I am looking at freeze-dried entrees for an upcoming trip, and was wondering of Mountain House, Backpacker’s Pantry, etc, who has the best tasting food, and which flavors do you recommend (just dinner entrees)
From another thread
on the wilderness tripping forum
http://www.paddling.net/message/showThread.html?fid=wtrip&tid=772051
Lots of good ideas.
Hope this helps
1 vote for mountain house
A kayaker friend turned me on to Mountain House. If you go to Campmor.com’s website, I believe you can get a full menu selection.
One tip: For anyone not completely sedentary and over 6 years of age, plan on a 2-person meal satisfying one person.
Beyond that - great menu selection. I haven’t had a bad one yet.
Dehydrate your own
– Last Updated: Dec-13-07 4:47 PM EST –
food.Last Spring I went on a 5 day Adirondacks trip. I used some rescipes from Lip Smackin
Backpackin Vegetarian. They have a none veg version also.
I highly receommend the dehydrated spaghetti sauce with dehydrated ground beef. Place it in a Freezer bag. Add hot water to the bag, cook spaghetti and drop into the sauce...easy cleanup.
I also recommend the dehydrated kidney beans and salsa to make burritos.
http://lighterload.blogspot.com/2007/05/book-review-lip-smackin-vegetarian.html
By the 3rd day the other 6 people on the trip were moaning about the commercial freeze dried foods. I was enjoying every bite!
Doing your own is cheaper (excluding the dehydrator) and you can include the ingredients/spices that you want. Take a look at the Sodium levels in the freeze dried food if you are concerned at all about sodium.
I tried different brands and buy a
mixture of them. I tried to make my own but I guess I am lazy I would rather buy mine.
Here’s a few…
http://maryjanesfarm.com/
http://www.grogandgruel.com/
http://www.packlitefoods.com/
http://www.wildernessdining.com/
Some of my favorite picks
I prefer the Mtn House brand generally;
Chicken Polynesian & rice; Turkey Tetrazinni; Chicken Teriyaki w/rice; Beef Teriyaki w/rice, Chili Mac w/ beef are favorites. I also like the Richmoor Honey Mustard/Honey Lime/and Mandarine Orange Chicken diners.
If you get plain old Rice with Chicken, it is kinda blah, but Beef Stew, Beef Strogaof and Potatoes and beef w/onions are pretty good too.
As far as serving size, I agree that one
2-serving size meal is needed per person IF that is all you are going to be eating. On the other hand, if the Fz Dr dinner is just a part of your meal, you can get away with one of the Pro-Pack single-serving size, and depending on the menu, I will sometimes have one 2-serving size dinner for two people. I never just eat a fz dr dinner alone. While waiting the 10 min for the dinner to “cook”, I’ll have a Lipton Cup-a Soup, or beef broth bullion, and I always have some kind of treat for desert - some individualy packaged junk food snack from the grocery store(Little Debbie or Dolly Madison types of stuff), and finish with a hot drink - either hot cider, or hot chocolate - the combination is more than enough to eat for me and anybody who has ever tripped with me, and the same menus work for backpack hunting when I often cover 8 or 10 miles of rugged mountain terrain. That works for me in conjunction with a normal breakfast of instant oatmeal, and a good sized lunch for each day. If you skip breakfast or skimp on lunch, then I’d definitely plan on one 2-serving size package per person.
Some tips on “cooking” the fz dr meal - I always add an extra 1/4 cup or so of boiling water, makes the dinner a bit moister and probably helps in “cooking”; mixing/stiring completely is important - instead of a spoon, I cut a twig about a foot long (1/8 or 1/4" diam)and use that to stir the contents - it gets into the corners a lot better than a spoon, and its a lot less mess than a spoon; and I will normally give the meal an extra minute or two of cooking time - that all seems to help.
Couple of tips
1. Adding xtra water is a good idea as mentioned.
2. A used nebble-wrap shipping envelope can be used as a cozy to keep the heat in whole soaking and weighs next to nothing.
3. Perfect spoon for Mtn House pouches:
http://www.rei.com/product/745318
Jim
true
…or if you’re adding certain recreational beverages to the mix…
I know when we were on our weeklong paddle, we were burning 5k calories or so per day, so in that case, I could have put away two two-person mountain house meals, and dessert. As it was, I lost 7# in a week even though I was more prepared foodwise than ever.
dehydrator
I really appreciate this conversation as well b/c I want to do more kayaking camping next summer around the Allegheny Reservoir and don’t want to cart my kitchen. Any suggestion on buying a dehydrator?
Mia
drying food
I just found an interesting site on drying food; http://www.ag.uiuc.edu/~vista/html_pubs/DRYING/dryfood.html
I also found sites that sells not mixed recipes but actual dry food you can buy and put it together as a recipe I guess!!
Mia