Trip Menu

[zac150]

I am heading on a three day walk with friends from work and was delegated the task of organising the food. I have to say I am pretty happy with my menu and the weight I have got the food down to.

Breakfast - home made breaky bar including mixed fruit and oats - 100g per person per day (includes coffee)

Morning tea - mixed dehydrated fruit and scroggin (soy chips / rice crackers) about 100g

Lunch - wraps - smoked ham, cheese & tomatoe, all up should come into 300g

Afternoon tea - soup 50g

Dinner - Spag Bol for 5 people including 650g of pasta, 4 tins of tomatoes, mushies, parmesan and a kg of mince was dehydrated to 1.1kg so 270g per person.

Shepherds Pie / Savory mince - 1.2kg total includes 1.4kg of mince, tomatoe paste, beef stock, wine jelly, mushies, peas, carrots and corn and deb. All up 290g per person.

All up food has come in at 850g per person per day, not perfect yet but I am pretty happy with the weight to quality of food ratio.

[vagrom]

...so you're on the wagon?

[stu]

I'd be including something more sweet for morning / afternoon tea if you want to be delegated food organiser again...or do you?
In all seriousness, a cup of soup for afternnon tea is not very practical (cooking required) nor very immediately beneficial on the energy front.
I always start my camp cooking routing with a cup of soup before dinner to help replace salts lost though sweating during the day.
What you'll need between major meals are constant nibbles, including dried fruits, nuts, chocolate & lollies to give both sustained & immediate energy release; also sweets are a mood enhancer which is oftenn required during a hard days slog.

I do like the idea of home made breakfast bars tho, care to elaborate on that recipe?

[zac150]

@ Vagrom no not on the wagon, we have managed a few bottles of wine per night. A lot of training has gone into being able to handle the extra weight of the wine.

Stu, the plan is to get to camp by 3ish which is very achievable, so afternoon tea will be cooked in camp. The soup is chicken noodle, so plenty of salt to replace those lost during the walk + tea / coffee, I am also carrying a few hydration (electrolyte) tablets which are great at the end of a day's walk. The dried fruit and scoggin will also cover afternoon tea, there is actually quite a lot of food in the 100g of scoggin.

I agree about the lack of immediate / processed sugar and this is something I normally carry however two of the walkers have type 2 Diabetes so I had to be careful. You have me thinking though so I might throw in a couple of packets of Gu Chews which are great energy hits.

Stu, thanks for the thoughts, it sounds like we think alike but obviously I did not give all of the info.

I also forget to mention / did not include dessert. As I am generally delegated food for trips, I started to get people to bring "specials" for desert. I am taking a hot chocolate (on a stick).

The recipe for the breaky bars is quite simple; choose any cereal products from your local health food store / super market I choose an all bran, bran flake and oat flake. To this I added chopped and dried mango, apricot, paw paw and coconut. In a separate bowl I melted a knob of butter, add a few caps of vanilla essence and about 150 ml of corn syrup (binding agent). I then mixed the butter mixture through the cereals until I get an even mix. Bake for about 25 minutes and then cool.

The bars are quite nutritious and mean no cooking in the morning which I am a fan of (still have to heat water for coffee).

[frank_in_oz]

Breaky bars sound interesting zac . How do you store them? Do they become crushed or crumbly?

Frank

[zac150]

Frank,

I'll give an honest answer to that in a couple of days (after the walk). I have packed them seperatly in snap lock bags so that if they do crumble each person still gets their share.

[Son of a Beach]

We sometimes carry my wife's home-made "honey oat bars", and sometimes some other oat-based home-made bars based on a Nigella Lawson recipe. But they always get packed in a hard plastic container along with enough other bags of stuff to fill in any gaps so that they cannot rattle around. Usually does the job. I do the same thing for biscuits/crackers, or any food that could be damaged easily. Occasionally, I even go to the extent of putting all of my food in one very large plastic container, instead of in a bag (if I have a lot of easily damaged food on that trip).

[andrewbish]

Good menu!
I mostly plan for one so it's a much easier job.

No hot breaky? I just love bacon & eggs to get me started and it curbs the appetite for ages.

For snacks on the trail I like Carmen- brand health bars (get them at the supermarket) - delicious, filling and low in cane sugar (evil stuff).

[zac150]

Yeah no hot breaky, I have to say I prefer to get away as early as possible and get to camp faster. Coffee and breaky bars make this very easy.

I may have gone overboard on the packaging for the breaky bars to try and stop the crumbling. As I said above I packed them in individual snap lock bags (left a little air in the bag) and then placed the bags in one large vacuum sealed bags, looks and feels like large bubble wrap. See how it goes.

[dee_legg]

A good lightweight storage option for crushable items is to get two 2L plastic milk bottles, cut them just below the handle and then put your food inside one and squeeze the other over the top.
They are light but not super rigid so they are easier to pack than tupperware or something similar. I've used them for vita wheats and cereals, worked really well!

[zac150]

Back from the walk and I have to say all were really happy with the food.

The breaky bars were fantastic and didn't break down at all, quick, easy, nutritious and really tasty. Most mornings we were on the trail within an hour of getting out of bed which allowed a few extra breaks on the trail and meant we got to camp each day by 2pm. I must say I don't miss hot breakfasts, just boil the water for coffee and I'm away.

Dried fruit and scroggin - always good. I have to say I didn't miss the sugar, lollies or chocolate in the scroggin. We were able to manage the the sugar levels with a few boiled lollies (especially those with diabetes).

Rolls were great for lunch, it is always nice having fresh fruit / veges even if it is only lettuce, cucumber and tomato.

Soup was brilliant, nice and salty which was just what we needed after a day's walk.

Dinners, (Spag Bol & Shepherds Pie). I dehydrate the ingredients separately, which I always find makes the best meals as the flavour can be adjusted accordingly. Tin's on tomato dehydrated very well, I reduced them on the stove with a little wine before dehydrating which worked really well (very surprised). Maggie Beer cabernet paste is an excellent substitution for a little more wine flavour in a meal.

All in all very happy and surprised at how well everything dehydrated, rehydrated and most importantly tasted.