year Food Supply that ships in 8 green totes and has a good 193 calories per dollar grade, giving it a score of 83 out of 100 in the Price Category. Read the full review here.
In conclusion, we salute all those who are helping spread the good word of preparedness. However, we believe in full disclosure, and we don’t think the Jim Bakker Morningside Gourmet Meals are as good of a deal as they are made out to be.
