[pct-l] A Serious Challenge

[Paul Mitchell]

> Maybe with some of your creativity here on the list, I can get some really
good ideas to help me along here with my food ideas, cause that seems to be
where I'm really really stuck so far in my planning for my own trip.

Hello Ronnie

Here's one way to avoid the worst of the junk:

Start with the staples (good pasta, rice, etc) or side dishes/noodle boxes
like annies pasta that don't have MSG or whatever else you can't eat.

Then bring along a lot of extra sauces/spices etc, like hot sauce, mustard,
etc.  Anything you can find to work with.  If you are a good cook, it's not
too hard to find a lot of good stuff.  There are squeeze tubes of garlic
paste, cilantro paste, pesto, hot pepper paste, etc and I'm pretty sure most
of them don't have MSG.

Then add freeze dried veggies and/or meats, tuna packs, etc.  By bringing
along a bunch of bulk ingredients like this you can be quite creative.  In
the sierras we found some green onions, which I combined with soy sauce, hot
sauce, nut butter, nuts from my gorp, extra veggies, etc and made a satay
sauce over pasta that was my fav meal of the trip.  Those hot sauce packets
from McDonalds are super handy.

Here are two suppliers of bulk freeze dried stuff that can really let you be
creative out there.

www.justtomatoes.com - excellent stuff.
www.adventurefoods.com - terrible website, confusing, but reportedly very
good quality stuff and PLENTY to choose from!

It's well worth spending some money on these foods.  You might add a bunch
to your shopping cart and get a bit of stick shock when it totals $150, but
a little bit of the freeze dried stuff goes a long way and food is
uber-important out there so you won't regret the expenditure.  Order quick
cause time's running out!

Be sure to add all the freeze dried ingredients to the water before you heat
it up.  They don't reconstitute well if thrown directly in hot water.

A lot of the packaged hiker meals are all natural too, but expensive and
they can get old fast.  Still, keep a few in your bounce box as options for
lazy dinner nights.

Send your extra supplies along in a bounce box. When you get to a town that
has some MSG-free food that you like (annies pasta, etc) add some to your
bounce box for when you're in a town that has nothing but MSG ramen.  :-)

Cheers,
Paul

Here's an example:

Bring along some tortillas, a foil pack of tuna, freeze dried onions or
green onions, freeze dried cheese (or the real thing), mayo packets, hot
sauce packets - you've got super yummy tuna-salad wraps, MSG free.  :-)