Cold food ideas?

[silverfox]

I'm only going to be out on the the trail a couple of nights. Any suggestions for dinner not requiring a stove?

[Dow]

I was thinking of cold foods myself. The more I think about the more I might get sick. If we spend most of the time eating like fine Americans and all of a sudden, we change our diet with a heavy pack and a tight belt, I would think we might get stomach problems.

[daddytwosticks]

How about sandwiches/wraps/bagels centered around cheese and pepperoni or cheese? Some of my favorite cold dinners on the trail. :)

[Rocket Jones]

Summer Sausage, crackers, olives. Hummus. Hard boiled eggs. Peanut butter on apple slices.

[garlic08]

Tortillas pack well and you can wrap almost anything in them. Cheese works well for days even in hot weather. Peanut butter lasts a long time. Instant mashed potatoes work OK with cold water for some. Ramen is already cooked and can be eaten like a big cracker without the package of whatever it is. Cold cereal with powdered milk is OK anytime, especially whole grain muesli. Try dried hummus sometime with crackers. Fig newtons are good.

I hiked half the PCT and the entire CDT, AT, and AZT without a stove and my hiking days got better because of it.

There are a few other threads on this forum about stoveless hiking. Use the search function and read up.

[Rocket Jones]

You can now get foil packs of seasoned chicken and steak for stuffing tortillas. Look near the "taco kits" in the grocery store.

[silverfox]

Thanks so much everyone. These are some great ideas and a lot more variety than I had anticipated:)

[EastCoastFeastCoast]

I love peanut butter and honey on tortillas. Packed full of good stuff and easy to eat. Pretty much anything with honey is good. Powdered milk with cereal is a lot better than you think it is, just choose a good cereal (I like corn pops / honey nut cheerios with... you guessed it, honey!) Turkey jerky is low in sodium/fat and a good snack food. Good nuts (cashews, pistachios, brazil nuts, almonds) are also tasty.

Someone on this forum once said something along the lines of- If you would enjoy it at home, you will probably enjoy it on the trail. Look in the pantry! Tuna fish from foil packets is good as well. Cheese will keep for a while even in 90degree heat (harder cheeses keep better, just wipe off the oily residue). I personally hate the chicken from foil packets, has no flavor at all. Bagels (cinnamon raisin) are mighty tasty on their own as well. I look for foods with high flavor content and good nutrition value.


Oh and duh... cheez-its and pop tarts!!!



Happy Hangin'
Ben

[EastCoastFeastCoast]

I also love beef summer sausage, forgot that.


I pay attention to 2 things-

Sodium - just try to keep it down. With all the hiking it's ok to go over a little, but a lot of stable foods have high sodium content.
Protein- the more the merrier

Carbs are easy to come by.
Sugar/fat don't really bother me when I'm hiking.

[EastCoastFeastCoast]

Oreos.... double stuff oreos



Sorry I'm rambling now

[Double Wide]

Oh and duh... cheez-its and pop tarts!!!



Cheez-its are especially badass when sprinkled with Cholula hot sauce!

[daddytwosticks]

Don't forget Fritos Corn Chips...they double as great fire-starters too. :)

[ScottP]

Tabouleh--mix fresh herbs in with the olive oil+lemon juice and dried veggies in with the bulgur
dehydrated hummus +pita or some sort of corn chip
oatmeal doesnt need to be cooked: add powdered milk, sweetener, fruit, and nuts and you have a good meal
I make yam-jerky that is pretty awesome

[Blissful]

I make yam-jerky that is pretty awesome

Recipe? Sounds interesting.

[ScottP]

clean (keep peels on), and slice into 3/8" strips

Toss in olive oil, lemon juice, cracked pepper, kosher salt/sea salt(lots of it), and rosmary

par-cook at 325

dehydrate

[silverfox]

Lots great ideas! Think I'll try the tortilla wraps with pb and honey and also pb and nutella. Going to try to throw in some fruit since I'll only be out 2 days.

Scott, do you use a dehydrator for your yam jerky? I'd like to try the tabouleh and yam jerky next time when I have more prep time.

[ScottP]

I use a dehydrator. If you're only going to be out for a few days you can probably get away with not dehydrating them.

[Nutbrown]

I packed tortillas, cheddar cheese and peperoni. My girlfriends made fun of me, but I had awesome pizza for lunch/snack every day.

[Serial 07]

bagels and cream cheese and tomato basil wheat thins...

[TinAbbey]

one of my favorite no cook breakfasts is bagel, cream cheese ( the whipped kind if you want) and strawberry jam/jelly from the squeeze bottle on top. and just do both the bagel halves that way.

[Spokes]

If you look closely at the way a Ramen Noodle block is formed you'll notice it shaped like a "U". Take the handle of your camp spoon and crack it open like shucking an oyster shell leaving two sections.

Spread Nutella, peanut butter, or heck even sardines and make it into a sandwich- Yum.

[fadeleaf]

Idahoan instant mashed potatoes mixed in cold water.
Tastes just as good cold as hot IMO

[vamelungeon]

Spam singles. Hard boiled eggs.

[Spokes]

Spam singles. Hard boiled eggs.

Add a beer and call it a Molotov Cocktail!

[Just a Hiker]

Spam singles. Hard boiled eggs.

Same here....when I go "stoveless", I make a bagel sandwich with Spam singles and cheese. I'll usually put sliced jalapenos on it and mustard or mayo from condiments packets that I save from fast food places.

[EJC]

That's what I do too, my favorite. I used the individual Boboli sauce packs, or use powdered pizza sauce and rehydrate, plus I used moz. string cheese.

[EJC]

Also, tuna salad (tuna packets with mayo, I think some places have them prepackaged, you can do it with chicken too), or chicken packets mixed with bbq are pretty good. I ate pudding a lot too.

[Espero]

I like pita bread and instant hummus. Fantistic World Foods and Casbah Natural Foods are good brands.

[vamelungeon]

Same here....when I go "stoveless", I make a bagel sandwich with Spam singles and cheese. I'll usually put sliced jalapenos on it and mustard or mayo from condiments packets that I save from fast food places.
I can't do the jalepenos but I do pack the condiment packs. Great free resource!

[Grinder]

I met Pacer in ME, a 60 something who was hiking stoveless.

He ate oatmeal twice a day. That's it.

Had been out several months and looked none the worse for wear.

[ncmtns]

Fruitcake...heavy but Full of calories

[Pollen]

great ideas, specially the dried hummus. Has any one used bee pollen? I do use it often, but never as the only source of protein. Was planning on just taking nuts and dried fruits, maybe a few tuna pouches then just getting my fresh veggies in town.

[hambone5126]

for breakfast i like to whip up some instant oatmeal cold. i mix it with water and instant coffee mix, let it sit while i pack up camp, and my the time im ready i have oatmeal ready to go with minimal effort.

for lunch i love packing hard cheese and some cured meat like hard salami. fats+salt+protien

i did a cold dinner with couscous last month, the stuff fluffed right up after just sitting in water for a little while

[Fredt4]

1/2 smoked ham steaks, best trail food I had on the whole AT.

[Bear Cables]

bagels and cream cheese and tomato basil wheat thins...

how well does the cream cheese hold up?

[daddytwosticks]

I don't trust cream cheese for more than one day unless it is cold out. I try and bring the non-spreadable type. I once brought the spreadable Philly brand on a warmish spring hike...after one day it looked like a science project. It was barely edible. :)

[sbhikes]

The yam jerky sounds really interesting. I may have to try that.

I found some stuff at my health food co-op called coconut butter. I was looking for coconut creme. I think this might be similar or the same. The ingredient is just coconut. The label says not to refrigerate it. It looks like white wax with some flecks of coconut in it and they suggest using it as a spread (after warming it up a little bit). I was thinking it might be really tasty while backpacking. Perhaps make a sandwich with peanut butter or even tuna. If you were going with cooked food it would probably taste really good in oatmeal.

When I saw the yam jerky recipe I thought ooh, maybe I could spread the coconut butter on yam jerky.

[geomaniac]

The precooked bacon that is shelf stable is pretty good. I found some at my local Kmart. Try it with sun dried tomatoes in a wrap for a trail worthy BLT...just an idea.

[inxesoft3]

Thanks for you awesome idea.. Keep it up guys..

[Miami Joe]

1/2 smoked ham steaks, best trail food I had on the whole AT.What is this?

[SCRUB HIKER]

I did an entirely stoveless 1800-mile AT hike this year. My go-tos for dinner were:

- Idahoan instant potatoes. I did not have a problem eating them cold. My hiking buddies occasionally sampled them and expressed an explicit displeasure with the texture, so I can't guarantee it's for everyone. Throwing in an olive oil condiment packet or two, and/or a 2.5oz tuna packet improved it.

- Pepperoni/summer sausage and cheese on a bagel or bagel thin. Bagel thins are lighter and less bulky than bagels, but with a similar texture and taste. I would have two or three sandwiches for dinner. Often I was carrying a small plastic mustard bottle, like Jack Daniels or Inglehoffer's Stone Ground, to add some good flavor.

- Instant hummus on bagels or tortillas. Again, the olive oil packets help. You could probably add fruits or olives to this. A section-hiker in Tennessee gave me half an avocado and some cheese to go with this meal one night, and it was one of the best trail dinners I had the whole time.

- And for dessert: peanut butter and nutella. Originally I was putting these on bagels or tortillas, but I eliminated the bread-product step after awhile. A 2/3 PB, 1/3 Nutella spoonful tastes like a candy bar, but without the tiresome and calorie-wasting act of chewing.

Cheers,
Scrub

[Bianchi Veloce]

A few cans of Cheese Whiz.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXwvL7n7NCQ

[atraildreamer]

Oreos.... double stuff oreos

My idea of a perfect trail food: Oreos double stuffed with peanut butter! :rolleyes: (Nabisco, please take note.)