Food Prep 101: I Bought a Dehydrator

Well readers, it’s been quite a while since my last blog post and I’m sorry for failing to keep you all updated. To be fair, I haven’t been doing much in recent weeks. In fact, I spent a week walking around San Diego. It was exactly an hour’s drive from the southern terminal. It’s so crazy that in just a few weeks (3 to be exact) I will be making my pilgrimage to the Far North. It wasn’t until I received my PCTA permit that it all started to get to me. Oh! I’m about to spend six weeks walking and I need to start getting to work!

So what does that look like for me at this stage? Well for now he’s thinking about food. I’m a big fan of eating and plan to do it quite a bit on the way to Canada. This trip seems very different than my trip through the great state of Colorado. Times were different for me and I had the budget to fly a little by the seat of my pants. I spent a lot of time in the city in hostels, eating out and buying food along the way. This summer funds are tight, and I mean tight! So I’ve come to the conclusion that to save myself time and money on the road I’m going to mail myself all my food for the entire six weeks.

I’ve invested in a Cosori food dehydrator, a cheaper alternative to the fancy freeze dryers on the market today. I’ve come up with an eating plan for myself that will balance the junk food cravings of a hiker with the sensible diet of a person actively trying to avoid colon cancer.

I follow a simple rule when it comes to packing food on the road. If I wouldn’t eat it off the trail, I won’t eat it on the trail. I’ve learned a lot about the foods I like and don’t like over the years by taking day hikes. First of all, fish seems to be something I look forward to eating. I cannot and will not enjoy the tuna packets. Secondly, if it is soft and cold I can’t swallow it. So no overnight oats for me, no thanks. I can make it mushy if it’s hot, so quaker oats are fine. For dinner, hot porridge is fine, but it needs to have a solid, salty crunch factor to be truly gourmet. In short, take the foods you like to eat at home to the countryside.

Then I took a look at my expected mileage. I’m looking at about 530 miles from Cascade Locks to the Canadian border and the hike back to Hart’s Pass to get off the trail. If I average fifteen miles a day, that’s about 35.3 days of hiking. However, knowing me, I’ll take a few zeros along the way. With my current budget I plan to spend some of those zeros along the way, so for the sake of food security I’m going to round that amount up to 40 days of food.

I’m the type of person who doesn’t mind eating the same thing every day when I’m not on the road. I usually make a big batch of something and reheat it throughout the week. However, along the way, I might get a little tired of eating the same curry five nights in a row. So to combat that, I’ve decided to list eight different meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I will plan to eat each of these meals five times throughout the tour. That way I’m not forced to eat the same thing every day for a week and I can have some variety. I will share with you what my menu will be like.

Dinner

1. Curried lentils
2. Peak Refuel Biscuits and Gravy (my all-time favorite dehydrated meal)
3. Macaroni with chili
4. Kimchi Stew with Tofu and Rice
5. Chicken and Rice with Beans and Pico
6. Peanut Stew (with Rice)
7. BBQ Mac and Cheese with Pulled Pork
8. Cheese Ramen (Buldak) with added vegetables

Lunch

1. Summer Sausage with Crackers and Cheese
2. Cold Soaked Broccoli Salad
3. Fry Bread with Velveeta Cheese and/or Jam
4. Couscous and Vegetables with Parmesan Cheese
5. Vegetarian Hummus Wraps
6. Peanut Butter and Honey Wraps
7. Bean Salad
8. Elote Corn Salad

Breakfast

1. Egg and Bacon Burrito
2. Fruits and Granola with Milk
3. Fry Bread with Jam
4. Bagels and Velveeta Cheese
5. Fried spam and eggs
6. Spam and Honey Fried Breads (Reserve Your Opinion Until After You Try It)
7. Chia Pudding and Coconut Flakes with Raspberries
8. Grits with cheese and bacon

Appetizers/drinks/complements

1. Dried Pineapple with Tajín
2. Almonds
3. Bars (these are basically protein bars, yum!)
4. Spasmodic
5. Electrolyte Drink Mixes
6. coconut chips
7. Peanut M&Ms
8. French fries
9. Coffee
10. sweetener packets
11. Olive oil

I find everything very tasty and I can’t wait to eat it all along the way! I eat a lot of vegetables off the trail and my only regret every time I’m on the trail is that I don’t get much fiber on my hikes. Which as I get older I realize is very important to stay healthy and avoid the discomfort of getting constipated while climbing the side of a mountain pass. With a dehydrator I now have the option to add vegetables to every meal I prepare.

There are some things that you just can’t dehydrate at home and there is a list of products that I will purchase and repackage in my replenishment boxes. For example, I’ll buy packages of Spam singles and BBQ pulled pork. I also plan to purchase packaged portions of Velveeta cheese, powdered milk, and a few bags of bacon bits. In true Midwest style, my salads that I plan to cold soak for lunch will have a good amount of mayonnaise added. I plan to buy packets of mayonnaise (or fill my pockets with the ones they give me at the gas station). I also plan to do the same with the jam and honey packets. Surprisingly, raw eggs dehydrate very well and I can cook them perfectly on the go.

Making bread is extremely easy on the go. All you have to do is mix the desired amount of flour in a Ziplock bag with a little baking powder and a pinch of salt. Then, when you are ready to make bread, add water directly to the bag and knead until you reach your desired dough consistency. Then, place that bad boy somewhere in your backpack where it won’t leak and let it grow as you walk. Fair warning, but you will have to use plenty of olive oil to prevent the bread from sticking. But this is by far the best climbing fuel I’ve ever had on a trip.

I’m going to take a chance and toot my own horn. I’m a pretty good cook and it’s something I really enjoy doing. It’s not unusual for me to experiment in the kitchen, so adding a dehydrator to the mix and making my own food seems like a natural progression in my backpacking gear journey. You don’t need to do this to be a successful hiker. In fact, along the Colorado Trail I stocked up at local grocery stores along the way. It was easier for me to see how many miles it was to the next town and then calculate how many days it would take me to get there. I always tend to overestimate or at least prepare an extra meal just in case (always better to be safe than sorry).

This is by far the most important task of the trip so far and I’m still in the process of dehydrating everything. I’m hoping by the end of next week I can start sorting my meals into the designated boxes and be ready to ship everything before I leave. In the coming weeks I hope to publish more blog posts detailing my gear picks. In the meantime, leave a comment and tell me what your favorite snacks and foods are.

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