Hi Ladies. I am going on a 5-day backpacking trip with a bunch of other mamas next month. We will each team up for dinners but I am wondering about good snack and lunch ideas that are super lightweight since 5 days is a long time. I am particularly interested in drying fruit. I do not have a dehydrator but have you ever dried fruit in your oven before? Any other cool ideas for lightweight delicious shacks that provide good energy? Or even energy bar recipes? I will be bring nuts, etc. too.
If you want to make something...this is a recipe for homemade Lara type bars. I love lara bars & when I saw this recipe I decided to make & they are delicious & really close to the lara bars
http://www.foodiewithfamily.com/2011/08/30/homemade-larab...
I would just buy dried fruit since it tends to have a better taste and texture than "homemade" dried fruit. Costco sells dried mango that is out of this world tasty! I think it is Philippian brand. Make your own trail mix with dried fruit, nuts, and even M&M’s and pretzels if you like. Personally I think most protein bars taste awful, but nuts have plenty of protein and are yummy! Granola bars would be good as well. Remember to bring plenty of water and some kind of water purifier (like the powder or drops) just in case you need to drink steam water, you do not want to get Giardia! Have fun!
If you are carrying all your food, the trick is to maximize calories and minimize weight. That means seeking foods with at least 100 calories per ounce. Good candidates include dry salami, almonds, dried fruit, dark chocolate :), and hard cheese. You also want to avoid foods with salt, which will cause you to go through your water reserves quicker. This includes pretzels, salted nuts, and many commercial protein bars.
Have fun!
Everything will taste delicious when you're backpacking! I'm assuming you need to store the food in containers and hang them to avoid bears? That creates a very limited space and you do not want the extra weight. Make sure you coordinate with the other mom's so there is minimal extras and everything fits in the containers. It is way more likely you will have too much food. I agree with Katia.
For something special, I love this granola bar recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/homemade-gr...
Have fun!!!
A favorite book of mine is the Well-Fed Backpacker. Lot's of great recipes. Have a great trip!
I remember a friend bringing energy cookies. Dried fruit is good, chocolate is always nice. I used to bring bagels instead of bread or pita bread as neither of those will get crushed in your pack. I would also pre-cook a bunch of stuff so that we'd have nice meals on the trip rather than eating freeze-dried stuff, which we were down to at the end. I went on a lot of interior canoe trips meaning we would have only the canoe and our backpacks and sometimes wouldn't see other people for days! I liked bringing fresh vegetables for the first couple of days as by the end we were down to dried stuff and missing. We were also able to wrap cheese in a cheese cloth and dip it in parafin wax to keep it from going bad, but we would leave it in the lake overnight - it gets so cold here at night, though, that it might work. We did the same with bacon and had that the first two days (we liked our comfort food even while roughing it!). Anyway, back to the original question, bring tortillas and cream cheese, or a can of refried beans - packets of sauces, etc. always help spice things up. Oh, and we used to buy dried eggs, but I have no idea where to get them here. They were great for having for breakfast. Dried milk to add to coffee or tea and have on cereal is great, too. Have fun!
I know you didn't mention breakfast, but something we did for a backpacking trip (long ago!) in high school was to take dried apples, and add water the night before..... then use the extra water in the morning to make instant oatmeal! Eat that with the somewhat rehydrated apples for a yummy breakfast!
You do need to remember the proteins, too... peanut butter is great, and keeps well. Instead of jelly, try honey... yum! Crackers would keep better than bread, most likely.
I like Lara Bars which are made of raw fruit and nuts. My boys prefer Clif Bars. Both can be found at Costco, Target, Walmart and Trader Joes as well as many grocery stores. I wouldn't bother drying my own fruit or making my own energy bars. I have recipes for granola bars but they tend to fall apart and with all that bumping around in your backpack, you'll be eating alot of crumbs.
I ate lots of dried fruit and nuts while backpacking. But would bring some 'real food" like fresh fruit for the first day. For dinners, I liked stuff like Near East brand rice pilaf and mac and cheese with butter but no milk, rather than the dehydrated packages of stuff from the camping stores.
Wow, backpacking with a bunch of other mamas sounds like fun. Have a great trip.
