[pct-l] Food on the trail

[Stephen]

Bland you say?
Oh ye of little faith...

Little Stevie's garlic pasta delight for a cold night...
In olive oil, start a quick sautee of garlic, remove from heat for a moment 
and add dried tomatoe, basil, red pepper, a half cube gourmet vegan soup 
base (all these items ready and standing by), and a splash of water (be 
careful with hot oil, this is why I suggest remove from heat for a moment). 
Put back on stove and bring to boil while stirring. Add water and bring to 
boil, add fast cooking spagetti or a thin linguini, or thin flat noodle. 
Cook down uncovered strirring often. Keep an eye on it as the idea is to 
cook down the water into the pasta, boil some out, and end up with a sauce 
(we do not strain the water out).  To save fuel start with less water keep 
aneye onthings and then turnoff stove and cover and let sit and finish 
cooking for a few mitutes. Add real chunk parmesian cheese (not the cheesy 
Kraft stuff) and see if you think that's bland...
Warning, this is not an instant meal.  But it is at least ten years trail 
tested and with a little practice is phenominal !

Notes on Little Stevie's pasta:

I much prefer to use fresh garlic cloves which I often carry and peel and 
chop up as I need them, but dried garlic powder or dried minced roasted 
garlic also works well and either of these would be better for parcels.  I 
have used home grown fresh basil, which is out of this world, but dried 
store bought works plenty good.  For dried tomatoes I like the stuff that 
breaks up easy, but home dried cut up easily with the little swiss army 
knife scissors or I tear the pieces up with my fingers.  For soup base I 
have taken a liking to a brand Repunzel vegan vegetable boullion with 
seasalt and herbs.  But just about anything will work and a chicken soup 
base cube works well also.  And while the base adds a little salt, I 
ussually add more garlic salt to flavor as the pasta cooks down.  For red 
papper I add a pinch. this adds a nice zing and keeps things warm even as 
the pot cools quickly in the backcountry cool air.  All ingreedients like 
red pepper esspecially are added to taste. This is a nice dish even without 
the parmesian, but having a real chunk of parmesian crumbled or sliced up 
and melting in the pot really pushes this meal over the top.  Since it might 
not be realistic to suggest to thru-hikers to place $8 hunks of Italian 
cheese in thier parcels, I'd rather have the Krap brand UL cheese than 
nothing even though it's highly processed and probably not cheese but 
simulated chemical cheese product.
More Notes:
I carry a spice and soup bag, and a big bag of quinoa and regular pasta, and 
make things however I feel. I carry a couple flavors of soup base, dried 
onion, carrots, peas, etc and other things to make soups, and of course the 
pasta above.  Red Pepper and garlic goes in most of these, but not too much 
pepper.  The corn pasta or quinoa soups are more fuel efficient I think as 
it will finish off better cooking about half way cover and remove from 
stove.  My soups I call trail groul as they get thick.  I just make a pot 
and mow it.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "jason moores" <jmmoores at hotmail.com>
To: <pct-l at backcountry.net>
Sent: Friday, February 06, 2009 8:57 PM
Subject: [pct-l] Food on the trail



I've carried many stoves over the years, from a Sierra wood burning, alcohol 
and multi-day trips with a jetboil or vargo Jet-ti. For the purpose of the 
'09 hike Melissa and I are planning to give "going stove-less" a try.

I've always found the dinners that most hikers prepare very limited in 
flavor and very high in sodium and preservitives. For us, prepping 200+ 
meals in advance is impractical so that option is out.  Most people resort 
to Lippton meals, spuds or rices. I know that I've eaten my share. With and 
without tuna. Many people find new and interesting ways of spicing things 
up. If you spend a little time walking down every food isle in the grocery 
store, examining the shelves, and asking yourself how could I incorperate 
this into my hiker diet, possibilities open up. Dried chilis, asian 
seasoning packets, hot sausces, dried fruits. All these things do improve 
your reconstituted dinner du jur. But in the end it's still Lippton for the 
18th time this month.

Some foods I can eat every day, others I can't handle more than once a week. 
As the years go by I've found myself carrying more and more fresh food on my 
hikes. Even to the point that I probobly end up eating healthier on a hike 
than at home. I've found that showing the same level of creativity that I 
once applied to improving the limmited 8-minute meals I was cooking, could 
be better spent finding better ways of carrying fresh ingredients.

At the point in time that we decided to try hiking without a stove (past 
July) we were using our stoves only for dinners. Even our morning coffee had 
taken a hit to improve our morning breakdown time. Now we mixed up instant 
coffee grounds with water the night before. The crystals hydrate by morning, 
and mix well with a breakfast/protien shake to make a crude frappacuinno. 
So, we found ourselves wondering if the weight of a stove and the requisit 
cooking time worth all the effort for a single meal. For us the answer was 
no.

For the most part our meals now consist of the usual suspects: a bread item, 
a meat item, and a cheese item. Then we add whatever fresh vegetable that is 
in season and packable. Green onions, a few stalks of trimmed asparagus, 
spinach and such. Most fresh foods will hold well for several days if kept 
protected from the heat of the day down in your pack. I find that packing my 
water bottles or bladders around my food bag of some help. Assuming that the 
water is cooler than the ambient air.

The trade off is of course the extra water weight that your gain by carrying 
fresh food as apposed to dehydrated. Factor the weight of a stove and fuel 
for two people and already you have a little leeway. We would normally carry 
some fresh food out of town with us anyways, now just apply this towards 
your dinner and even more of the weight issue is mitigated.

As in all things, balance is what we're looking for. It's not necessary to 
carry ten pounds of fresh food to enjoy some fresh ingredients in the daily 
rotation. I'm sure our bodies will appreciate getting it's vitamins from a 
natural source instead of the pills we pop to compensate for our diets 
deficiencies. I'm willing to carry a few more #'s to eat healthy. Specially 
when you consider that you'll be eating like this for five months.

Obviously, you could still do all these things with a stove. YMMV and such. 
We've tried this style of eating for the past six months and have found that 
it works for us. Plus, now no worries about canister resupply (Canisters 
work out more efficiant for us on multi-day hikes).

jason




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