[pct-l] Dehydrating Food

[AaronD at Cadwell.com (Aaron Doss)]

Jon,

I think I saw you on the yahoo 2006 pct group.  We (wife and I) will
also be thru hiking next year.

 

We are also planning on dehydrating our food, it's a daunting task. 

 

Our problems are related to 

1.    The amount of food required (how much should we make)

2.    Not knowing which foods will preserve for months while dehydrated.
We plan on dehydrating over the next few months and some of the food
will have to last until next fall if we still plan on eating it near the
end of the hike.  I know that any foods which have any fat or oil in
them will go rancid after a few weeks.

3.    Not knowing what foods we will still enjoy.  We need to collect
some more tried and tested recipes so we can have variety.  Any previous
thru-hikers have any good tasty/high-energy/storable recipes? 

 

It seems that most people use cheap dehydrators and get great results.
You should get one with a thermostat for temp control and it should also
have a fan to circulate air, that's pretty much all you need.  We have
two "American Harvest" units from Walmart, they work fine.

 

Aaron 

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: pct-l-bounces@mailman.backcountry.net
[mailto:pct-l-bounces@mailman.backcountry.net] On Behalf Of Jon Bellmore
Sent: Friday, October 21, 2005 3:11 PM
To: pct-l@mailman.backcountry.net
Subject: [pct-l] Dehydrating Food

 

Greetings,

 

I'm going to rely on at least half of my food supply to come from food
that I will dehydrate myself.  Does anyone have any suggestions for good
dehydrating equipment?  Maybe plans for homemade equipment?  Thanks.

 

Jonathon