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Traillium
03-30-2016, 08:56
Does anyone have experience cooking 'pantry-style'?
Some background: Nearly a century ago, my father paddled in the early wave of recreational canoeing. He and several fellow students took the month of May, from ice-off to serious bugs everywhere time, to paddle through the Algonquin area. In the time-honoured tradition of the northwoods, they carried canvas gunny-sacks of ingredients, i.e., one of oatmeal, one of flour, one of beans, etc. To make a meal, they chose from a very limited menu, opened whatever gunny-sacks they needed, and assembled their meal. Everything was cooked over open fire. (BTW, they slept in Egyptian cotton Baker tents, with no floors, and only a bar of mosquito netting that draped across the open front (if they kept the front tarp open. Fish, mainly Lake Trout caught with big silver spoons and Monel line, was their main animal protein source. They also carried double-smoked bacon on-the-rind.)
I've been in discussion with an experienced backpacker who swears by a similar method she refers to as 'pantry-style'. She carries dehydrated rice in one container, dehydrated beans in another, and so on, including grated Parmesan, oil, dried Nido milk, TVP, etc. Ahead of time, she figures out a rough menu, determines how much of each ingredient she'll require, packs that amount, and goes. On the trail, she decides what she want for any particular meal, combines, adjusts spicing and calorie count, and cooks. She figures fewer wasted plastic bags, and much more adjustability. She carries plastic jars and bottles of various sizes, as well as Silnylon dry bags for the bulk dried ingredients.
For decades while paddling, we've always premeasured and packaged each meal separately, with each day again bagged together.
Does anyone have experience — or measured opinion — on her pantry-style approach to cooking?


Bruce Traillium

WingedMonkey
03-30-2016, 11:54
I have a 25 year old copy of "The NOLS Cookery" from National Outdoor Leadership School.

Even though most of the recipes are for group cooking, it uses the type of "stock ingredients" like you are talking about and I've adjusted many of them to single person meals.

Puddlefish
03-30-2016, 12:15
I've only used that style of cooking on a sailboat, when cruising. TVP makes me sad. I'd think that overall, that style of cooking would favor groups over the individual when on the trail.

I have an extra bag of instant mashed potatoes, to use as a thickener, in the event I add too much water to a dehydrated meal. I'm having a little bag of dehydrated veggies sent to a few drop points, to add in to meals. A lot of people carry olive oil/spices/envelopes of meat as add ins. I like plain oatmeal, so it's possible I'd buy a tub of oatmeal to save a few pennies, and avoid the overly sweet pre-packaged stuff. I'm planning on being flexible of course, as I might be craving that overly sweetened stuff on the trail for all I know.

Just Bill
03-30-2016, 14:26
Yar, I grew up reading Horace Kephart and idolizing Bill Mason. While we didn't call it pantry style, that is how we mainly cooked.

As mentioned- it favors groups of 4 or more and is ideal for paddling. It is usually done as a multi-course meal.
Supplementing with fresh fish or even some frozen meats packed in fit really nicely into this plan too.
And on the water, you're on the water... so doing a load of dishes at the end of the feast is no monstrous task.

I never thought it translated well to backpacking or even a pair, but as you say some do still do this or go with a staple style of a some basic common stuff (taters, grains, pasta, beans, oil, spices, etc.) and then a few planned meals or specialty items that can be worked around. A chicken packet might then be chicken and pasta italiano, or a chicken and rice bean chili, or... You get it. A good spice kit is the key and it is nice to vary portion size and flavors on the fly.

Mainly the issue is-
Having a diverse cook kit.
You certainly could adapt it, but one pot meals or simple boil water meals with a hot drink do the job backpacking and allow you to keep it down to one pot. Saving tons of weight and space.

And the core of the kit was a small zip open first aid style kitchen bag with a few decent utensils, a bottle or two of oil, balsamic, etc. As well as a good 15-20 film cans of spices. Course as that bastard weighed a good two pounds all by it's lonesome- bit hard to justify beyond my scouting years. We did a few backpacking trips this way; but that was cooking by patrol, where a kitchen roll and group cook kit with two stoves made some sense split amongst eight folks.

Secondary thing- backpacking is relatively predictable. Other than a bad case of the "F-its" yer going to pretty well cover the ground you expect and end up about where you planned. It's going to take about the same effort and roughly the same timeframe. So picking a simple meal plan isn't quite as hard. And you walked all day- you know you'll eat durn near anything most days too.

On a bigger paddle trip; you could catch an easy sunny day with a breeze at your back or be stuck paddling for a hard day in a headwind. Your appetite is all over the place. You can get stuck windbound for a day and need to stretch your food, or you could catch a stringer of fish and have too much food.


Guess the closest thing I do these days...
I may carry a few ramens, a few different veggies, a few dried meats, and a few Pill zip-lock's of spices.

So while it's ramen... it could be red pepper and tarragon with dried mushroom Or chicken and veggie italiano ramen. Or bring a pill bag of powdered eggs and one night it's egg drop soup ramen.

Anywho-
Really I suppose hiking hours are what matters.
If I wanted to add a five pounds to my pack and scale back my hiking hours; well a pantry style kit might make for a nice easy amble with some leisurely meals.

Good or bad- if I do get a shot to get out the timing is usually a bit tight- so I need to keep the weight down, feet on the trail, and make some miles because that's what I want... I'll eat plenty fine back at home so I try to get the most backpacking in I can... but if there was no hurry there is an appeal to adapting the paddlers tripping style to foot travel.

Traillium
03-30-2016, 17:33
Thanks, Puddlefish and Just Bill. I'm leaning your ways. I'm especially thinking there are several ways to incorporate some limited aspects of the pantry system — just which ones I'd like to rationalize …
I'd love to hear more knowledgeable comments like these, please.


Bruce Traillium

rocketsocks
03-30-2016, 18:24
Flour is probably the one item pantry I would consider bringing, it can be used many ways and that would be key...more than one use.
thicken
bread on stick
steam baked muffin
dumplings
pancakes
even doughnuts with the addition of oil.

rocketsocks
03-30-2016, 18:26
Oops, forgot one, breading fish, fowl or what not and fried.

zelph
05-09-2017, 20:08
Flour is probably the one item pantry I would consider bringing, it can be used many ways and that would be key...more than one use.
thicken
bread on stick
steam baked muffin
dumplings
pancakes
even doughnuts with the addition of oil.

Dumplings, what a great idea. Does anyone think they could be made on top of a pot full of Ramen by using the following recipe:

Drop Dumplings from scratch. Super easy and delicious! -- 2 C Flour; 1.5 tsp Salt; 1 Tbsp Baking Powder; 2 Tbsp Veg. oil; 1 C lukewarm Water. Add dry ingredients together well. add oil and mix with a fork. add water to desired consistency. Drop by spoonful of dumpling onto broth or stew and let steam for 4 minutes.

https://www.pinterest.com/explore/drop-dumplings/

Venchka
05-09-2017, 20:21
Santa Fe Instant refried beans.
Minute Rice of course.
Peanut Butter
Pea protein
Hemp hearts
Taco seasoning
Lemon and Lime crystals
Cafe Bustelo instant coffee
Nido Whole milk
Instant Breakfast
Dried fruit
70% Chocolate
Better Oats quick cook oatmeal
Korean Ramen
Just a few things that live in my pantry. Multifunctional.
Wayne


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zelph
05-09-2017, 20:40
This is what the drop dumplings look like when used in a stew my wife made today:

39250

I'm sure they could be used with Ramen noodles, I'll give it a try next time out :-)

russb
05-10-2017, 05:44
I grew up with this style. I was mostly canoeing back then, but we did this for backpacking too. Quite a bit of variety can be had with the simple ingredients. I have seen other canoeists with the giant spice bag like Bill described, ours was very small... no bigger than what I currently have for backpacking, salt, pepper, and old bay. The real difference between pre-pared meals and the pantry style really just comes down to having the same ingredients separated out. Most ppl now carry individual packets of oatmeal for example instead of one bigger bag. Same with mashed potatoes or rice. Instead of having servings pre-measured and divided, scoop out what is needed at camp. Bisquick I tecall was a staple ingredient, we made biscuits, pancakes, dumplings, fish batter, everything.

Venchka
05-10-2017, 10:57
You can take anything and everything canoeing.
Wayne


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Farr Away
05-11-2017, 17:00
Dumplings, what a great idea. Does anyone think they could be made on top of a pot full of Ramen by using the following recipe:

Drop Dumplings from scratch. Super easy and delicious! -- 2 C Flour; 1.5 tsp Salt; 1 Tbsp Baking Powder; 2 Tbsp Veg. oil; 1 C lukewarm Water. Add dry ingredients together well. add oil and mix with a fork. add water to desired consistency. Drop by spoonful of dumpling onto broth or stew and let steam for 4 minutes.

https://www.pinterest.com/explore/drop-dumplings/

I haven't tried this specifically, but I think you could have the dry ingredients in a ziploc; add the wet ingredients; close the ziploc; then massage (carefully) to mix. Cut off a corner and you could squeeze the dumplings into your pot.

-FA

plexusbritt
05-11-2017, 17:26
I've used self rising flour with water to make a "biscuit dough", wrapped around sausages that I packed out frozen and then put in the stream under some rocks (central AL so no bear worries).


Cooked on a stick, it made pretty great "pigs in a blanket". I have to make sure the food is reeeeeaaaaalllly good when I drag my husband backpacking. The original Pinterest method called for canned biscuits but I was NOT packing that out.

zelph
05-11-2017, 19:47
I've used self rising flour with water to make a "biscuit dough", wrapped around sausages that I packed out frozen and then put in the stream under some rocks (central AL so no bear worries).

Cooked on a stick, it made pretty great "pigs in a blanket". I have to make sure the food is reeeeeaaaaalllly good when I drag my husband backpacking. The original Pinterest method called for canned biscuits but I was NOT packing that out.

No bears but a few alligators lurking in the rivers :-))

Tomorrow I try the biscuit dough technique on Ramen Noodles or Mountain House Rice and chicken. Hmmm, maybe the pigs in blanket also :-)

I'll try Farr Away's ziploc dispenser method.

russb
05-11-2017, 22:14
You can take anything and everything canoeing.
Wayne


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Just having a canoe doesn't mean you can take anything and everything anymore than saying you can do it because one has a backpack. I canoe and backpack. Often the canoe trips require more careful attention to weight because of portaging. On a 2 mile portage, I am carrying all my backpacking gear plus canoe and associated gear. The idea that a canoe means takes everything is uninformed.

Venchka
05-11-2017, 22:25
Portaging. I forgot about those.
Ice chest full of real food was our style.
Wayne


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plexusbritt
05-12-2017, 10:52
No bears but a few alligators lurking in the rivers :-))

Tomorrow I try the biscuit dough technique on Ramen Noodles or Mountain House Rice and chicken. Hmmm, maybe the pigs in blanket also :-)

I'll try Farr Away's ziploc dispenser method.

If we have them up near central AL, I haven't seen them and that is just fine with me! I probably should mention that getting maple sausage does let some flavor seep into the biscuit so it wasn't bland. This thread now has me looking at powdered butter to see how it could be improved... :-?

zelph
05-12-2017, 20:15
I spend my winters in central MS, Columbus MS. Tombigbee river has gaters. Campground host got his arm scarred up from trying to pick a small one up by the tail to get it off one of the trails. 10 footers have been killed near by. Columbus is on the same parallel as Tuscaloosa AL.

Had success with my dumpling tests today. Did 2 tests and came up with a good method.

1st one came out a little soft in the center and a little dry. it was one big dollop in the center of the pot. Second test was with 3 smaller dollops and that worked well. I used a Toaks 900ML pot on my kitchen stove. Mountain House Chicken and Noodles was used, one cup per test. Brought 2 cups of water to a boil and shut off stove. Poured 1 cup Mt House into water and let sit while I prepared the biscuit dough in a ziploc. Bit off the corner of the ziploc and squeezed out 3 dollops on top of the noodles. Turned stove on to the smallest flame and simmered it for 4 min.

Next test I'll add 6 dollops and some seasoning to the dough.
I take a couple of #10 cans of Mountain House with as my pantry style cooking when I car camp :-)

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plexusbritt
05-13-2017, 10:47
I spend my winters in central MS, Columbus MS. Tombigbee river has gaters. Campground host got his arm scarred up from trying to pick a small one up by the tail to get it off one of the trails. 10 footers have been killed near by. Columbus is on the same parallel as Tuscaloosa AL.

Had success with my dumpling tests today. Did 2 tests and came up with a good method.

1st one came out a little soft in the center and a little dry. it was one big dollop in the center of the pot. Second test was with 3 smaller dollops and that worked well. I used a Toaks 900ML pot on my kitchen stove. Mountain House Chicken and Noodles was used, one cup per test. Brought 2 cups of water to a boil and shut off stove. Poured 1 cup Mt House into water and let sit while I prepared the biscuit dough in a ziploc. Bit off the corner of the ziploc and squeezed out 3 dollops on top of the noodles. Turned stove on to the smallest flame and simmered it for 4 min.

Next test I'll add 6 dollops and some seasoning to the dough.
I take a couple of #10 cans of Mountain House with as my pantry style cooking when I car camp :-)

39275

Oooooo that looks good!


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zelph
05-13-2017, 11:14
It tastes so good I made some for breakfast. Did it with 6 dumplings and turned out purrfect. I maxed out the room in the 900ml Toaks pot. 2 cups water boiled, add 1 cup MT House, let sit 4 min while going dumpling mix then add the mix out of the corner of a ziploc. Moisture content worked out just right. Contents of the pot stays hot for a long time. dumplings must insulate it. This combination is a winner :-)

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Deadeye
05-13-2017, 11:20
I guess my usual meals are pantry-style. I bring mashed potatoes, rice, a bunch of dehydrated veggies (Harmony House), and packets or cans of chicken, tuna, shrimp, salmon or spam. A few condiments and spices and you can create a variety of decent meals.