A minimal stove to consider, and it will cost you about a quarter.

The Pepsi can stove is a legend, Wings is the best place I know to get a good overview of the designs. It's handy in your BOB, it's handy at home, it's perfect for a warmer at the next buffet, just don't shake it too much, it can spill and that's the only reason the gelled sterno is still so popular... there must be a trick to that.

For fuel use alcohol, not gas and I'm serious, the gas will burn just fine and maybe melt your stove or 'pop' violently when you light it.

I've used Everclear and it works great and it's something you can enjoy if it's your thing, mix well with juice and ice imo. Many places say get a bottle of rubbing alcohol and use it in your stove.. well, I'm not happy with my last bottle of juice and so I'm here to tell you. I've used 70% isopropyl successesfully in several stoves of the years but the bottle I bought today will only flare and not burn. Aim for the 90% version if you want consistant results, it's cheap and about 2 oz will boil a 1//2 gallon of water.

Fuel additives like Heat do work well but I don't have stats on them, the cost a lot more than rubbing alcohol.

You can always flip over a popcan stove and burn a solid fuel like trioxalene on it's ass-end, a 50 cent 1-1/4" drain grate will extend it's life.

Here's a picture of my new stove.

I prefer the organic method for cooking, ie. FIRE, but a stove with portable fuel makes a lot of sense and works in better in my SAR pack.
I have the tryoxylene fueled flat pack stove, it works great if you scrape up the center of the disk to provide tinder.

My old can stove still works better but I think it's the fuel issue, I'll take pics of it next time and all the addons; snuffer, grill, pot holder.

Rick

Can you cook things from scratch?

I've been looking around at my preps and know I can prepare my stored beef, beans and rice, with a fair influx of wheat and corn and a few canned veggies and fruit but can you grow your own herbs, make your own soy sauce, bake your own bread?

It's an issue of the perfect season to the current season, your crop may fail, you might have to beg borrow barter or purchase from another grower.

I had garlic and onion seed ready to go in two plots this year, great bulbs on the sweet onions already; my boys were cutting weeds and decided the garlic bed was offensive ... I'm not sure where to turn, other than I can force the garlic for another year. I seriously wanted to beat some heads as this patch was already weeded and cleared. 4 perfect heads of seeding garlic and they cut them down like the danylions, I almost cried.

Teach your children welll and don't whine when they don't know better than what you've shown them.

Rick