View Full Version : Think about - No Cook
Ronnie Motrose
10-02-2008, 00:39
Think about cold food, it can be a pain in the ass. But amusement for others, sorry i'm not called Carny. How long for those noodles to come back, this is a option.
"From the Streets in a blanket"
Ramen works in about 15 minutes in cold water :) Makes a pretty good (and easy) pasta salad that way. Add in dressing, meat, cheese, etc. You can soak freeze dried vegetables with the ramen also.
Yea you can live off no-cook food, but why would you want to?
Generally no-cook food is heaver.
If light weight is a person’s reason for going no-cook, a hobo wood stove keep the weight down.
And a light weight pot to cook with is going to weigh about the same as a Tupperware bowl you are going to soak any food in while you walk. And you are carrying water in the Tupperware that you may not otherwise need to. So that adds more weight.
One of the PCT thru's this year was eating all cold food that he had prepped at home (Sarong, who also hiked the AT). Had a chat with him last month on the trail - pretty cool to hear what worked for him.
Two A/T thru hikers this year did part of their hike stove free. One is the unknown hiker and the other is stumpknocker.
Both have multiple through hikes behind them. Both can cover a lot of miles per day.
You can read their thoughts in Trail Journals. They both went back to stoves after a month or so. Stumpknocker because he loves coffee so much (My personal opinion)
Grinder
Two A/T thru hikers this year did part of their hike stove free. One is the unknown hiker and the other is stumpknocker.
Both have multiple through hikes behind them. Both can cover a lot of miles per day.
You can read their thoughts in Trail Journals. They both went back to stoves after a month or so. Stumpknocker because he loves coffee so much (My personal opinion)
Grinder
I know of two more who didn't go back to stoves. Shilo and Smiley. Unfortunately Smiley got injured in the Whites and had to get off, but he was doing perfectly fine without a stove.
I don't know exactly what they were cooking, but each had a different approach. Shilo pretty much snacked the entire trip and did big miles. That way he hit a town about every 1 or 2 days, so he got a good meal every other day in town, and packed out a good meal from the restaurant for dinner that night.
Smiley ate regular hiker food, just without cooking it. Ramen, Liton sides, oatmeal I think, etc. Just buy all of the standards and test it out. Add some water and let it set. See what happens. Another option it to carry a lightweight pot that can withstand heat. Meaning a metal pot instead of plastic or tupperwear. That way if you feel up to it make a fire and have an occasional cooked meal. A lot of times there is a fire going at the shelter anyways, so why not take advantage of the heat every once in a while? If there is no fire that night wherever you are at, then eat cold.
I say give it a shot. If cold food gets old spend about $30 on a snow peak or pocket rocket and some fuel.
Tipi Walter
10-25-2008, 17:31
I don't know exactly what they were cooking, but each had a different approach. Shilo pretty much snacked the entire trip and did big miles. That way he hit a town about every 1 or 2 days, so he got a good meal every other day in town, and packed out a good meal from the restaurant for dinner that night.
Not having to hit a town "every 1 or 2 days" is precisely the reason I carry a cook stove and a big bag of cookable foods. A backpacker can stay out much longer(and using less money)with a stove and dry foods-meant-to-be-cooked. If I wanted to pass thru a town every 1 or 2 days, I'd just stay away from backpacking until I got the nasty tendency of frequent town trips out of my system.
Not having to hit a town "every 1 or 2 days" is precisely the reason I carry a cook stove and a big bag of cookable foods. A backpacker can stay out much longer(and using less money)with a stove and dry foods-meant-to-be-cooked. If I wanted to pass thru a town every 1 or 2 days, I'd just stay away from backpacking until I got the nasty tendency of frequent town trips out of my system.
Yeah, but if you are on a time restriction, it helps. Heavy food bag means lower miles. Also, I figure if you don't want to go into towns and be around civilization the AT isn'tthe best trail. That's how Shilo wanted to hike, so that's how he hiked. Not everyone wants to avoid towns.
Talk to Garlic. He's on WB and just finished the AT this past year stoveless.
http://trailjournals.com/photos.cfm?trailname=6620
(Trail journals appears to be down currently...)
I'm a really serious food guy and a solo hiker and to my way of thinking a great hot meal at the end of a long day nourishes my spirit as much as it nourishes my body
Cold food of course has it's place but not when I'm hiking.
Yeah, but if you are on a time restriction, it helps. Heavy food bag means lower miles.
That isn't what I'd call sound reasoning - cut pack weight everywhere else, but come on, without food and a lot of it, you will falter. Lets say you restock every 7 days - sure on day 1 every week your pack gets heavy. By day 5 or so it isn't. You ate the weight!
For me long miles has little to do with pack weight, rather it is mental. (Don't get me wrong though - a 20 lb pack is better than a 35 lb one......)
PCT hiking is definitely a carrying food for the haul type though. In Washington for example you only see fresh food when you hit passes. And even then, it is a gas station and that is pretty much it.
That isn't what I'd call sound reasoning - cut pack weight everywhere else, but come on, without food and a lot of it, you will falter. Lets say you restock every 7 days - sure on day 1 every week your pack gets heavy. By day 5 or so it isn't. You ate the weight!
Not if you eat a good meal every day, or every other day, and carry a good cooked meal out of town to eat that night. Just because you are eating uncooked food doesn't mean it's bad for you, it just gets old for some. Eat decent every one or two days, then have two really good meals in a row. In return you aren't carrying a stove, and just a couple of pounds of food to eat cold. Restocking every 7 days means you leave town with anywhere from 14-20 lbs of food. You pretty much double your pack weight every time you go into town. That's why it take 7 days to get to the next resupply point. You are burning more energy to get from point A to point B that way because you are draging so much more weight up every climb.
Tipi Walter
10-25-2008, 23:18
When you young backpacking bucks stay out as much as possible during a lifetime of trail exploration(and not working constantly to get health insurance or dental care), you may find as you get older the wonderful world of toothaches and tooth pullings. When you start losing your teeth you may rethink the No Cook Diet. Cooking softens food, and even with healthy teeth and gorilla-like jaw muscles, chewing granola and frozen power bars and almonds and nutty cereals or jerky can tire even a healthy mouth. Another vote here for carrying a cook stove.
And if you stay out long enough, you will crack and bust a tooth on some particular peanut cluster or nut brittle. Another reason oatmeal is the perfect camping food.
I can eat cold food and drink cold tea so I won't make any excuses.
I don't burn down buildings or anything like that, but I still need to play with fire.
Tipi...lol!!!!Yep, braces and extensive dental work is one reason I cannot eat a raw diet. I have nightmares of popping a bracket or a crown while out.
It hurts when I watch people use their teeth to rip packages open or gnaw on hard bars - I want to scream "Dude! You only get one set!" My husband has put about $10K into my mouth at this point with another $5-10K more in the future (3 implants in the future)
I haven't eaten a raw veggie except for super small diced in over 2 years :(
As for carrying more food weight though , in reply to Nest? Note I didn't say whether or not the food was to be cooked or eaten cold. Maybe on the AT you can get away with resupplying every 2-3 days but on most long trails that won't happen.
As for being weighed down? Myself I walk the same speed whether I have a daypack or backpack on, 10 lbs or 35 lbs. My speed won't change, neither does my miles.
As for weight...14 lbs for 7 days is about average it seems for most people.
I can see Tipi's point also. I still have all my teeth but I can feel them going, probably all at once some day. LOL. My main staple is oatmeal porridge also, but I am getting into dry vegie soup mixes with extra lentils thrown in. When I hike with my daughter we bring those noodle packs and toss in a pouch of tuna. She really likes that. She is getting to be a bit of a pyro like me also. I'll have to keep an eye on that. ;)
Sarbars souns like she is in pretty good shape, for a silly girl. ;) I can do 2 pounds of food per day also, but I wouldn't be keeping up with here until I lose some serious body weight. In summer I bring 1 pound per day and try to burn a pound of body fat each day, but I don't go more than 5 days. In spring/fall its 1.5 pounds of food just to be a little safer, and the full 2 pounds in winter, but I try to have some on me when I return though, and see if I've lost any weight. I figure on burning 0.1 pounds of body fat for every hour of hiking. My food is the kindling, mostly carbs. Anyhow, I like hot foods high in fibre and lots of hot water with it. The porridge not quite so watery but lots of milky tea with it. All the fibre and hot water helps fill the tank and keep the fat burning, and keeps the starches and skim milk from plugging me up. If I ever get lean again I will need to have denser calories and more dietary fats and oils, but hot porridges and hot lentil soups work well for me now. Very filling and warming. I eat a little jerky to give me something to chew now and then, but its mostly soup and gruel.
Mr. Parkay
10-26-2008, 10:59
I prefer not cooking because of its speed and simplicity... and because I'm lazy. When it's time for dinner, I like being able to start eating immediately, instead of having to wait around for food to cook. Additionally, it's also nice not having any extra chores, such as buying fuel, cleaning pots and carrying extra water for cooking.
There are those who do not cook and those that do. I do. I feel like that hot meal after a long day is worth every ounce of wait on my back. The thing about food that is important to remember is it is the fuel that gets you over the mountains. Food is probably, IMO, the most important item you carry in your pack. I have to watch my food intake when I hike. My sugar tends to drop quickly if I don't. I have gone without cooking in low water situations and have been just fine. Just make sure to balance out your intake--proteins, carbs, etc.
I prefer not cooking because of its speed and simplicity... and because I'm lazy. When it's time for dinner, I like being able to start eating immediately, instead of having to wait around for food to cook. Additionally, it's also nice not having any extra chores, such as buying fuel, cleaning pots and carrying extra water for cooking.I am that way sometimes also. I try not to bring too many granola bars because I just eat them. Personally I think its better to find an efficient routine for making tea and for cooking, something you can do even in a storm. In practice this is very easy with something like a Kelly Kettle, and a Jetboil might be the same way. Hobbo stoves are a little trickier, but I think people that use there alchol stoves or whatever stoves they have alot are just as efficient with them as I am with my Kelly Kettle. I'll bet the real hobbos were pretty slick with their stoves also.
With my Kelly Kettle I can have hot tea with milk and honey in 10 minutes from the time I stop. 15 minutes at most in the most nasty conditions including throwing up a rain shelter and popping some extra layers on myself. No ****. It's a fun thing to practice, and a good thing to practice. It makes you less reluctant to stop and rest and make tea and think when you really need to stop and rest and make tea and think. Sometimes stuffing down a granola bar and keeping hiking is the worst thing to do.
It's still important to carry something for quick energy though. I typically carry a 500ml plastic jar of honey in the squirt top it comes in. I try not to use all of it when I'm trying to lose weight but its easy to just put back on the shelf when I get home. I use it mostly as a condiment for tea and for oatmeal, and maybe a squirt before bettime on a cold night, but its a good form of emergency ration because it is quick energy when needed and can be diluted with bark tea to ration it out when needed and make the bark tea taste better, and it is very dense both weight and volume wise, for a carbohydrate, and its a natural preservative and disinfectant also, for first aid and stuff.
500ml of honey. A good thing.
While I continue my experiment to fine tune my backpacking camp setups for the coming season (I am still looking for a little more comfort without resorting to inflatables or hammocks) I think I will also build something like a wigwam for the backyard. You a small one, just big enough for me and my daughter and my Kelly Kettle when sleeping but perhaps a few more of her friends when sitting. If I do it right they will all get together and throw me out and I will have to build another one just for myself.
I think it will be more or less traditional except for the birch bark. Plenty of saplings around for bent poles and sleeping cots, and I think I'll use jute instead of spruce root, but we don't have a lot of big pieces of birch bark and I wouldn't want to use it if we did. Tyvek maybe, but cut into birch bark sized pieces. Be nice to get that stuff without the logos. Maybe a little white paint over that. Maybe a little more paint and it might even look like birch bark. Maybe do some tests with linseed oil and white pigments and burlap to see if I can make my own bark. Make sure it isn't too flammable, or smelly.
Posted in wrong thread. LOL
Jak, honey is good stuff. Always carry it! A quick Tablespoon or so will give one a huge boost.
And lol...I walk 2 mph going uphill or downhill. It never changes, be it 2 miles or 20 :D
I do carry a meal/snack or two on every trip that doesn't require cooking (like instant hummus and crackers is good). Good for snow/rain hitting.
As for cooking? I can have my water boiled in 5 minutes and after my food sits for 10-15 minutes more I am eating. During that time I usually have a cup of herbal tea (with honey) and finish setting up my home for the night.
I don't do dishes of course.........
garlic08
10-27-2008, 00:12
Pickle and I both had really fun AT through hikes this year without cooking. But that's just our style and sure, it's not for everyone. But don't knock it until you've tried it. Keep in mind stoveless hikers have hiked with a stove before and have decided it's better for them without. I chucked mine in No Cal on the PCT when I finally got tired of every variation of noodles and sauce, and started carrying fresher, better food instead of stove and fuel. The hiking got more fun after that, for me.
I met at least a dozen AT hikers this year without stoves.