Winter menu

[VashFive]

What's your favorite winter foods/recipes on the trail?

Breakfast: Oatmeal with brown sugar, raisins, and powdered milk with coffee.

Lunch: Summer sausage w/cheese, flatbread, and kale chips

Dinner: Pot of Lipton french onion soup and add either noodles, rice, or mashed potatoes. I'll throw in some cheese powder to thicken things up or maybe some curry. I'll also add some peas if I have them.

Dessert: Chocolate and herb tea.

Of course, this is time and weather dependent.

[handlebar]

I carry the same items for breakfast, snacks, lunch and dinner whatever the season, but in winter I'm usually out for 3 days or less which lets me keep my total pack weight setting out not more than a few pounds greater than my summer weight when I often set out with a 5-day load. For me "winter backpacking" means the temps at night are in the teens or 20sF and during the day in the 20s or 30s. That requires some gear modifications: swapping a white gas stove in and my alchemy stove out; replacing Smartwater tbottles and Platy with Nalgenes, warmer clothes and sleeping bag, etc. Before turning in for the night, I heat hot water to turn the Nalgenes into hot water bottles to help my body heat up the sleeping bag. It the morning it's still lukewarm so I boil enough of it for a hot breakfast making hot chocolate from two packs of Carnation Instant breakfast in my cup and using the rest to make hot oatmeal. I can then heet up the balance of my water once I've drunk my fill, adding extra water from a flowing source or snow, so the nalgenes don't freeze in their cozies. Lunch and snacks are still cold, but if they are likely to freeze rock hard, I Cary them close to my body so I don't break teeth trying to bite them. I usually carry extra snack items as my stops for breaks are very brief so I don't get chilled. Dinner is my usual Liptons side with tuna or salmon packet or Mac n Cheese with Spam and dressert of Cadbury's Royal Dark (so good), followed by tea to drink while I boil water for one or two Nalgene hot water bottles. Another Cadbury's goes between my sleeping bag and pad for middle of the night to fuel the furnace after the quick exit from the bag when nature calls.

[RockDoc]

No food in Am, keep insulin low so body fat flows as fuel; just pack up and start hiking. Stop around 10 am for coffee. Lunch is hard boiled egg, avocado, dried meat (jerky, Landjaegar sausage). Dinner is homemade soup with dehydrated vegetables, salmon packet, cheese, 90% Lindt chocolate & Justin's almond butter for treat.

Cutting simple carbs solves the "hiker hunger" problem. We never got hungry, and walked out of the woods still with a lot of food. Running on ketones is the body's default energy system for long, slow endurance, for 2 million years plus.

20th Century industrial carbage (sugar, oatmeal, Mac & cheese) will make you fat, sick, and hungry.

[Dogwood]

If you're planning on pushing it hard in winter up the good fat content of your nutrition and don't forget that you still need to drink copious amounts of clean water and/or liquids. My winter menus always include hearty soup preferably having high fat and higher than fair weather hikes protein content. I like adding winter root vegetables and sea vegetables(seaweed, kelp, etc ) into the winter trail menu. They go perfect into hearty soups. In winter I eat more Indian/Asian curry inspired dinners. In winter I up the dried or powdered coconut milk, coconut flake and baked coconut chips get added in greater amounts to trail mixes, dried full fat milks(goat and soy milk included), dried butter powder, smaller packets of coconut/EVOO oils and ghee(warm before adding to foods), fatty seeds(I like chia, pumpkin, and sunflower especially in the winter) and nuts(I like whole cashews and Brazil nuts in the winter), nut butter packets(again, warm in your pocket first), fatty fishes, etc. Don't forget to switch over to the warming herbs, spices, and greens i.e.; cinnamon, cardamon, ginger, cayenne, cloves, nutmeg, black pepper, garlic, rosemary, oregano, basil, arugula, mustard greens, peppery watercress(when not bitterly cold), onions, etc. Chai latte trail version with dried milks and warm ginger turmeric chamomile tea to perhaps adding matcha to these is a winter favorite for me. Vegan Hiker offered a great warm drink for winter recipe that also included turmeric! Not a big fan of frozen dairy like frozen hard cheese but perhaps the softer cheeses can be considered for this season. I prefer adding more jerkies made from fish, especially fatty salmon and ahi, chicken, and turkey. Sardines, mackerel, salmon, and kippers in EVOO are included but are warmed to liquify the EVOO prior to adding to a meal or eating; I want those fat calories.

I tend to eat a warmed real more traditional b'fast on trail for winter. For me that means oatmeal or a hot whole grain mix of chia, flax, hemp, cracked buckwheat, amaranth, millet, quinoa, etc with warming ingredients and fat in it like cinnamon, clove, ginger(dried is fine, crystallized dried is OK), nutmeg, etc with some nuts(almond or pine or pecans) and dried full fat milk powder(milk does not just come from cows!) and some dried fruit for greater sweetness(dried blueberries or Nutiva Naturals pomegranate powder with dried milk powder are great combos to be added). Some great pasta b-fast porridge dishes can be tweaked too made from cous cous(it's just little pasta), dried fruit(apples), nuts, powdered milk, and spices(cinnamon and clove). No reason why this Pumpkin Banana Pudding recipe can't be tweaked eaten as warm b'fast. http://www.trailgroove.com/issue18.html?autoflip=113 or Paul's(Mag's) pudding and dessert recipes. http://www.trailgroove.com/issue24.html?autoflip=131 I can easily see adding peanut or almond butter to either of these.

To satisfy the occasional sweet tooth I prefer dried fruits like coconut or mulberries or high quality whole dark chocolate with cayenne, ginger, and vanilla even more so in winter.

Like RockDoc more than ever the simple carbs denuded of comprehensive nutrition are nixed or sparingly, very sparingly, with consciousness may be considered.

[Heliotrope]

If you're planning on pushing it hard in winter up the good fat content of your nutrition and don't forget that you still need to drink copious amounts of clean water and/or liquids. My winter menus always include hearty soup preferably having high fat and higher than fair weather hikes protein content. I like adding winter root vegetables and sea vegetables(seaweed, kelp, etc ) into the winter trail menu. They go perfect into hearty soups. In winter I eat more Indian/Asian curry inspired dinners. In winter I up the dried or powdered coconut milk, coconut flake and baked coconut chips get added in greater amounts to trail mixes, dried full fat milks(goat and soy milk included), dried butter powder, smaller packets of coconut/EVOO oils and ghee(warm before adding to foods), fatty seeds(I like chia, pumpkin, and sunflower especially in the winter) and nuts(I like whole cashews and Brazil nuts in the winter), nut butter packets(again, warm in your pocket first), fatty fishes, etc. Don't forget to switch over to the warming herbs, spices, and greens i.e.; cinnamon, cardamon, ginger, cayenne, cloves, nutmeg, black pepper, garlic, rosemary, oregano, basil, arugula, mustard greens, peppery watercress(when not bitterly cold), onions, etc. Chai latte trail version with dried milks and warm ginger turmeric chamomile tea to perhaps adding matcha to these is a winter favorite for me. Vegan Hiker offered a great warm drink for winter recipe that also included turmeric! Not a big fan of frozen dairy like frozen hard cheese but perhaps the softer cheeses can be considered for this season. I prefer adding more jerkies made from fish, especially fatty salmon and ahi, chicken, and turkey. Sardines, mackerel, salmon, and kippers in EVOO are included but are warmed to liquify the EVOO prior to adding to a meal or eating; I want those fat calories.

I tend to eat a warmed real more traditional b'fast on trail for winter. For me that means oatmeal or a hot whole grain mix of chia, flax, hemp, cracked buckwheat, amaranth, millet, quinoa, etc with warming ingredients and fat in it like cinnamon, clove, ginger(dried is fine, crystallized dried is OK), nutmeg, etc with some nuts(almond or pine or pecans) and dried full fat milk powder(milk does not just come from cows!) and some dried fruit for greater sweetness(dried blueberries or Nutiva Naturals pomegranate powder with dried milk powder are great combos to be added). Some great pasta b-fast porridge dishes can be tweaked too made from cous cous(it's just little pasta), dried fruit(apples), nuts, powdered milk, and spices(cinnamon and clove). No reason why this Pumpkin Banana Pudding recipe can't be tweaked eaten as warm b'fast. http://www.trailgroove.com/issue18.html?autoflip=113 or Paul's(Mag's) pudding and dessert recipes. http://www.trailgroove.com/issue24.html?autoflip=131 I can easily see adding peanut or almond butter to either of these.

To satisfy the occasional sweet tooth I prefer dried fruits like coconut or mulberries or high quality whole dark chocolate with cayenne, ginger, and vanilla even more so in winter.

Like RockDoc more than ever the simple carbs denuded of comprehensive nutrition are nixed or sparingly, very sparingly, with consciousness may be considered.

Damn! You are making me hungry!


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[Bronk]

I like to carry a bag of frozen meatballs to roast over a fire. No mess, no prep work. High in fat and protein.

[saltysack]

I like to carry a bag of frozen meatballs to roast over a fire. No mess, no prep work. High in fat and protein.

Good idea...


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