Food-Please Help

[old hickory]

I plan on a starting a NB hike starting the third week of April. I plan on re-supplying along the trail. I feel confident that I’m prepared except for one of the most important issues-What do I eat to consume between 4000 and 5000 calories a day? Are there any good books out there that actually suggest what to eat for breakfast-lunch and dinner. What do I actually buy for five days between supply points. I guess what I’m looking for is a book that has a grocery list for a well balanced diet. This has me totally frustrated. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[bigcranky]

You'll eat what you can find in grocery stores, and you probably won't get 5000 kcal per day. That's why you'll be so hungry when you hit town. It's okay, though, since you can make it up at the AYCE pizza buffet.

Breakfast: pop tarts, granola, instant or quick oatmeal (add fruit and powdered whole milk), instant grits (add butter and cheese), bagels. Coffee -- instant or bags.

Lunch: anything you can spread on a tortilla or a bagel is lunch -- peanut butter and whatever, tuna (bring mayo packets), cheese, pepperoni and string cheese, jerky, a sub from Subway on the way out of town, energy bars, Snickers, gorp

Dinner: Liptons noodles/rice and sauce are popular -- add bags of chicken, tuna, salmon, clams. Mac and cheese -- add butter or olive oil. Ramen (I hate ramen). Couscous dinners. Thai noodle soups. Anything you can cook in a single pot is good. In summer I just repeat my lunch menu for dinner. Chocolate for dessert, or little debbies or moon pies.

Snacks: gorp can be anything you want -- nuts, dried fruit, jelly beans, whatever -- all in a ziploc bag. I like rice cracker mixes, more jerky, pretzels, Combos, M+M's, Snickers (cheaper than energy bars) -- all that junk in the nuts and pretzels aisle at the grocery store that you can't eat at home, you can eat on the Trail.

Just bring enough food for 3-4 days to start, and you'll get the hang of it when you see the selection at the first few stores.

[hobojoe]

$o.99 huney buns are like 500-750 calories

[Terry7]

Food is heavy!!! What and how much is all about how much weight you want to carry. I bought a new pack this year just so I can carry more food. I am cutting my gear weight as much as possible so I can carry more and better food. You will understand my thinking when you have been on the trail for aleast a month. There are times when all you think about is food. Good luck on your hike.

[Jan LiteShoe]

Some ideas that worked for me:

Carry a little squirt bottle of olive oil and add to your hot-pot meals, like chicken-and-mashed-potatoes, or Lipton's dishes. Olive oil is a "good fat" and will help up your caloric intake.

Avocados are also good to carry out if you like them and can find them.

Lots of folks carry out leftover pizza for the first evening meal , or a deli sandwich and such. In parts of NY and NJ, Land of the delis, you can eat town food three times a day.

Snack on nuts and dried fruit, besides candy bars.

Pay attention to your protein intake and get some every day (cheese, hard-boiled eggs, powdered milk, packaged tuna/chicken/salmon/turkey, jerky, etc).
Keep your weight up early on, because it will melt off in the heat and in the Whites/Southern Maine.
About half-way, I started carrying loves of fresh-baked crusty bread out of town - carbs! That and 8 oz. packs of cheddar, once I hit Vermont.
Don't forget your veggies. Not high calorie, most, but important for bodily repair.

[mountain squid]

bigcranky pretty much nailed it. That will be your diet for the next 5-6 months. To get those .99 prepackaged, calorie laden honey buns and other sugary breakfast items as hobojoe mentioned, stop at a convenience store. You usually won't find the individual items in a grocery store.



See you on the trail,
mt squid


PS. If you share your gorp (trail mix), 'pour' it into others hands - avoid filthy hands digging into your mix...(I usually pour it into my own hands, as well.)

[Fiddler]

If you want to find the caloric values of foods check these sites:
http://www.calorieking.com/
http://nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/
http://oc.edu/staff/philheffington/FoodCalories.htm
A lot of good info there.

[Blissful]

That's why most lose weight. Hard to maintain the calories for the energy spent. You do the best you can. At least you make up for it somewhat in towns, which are fairly frequent.

[RenoRoamer]

The most important food is carbohydrates. If you don't get enough carbs, your body will have to break down muscle protein to supply your brain with glucose and you will run out of energy. You cannot convert fat to glucose. The brain runs only on glucose and the muscles run only on glucose when oxygen deprived (climbing hills), so glucose is critical, but the body can't store very much glucose, which is why eating carbs is so important. Try to get at least 1200 Calories (300 grams) per day of carbs, but make sure you get them in a form that doesn't cause an insulin reaction, since this will cause the precious carbs to turn into fat. (What causes an insulin reaction varies based on metabolism, on how you eat, on when you eat, on what you eat, on how you cook the food, on how much you chew, whether you eat carbs mixed with protein, etc). Some people can eat pure sugar with no insulin reaction, while other people (diabetics, pre-diabetics, hypoglycemics) have to be very careful of to avoid insulin production. With some experience, you will learn to notice an insulin reaction in your body. And don't forget Vitamin C. Most other things (fat, protein, minerals, most vitamins) you can store on your body, so that you deplete your reserves while hiking and then rebuild reserves when you reach town.

The simplest way to reduce food weight is to eat a lot of fat, protein, fresh fruits and vegetables when you arrive in town, spend the night there, then eat a lot more of these same foods before leaving town, then eat mostly carbs plus a little protein on the trail. Insulin is a GOOD thing during town stops, because it helps build back your fat stores, so do the opposite of what you did on the trail to avoid insulin.

[Appalachian Tater]

After losing 8 ounces a day for a month, I started drinking powdered drink mixes. Fat is more concentrated calories but I can only eat so much fat. The powdered drink mixes are almost all sugar, pretty efficient as far as carbs go.

Another way I increased caloric intake was by eating peanut butter cups in cold weather, peanut butter M&Ms in hot weather.

[the_iceman]

Fat = Fuel
Yeah you need carbs but things like olive oil, summer sausage, etc give the best caloric bang per oz of weight. At some point your body decides it has dumped enough body fat and starts attacking muscle that is when the trouble begins.

Carbs burn fast and fat slows the burn rate so you don't get a flash burn plus you need the protein and fat to rebuild muscle. Carbs alone are an empty fuel and can spike you insulin levels.

Powdered whey protein (big jars Wal-Mart) became a must for me by the time I hit New England.

[rafe]

For what it's worth, here's a list of "candidates" for hiking food, that I made about 20 years ago:

Instant Coffee
Instant Milk
Instant Hot Chocolate
Instant Lemonade Mix
Cream of Rice
Oatmeal
Cold Cereal
Dried Pineapple
Dried Apricots
Fruit Leather
Raisins
Pop-Tarts
GORP
Sugar
Salt
Pepper
Margarine
Instant Soups
Freeze-Dried Entrees
Cheese
Canned Meats
Hard Salami
Beef Jerky
Pasta
Dehydrated Potatoes
Quick Rice
Bread / Rolls
Candy bars
Peanut Butter
Halvah
Cookies
Jelly
Instant Pudding
Popcorn

[Blissful]

We lost a ton of weight from Caratunk, ME on - didn't have adequate resupply and we were doing a lot of 20 plus miles. On Katahdin we look like bean poles, seriously. Food is critical and as I mentioned in another thread, severely overlooked compared to the time spent on gear prep. We used most of the month of Feb before our hike to work on food, drops, planning, etc. I've heard hikers say - I don't like to plan. Well, don't be surprised then if the hike turns out the way you did plan for it. I know a few people have completed the trail without any planning. But for me, planning, esp in food prep, worked. And without adequate food your body doesn't go anywhere, even with the fancy pack, down bag, and good shoes.

[Pennsylvania Rose]

Two great books to give you ideas are Freezer Bag Cooking by Sarah Svien (one of our own wbers), and The Well-Fed Backpacker by June Fleming. You can cook the freezer bag meals in a pot if you want. And, you don't have to make all your food ahead of time - just use the books for good ideas, and grab what you need at stores along the way.

[hopefulhiker]

One thing I did was mix Carnation instant breakfast with a little coffee.

Bagels and hard cheese are good.. Parmesagn keeps a long time.

Also I ate a lot of Snickers and Power Bar type things... About four a day.. You can make your own GORP on the trail...

I usually snacked on something about every two hours of hiking..

[TrippinBTM]

How do you notice a glycemic reaction? What are the signs?

The whey protein is a good idea tho, I may have to do some of that. (i'm skinny to begin with).

[TrippinBTM]

^^^i mean, insulin reaction

[Doctari]

It is really hard to carry "enough" calories. If all you ate was olive oil (280 cal / oz) you still need to carry 1.75 lbs per day to get the 5000 cal you are looking for. The big downside of eating straight olive oil is, well, it sort of passes right through you, at nearly the speed of light

BUT, adding olive oil to your meals will increase the total calories.
Also: adding drink mix, like Gatorade or Tang, to your water bottle can help.

Likely the best you can do is carry calorie dense foods, & really pig out in town. As to resupplying: practice before you hit the trail. Go to your gocery stores, look at the dried foods, take notes on the calorie to weight ratios. Shop "Mom & Pop" type stores to see what they have, that will likely give you an idea of what is avalable along the trail, and buy something!

Avoid things marked: "Fat free" or "Low calorie" etc.


Have a good hike!

[tenlots]

We sat on bagels and flattened them out, then packaged them separately. We bought peanut butter in squeeze containers, a little heavy, but oh so normal tasting. This year I am trying to think of something different. Thanks for the avacado and hard cheese idea!!

[ofthearth]

Some ideas that worked for me:

Carry a little squirt bottle of olive oil and add to your hot-pot meals, like chicken-and-mashed-potatoes, or Lipton's dishes. Olive oil is a "good fat" and will help up your caloric intake.

The Importance of Olive Oil

http://www.treelight.com/health/nutrition/OliveOil.html

info on olive oil