[pct-l] Cookless Soak-N-Eat Foods

[chelin at teleport.com (Sharon & Chuck Chelin)]

Good morning, Bluce,

Below is the text of a post from a few months ago about reconstituted beans.
I like the stuff as a no-cook option.  Most people like bean dip for various
chips, crackers, or bread things.  I can eat well without cooking in all but
the coldest weather, but I have not yet tested it on a trip longer than a
month.

For long walks the question for me is not so much can I eat cold food, the
question is how will I resupply.  If I chose to rely almost totally on my
own mailed supply boxes I can have all of the foodstuffs that I like and
that can be eaten cold.  If however, I totally or in part, resupply from
such stores as I may find on the way, the eat-cold selection may be limited
to Twinkies and chips.  In that regard the weight of a stove buys the
freedom to use a much greater variety of opportunity foods, such as pasta,
dry soup, and various "helpers" found in most markets, large and small.
Even long-cook items such as regular beans and rice could be used if
sufficient time and fuel were available.  Probably the most versatile and
adaptable arrangement (which I do not use, by the way) is a medium size pot
with an multi-fuel stove.  With that you could use any available fuel and
eat any available food.

Keep your options open because I don't think there is any one answer.  Hike
some sections cooking, while others not.  Some of the food would be sent and
some would be purchased locally.  Here in the Northwest, in late summer, I
can eat all of trailside huckleberries I want as fast as I can poke them in
my face, but I do not rely upon them in my meal planning.

Steel-Eye


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Bluce Ree" <bluceree_superstar@yahoo.com>
To: "Deems" <losthiker@sisqtel.net>; "pct" <pct-l@mailman.backcountry.net>
Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2004 12:06 PM
Subject: Re: [pct-l] Instant coffee tastes awful?? Cowboy Coffee


> I was wondering if anyone had luck with soaking foods
> ie beans, rice instead of cooking them. I'd like to
> ditch my stove for this hike. Any ideas?
>
> aloha, Bluce


Good morning,

Last week someone asked about the availability of dehydrated refried beans.
I didn't reply then because I make my own, but then I thought maybe others
haven't discovered the stuff yet.  Beans have long been a staple of those
who outfit wilderness travel, such as Hudson's Bay Company, and U.S. Army.
You may have heard the old Cavalry expression, "Forty miles a day on beans
and hay."  Beans are durable, cheap, readily available, nutritious, and
tasty, but compared to many other dry food-stuffs, like pasta, regular dry
beans are pretty much off the hikers' list because they require such a long
soaking/cooking time.

Pre-cooked, "refried beans", solve that problem once they are dehydrated.
Refried bean paste is ready to smear on your dehydrator sheets, or on a
cookie sheet for oven drying.  It dries quickly, and afterward I give it a
ride in the blender to make it into powder.  It reconstitutes well to make
soup or to thicken any other kind of soup-like stuff.  I rarely cook lunch,
but sometimes I add water to a zip-lock sack of bean power and kneed it a
bit as I hike to make a dip/spread for crackers or bread.  It is quick, and
it is good cold.  I like to inspire it a bit with some jalapeno, but as
tempting at it may be, I don't think a shot of bear-spray in the dip is a
good idea.

I sometimes boil dry beans to make the paste, but here in the Northwest
COSTCO sells a #10 can of refried beans . that's a 7 lbs. gallon. . for less
than $3.00, so I have started using that instead.  Before any of you
comedians get a chance to say it, yah, I know: COSTCO is selling gas for
$3.00 a gallon.

In the same way I dehydrate sea-poop.  I mean pea-soup.  Boil your own, or
open a can of thick, condensed soup and smear it on the dryer sheet.

A little variety surely beats an endless diet of pasta and instant mashed
potatoes.

Steel-Eye