Eating well while wild camping

[discoveringtheforest]

Hi, this is my first post after lurking a while, I do enjoy reading the forums.

I've been thinking a lot about what kind of foods to take with me on overnighters or 2 to 3 night trips in the scottish hills. So far all I've got on my list beyond the obligatory sandwich for the walk in is :

Brew kit and snacks:
- crusader cook-set in pouch with plenty ethanol gel, various instant soups, tea bags, instant coffee, hot chocolate, sugar, powdered creamer. A few bars of chocolate and flapjack type things. A few days worth of comfort in 1 pouch if you bin the horrid 58 pattern waterbottle.

Breakfasts :
- pre-portioned porridge oats with powdered milk and brown sugar in ziplock bags
- pre-portioned pancake mix made of powdered milk and egg, and self raising flour (yet to test this) with jam

supplement with seasonal foraged fruits such as blueberries, brambles, rasps etc

Lunches :
- pumpernickel (dark heavy rye bread) with hard waxy cheese like very mature cheddar or gouda and dry-cured preserved sausage like salami (these foods should last well over 2 or 3 days in cool weather) and maybe mayo in fast-food style plastic sachets. A couple of tins of sardines is very little extra weight to carry aswell.
- instant soup

supplement with foraged greens such as nettle added to soup, wood sorrel to perk up the sarnie etc.

Evening meals :
- pre-portioned couscous with stock powder (crumble in an oxo or whatever) and additives like raisins, nuts, dried onions, garlic salt, spice mix etc, add pre-cooked vac-pac pulses and maybe sardines/tuna?

The evening meals is what I'm having trouble with really. I don't think I would begrudge carrying a few potatoes and a couple of carrots with me, its the matter of getting meat protein in there without it going off over time, or having to spend loads of time boiling pulses. Any advice is much welcome.

One thing that seems to be a bit of a mantra here, is that that bushcraft is about being comfortable out in the wilds, but tbh eating spam and instant noodles mixed with cuppasoup is not my idea of comfort, letalone eating MRE's or wayfarer meals.

Most of my trips will have a fishing slant to them, so there is a good chance of fresh fish protein.

Anyway I welcome any suggestions of good tasty nutritious food to carry on such trips, and look forward to hearing what you guys like to take with you!

Quite the luxury food there mate.

 

[Noddy]

...............

 

[traderran]

When out camping. I live on Chile and Stu's easy to make and filling

 

[xylaria]

If you try the thermos cooking method a great recipe is diced Lamb, pearl barley, carrots and garlic. Fry off the Lamb and garlic, bring barley and carrots to the boil with a stock cube, add all to the flask and come back latter to a great stew.

After reading this post, I experimented with making proper stock in a 1 1/2 litre thermos. Apart from the initial difficulty of getting the bones to fit through the neck it was really efficient. Simply bring the bones to the boil and then put it in the thermos. I left it for six hours, and then strained the stock off. I then spent 45 mins trying to get the bones out of the thermos with a fork, I am sure it would pretty simple with chicken or rabbit bones, not smashed turkey bones.

I have never really thought of cooking with a thermos, but by the looks of the stock i made it would make perfect stew, and it uses virtually no fuel and no pot watching.

Thank you have an invisible rep point:You_Rock_

 

[Sisyphus]

Ooo that is a good idea, my problem making chicken stock on the hob at home is that I can never get a gentle enough simmer, so it always ends up cloudy. Doing it this way sounds like it might produce a proper clear stock....

After reading this post, I experimented with making proper stock in a 1 1/2 litre thermos. Apart from the initial difficulty of getting the bones to fit through the neck it was really efficient. Simply bring the bones to the boil and then put it in the thermos. I left it for six hours, and then strained the stock off. I then spent 45 mins trying to get the bones out of the thermos with a fork, I am sure it would pretty simple with chicken or rabbit bones, not smashed turkey bones.

I have never really thought of cooking with a thermos, but by the looks of the stock i made it would make perfect stew, and it uses virtually no fuel and no pot watching.

Thank you have an invisible rep point:You_Rock_

 

[xylaria]

[Edit food should be cooked for ten minutes before adding to a vacuum flask, so says the food safety fairys of the interweb]

I never really considered stock the type of thing I could cook while camping. I have left a stew in an earthenware jar in the embers of a communal fire, but I always felt proper stock was too awkward to cook when out. In truth I am not bothered whether stock is clear or not, i put that much veg my soups it doesn't make much of a difference. I eat quite a few stock based meals in week since finding out just how much better my dicky joints are if I eat homemade stock. So finding out i can still make it while out is great for me. I would live off chicken stock if I could.

I like the idea of having say grilled chicken one night and the then doing stock in a thermos for the next night. It certainly beats an oxo cube added to the nettles and barley. I would love to try stew done by the same method. I always felt thermos flasks were used with what I would call kitchen sink camping (airbeds and fold up tables), i now think they are really cool thanks to rikuk.

 

[jimford]

When backpacking I don't have a mule or sherpa, so I can't carry all the ingredients and cooking ware, and indulge in the above recipes!
;^)

I have a problem in eating when backpacking in that I lose my appetite and sometimes have to force myself to eat. I'm also a vegetarian.

I won't carry 'air' - eg bread, puffed wheat etc, and won't carry water, because there's plenty in the burns.

Breakfast: Cup of coffee, packet of instant custard.
Midday: Coffee, a couple of oatcake biscuits.
Evening: 6 spoons of red lentils + 6 of bulgar wheat and a veg. stock cube, and sometimes a little chilli sauce. Maybe another instant custard after (very comforting!) if I can be bothered.

I bring the water to the boil in a 'Titan Kettle', tip the ingredients in and bring back to the boil. I then turn off the gas and put the kettle in a cosy I've made of 2 layers of radiator insulation (with a lid). I can then put it to one side to complete cooking, and it'll be still too hot to eat after 20+ mins. The cosy is a great saver on fuel and there's no stove to watch over.

I wish I didn't lose my appetite and can then be a bit more immaginative - and welcome any suggestions.

Jim

 

[rik_uk3]

Thermos cooking is not new

click to enlarge

 

[Landy_Dom]

I wish I didn't lose my appetite and can then be a bit more immaginative - and welcome any suggestions.

Jim

cous cous is an excellent staple - boil some water, chuck in the cous cous and leave at the edge of the fire for about 5-10 mins (just keeping warm) - you can add all sorts to brighten it up too.

Dom.

 

[rik_uk3]

Cous cous is like Polenta, bloody bland grub without a sauce of some kind.

There you go, Polenta, another idea for camp food, smother in stew or spag bol sauce

 

[harryhaller]

Survivalists dig up the most fascinating stuff - here is an article which is very interesting about Pinole, an emergency food of the native north americans.

http://www.survivalplus.com/foods/page0011.htm

Haven't tried it though.

 

[Iona]

Quinoa is GREAT, it's carbs and protein in one meal so you can just add foraged veges and a few herbs/spices and stock... Before I go I usually mix a load of nuts and seed together in a bowl with some dark soy sauce to coat them and toast under the grill til they're dry. Great sorce of fat and protein, and they taste fantastic and last forever. And take chili sauce everywhere...

 

[jimford]

cous cous is an excellent staple

Yes, I've also used cous-cous as an alternative to bulgar wheat, but as I previously mentioned, I don't eat any of it very enthusiastically when trecking.

Jim

 

[lub0]

I'd take quinoa over pasta, couscous or any other processed junk because the advantages are clear; complex carbohydrate so fills you for longer, more nutrient-dense due to all the vitamins and minerals and has fiber rather than starchy white flour-based carbs which fill you with mucus and spike your blood sugar and mess your body up.

 

[traderran]

Looks like no one will starve

 

[clcuckow]

Survivalists dig up the most fascinating stuff - here is an article which is very interesting about Pinole, an emergency food of the native north americans.

http://www.survivalplus.com/foods/page0011.htm

Haven't tried it though.

This is also known as Gofio in the Canary Islands and it still a common ingredient and in the past has been as staple. Traditionally it was put into a goat skin bag and mixed with a little water and sugar and kneaded to form a dough. There are several different types of 'grains' used including wheat, barley, maize and I have made it before with long grain rice.

Traditionally it was made by mixing the grain with sand in a large flat ceramic 'pan' (the one I saw on Fuerteventura reminded me of a pot paella pan) over a low fire/ashes and constantly stirred with a long handled spoon so that it does not catch, the sand also helps in evening out the heat and is just sieved out before it is milled into 'flour'.

When I made my rice Gofio I just did it in the oven and passed it through a coffee grinder and then through a mortar and pestle. It's got a really nice nutty taste and is really nice made into a kind of cake/paste with sugar or honey and a bit of water. It is also added to hot water or milk as an invalid food in the same way we used to use gruel.

If you are a baker it a great way to reuse the rice when you are using the weigh down the pastry when you are baking blind.

 

[Crowe]

Sardines in oil - Puncture the corner of the can and isert a wick. You then hav a crude oil lamp for those long evenings.
Crowe