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What foods do you bring with you on long expeditions?

thunderseed

Paddler
Joined
May 14, 2014
Messages
106
I just need some ideas of what foods to pack on my 3 week trip. I'll be able to restock along the way.

I'll have my mini pocket rocket camp stove and lightweight cookware with plenty of fuel so I'll be able to cook real meals but it would be good to have easy snacks too. Jerky would be good but I have a problem with chewing it because it hurts my back teeth and there would be nothing worse than having a tooth ache in the middle of nowhere, unless I can find softer jerky somewhere.

I'm hoping to catch fish, collect clams, mussels and oysters and maybe eat some wild greens and berries if I can find any, but that's only if I can find any LOL.

I eat a lot of food and I have a very high metabolism, so I need to bring foods that are very high in calories for energy and high in protien to help repair muscles. I need lots of complex carbohydrates but the fact that I eat gluten free is sometimes problematic.

It's not like I can sit down and eat a giant pot of rice pasta while camping... or can I? All I really need is to pack the noodles, just bring olive oil for sauce, spices, a vegetable and I could even bring a block of cheese because cheese doesn't need to be refridgerated. Haha I can't live without cheese.
I guess I could always bring an ice cooler but a lot of vegetables and fruits don't even need to be refridgerated. The only things that really need to be kept cool are meats, milk and leafy greens. Apparently eggs don't need to be kept cool and apples should not be kept with other fruits because they make other fruits ripen faster.

Well I am interested in hearing what you guys bring with you!

Also, what do you do for drinking water when you are at places with only salt water? Just pack tons of bottled water? That would get so heavy and take up so much space in the kayak... considering I drink 2-4 litres of water a day.
I do have a mini water filter that I like to bring when I go exploring the wilderness, but what good does that do on the ocean LOL. I was thinking of building a portable solar still to make salt water drinkable but I'm not exactly sure how and the process probably takes forever.
 
thunderseed said:
Also, what do you do for drinking water when you are at places with only salt water? Just pack tons of bottled water? That would get so heavy and take up so much space in the kayak...
Yes....
But not commercial bottled water (for me, anyway). Containers filled with tap water or filtered fresh water from streams, etc..
I like to use 'soft' water 'bottles'/bladders - like the Platypus or soft Nalgene ones for smaller quantities and MSR Dromedary bladders for larger quantities. You could definitely get away with re-used plastic containers if you were careful.
The flexible containers lie in the bottom of the boat and 'stay put' reasonably well if other gear is packed on top.
I have some attachment points inside the compartment(s) so I can tie down the water bladders with shock cord.
I don't know what attachment points might be available in your folder.
It does add weight to the boat, but that's not always a bad thing in terms of stability.
Water is just part of the planning process, and on a longer trip you definitely want to make a note of where water is available.

BTW, I thought there was a water pump on Wallace (near Conover Cove?) though I haven't actually used it. I think the BC Parks website has info about Wallace, Pirates Cove, etc. .
 
thunderseed said:
It's not like I can sit down and eat a giant pot of rice pasta while camping... or can I?/quote]

It depends on how hard you have been working! :)
You might be surprised.
How much variety do you need in your diet? Repeating dinner choices every few days, and eating the same breakfast every day helps with the planning if you are happy with that....

There are lots of websites like http://www.trailcooking.com/ with 'backpacking food' recipes. I find that most of the 'kayak cooking' stuff is a bit 'upscale' for my taste or depends on fresh-caught seafood, etc.. Happy searching!

Just cruise the grocery store aisles with 'camping eyes' and you may find quite a few edibles that will work.
BTW, I'd advise trying as many recipes as possible at home before you go.

I haven't eaten freeze-dried food for 35+ years and I've spent a fair bit of time camping.
 
JohnAbercrombie said:
thunderseed said:
Also, what do you do for drinking water when you are at places with only salt water? Just pack tons of bottled water? That would get so heavy and take up so much space in the kayak...
Yes....
But not commercial bottled water (for me, anyway). Containers filled with tap water or filtered fresh water from streams, etc..
I like to use 'soft' water 'bottles'/bladders - like the Platypus or soft Nalgene ones for smaller quantities and MSR Dromedary bladders for larger quantities. You could definitely get away with re-used plastic containers if you were careful.
The flexible containers lie in the bottom of the boat and 'stay put' reasonably well if other gear is packed on top.
I have some attachment points inside the compartment(s) so I can tie down the water bladders with shock cord.
I don't know what attachment points might be available in your folder.
It does add weight to the boat, but that's not always a bad thing in terms of stability.
Water is just part of the planning process, and on a longer trip you definitely want to make a note of where water is available.

BTW, I thought there was a water pump on Wallace (near Conover Cove?) though I haven't actually used it. I think the BC Parks website has info about Wallace, Pirates Cove, etc. .

Okay thanks, I'll check into those soft water bladder things! I didn't think of the water bottles rolling around LoL.
On the website I went to it said something along the lines of "warning to visitors, no drinking water available on Wallace Island". I'll have to look into it more, it would be great if there was water available there, then I won't have to pack so much during the first part of my trip.
 
JohnAbercrombie said:
thunderseed said:
It's not like I can sit down and eat a giant pot of rice pasta while camping... or can I?/quote]

It depends on how hard you have been working! :)
You might be surprised.
How much variety do you need in your diet? Repeating dinner choices every few days, and eating the same breakfast every day helps with the planning if you are happy with that....

There are lots of websites like http://www.trailcooking.com/ with 'backpacking food' recipes. I find that most of the 'kayak cooking' stuff is a bit 'upscale' for my taste or depends on fresh-caught seafood, etc.. Happy searching!

Just cruise the grocery store aisles with 'camping eyes' and you may find quite a few edibles that will work.
BTW, I'd advise trying as many recipes as possible at home before you go.

I haven't eaten freeze-dried food for 35+ years and I've spent a fair bit of time camping.

Thanks for the link!

Oh I actually have no problem eating a full pot of pasta when I'm active, I was just thinking if it's possible to bring and cook pasta while camping, I never thought of it as a possible camping food is all. It would be awesome because pasta noodles are very light and quite compact, I could pack a lot of pasta with me! I am going to bring some oils too, olive oil for cooking, soap, and toothpaste, coconut oil for a natural sunscreen, and castor oil because it's good for healing many things when put on skin.

I actually don't like variety LoL. I usually eat the same thing for days until I tire of it and decide to get groceries to make a lot of something else for days and it's not that I'm unwilling to try new things, I just never know what to try LOL.
I'm the type of person who always orders the same thing at a restaurant too. I can count the number of recipes that I enjoy on both hands and I despise cooking, so my meals are often simple.
I think that the "eat right for your blood type diet" is accurate for me seeing as I'm O Positive, I don't know if that's just a coincidence or not, but just like it says, I can't eat wheat and I was able to drink dairy when I took probiotics for a year, I can digest meat very easily and need more of it than most people and don't actually need a lot of vegetables.

These are the only meals I really know of and enjoy:
- Pasta
- Raw steak, mashed potatoes, cooked vegetables
- Sushi or raw salmon or raw tuna with avocado
- Tuna melts or lunch meat sandwiches with a spicy curry vegetable soup
- Nachos or Corn chips with fresh avocado/lime cheese dip
- Curry Chicken and Rice with broccoli
- Rice crackers with swiss cheese and canned sardines
- Cooked seafood (i like all seafood!) with raw greens and rice (I could take a huge box of rice)
- Shepards Pie

And for breakfast I usually just eat eggs and toast sometimes with a raw steak, or oatmeal and milk, but if I'm not as hungry I just drink juice from raw veggies and fruits, or smoothies. Sometimes I go out to a restaurant and get a pan fry skillet, I love those but never have patience enough to make them LoL.
I could take eggs with me but I'm worried about them breaking. Having eggs while camping would be just awesome though, so easy to cook too.
If my gluten free bread would last for a long time I'd be all set on my trip but it goes bad really fast and I doubt I'd be able to restock it because it's not easy to find. Maybe I'll just take potatoes and make hashbrowns along with the eggs or something. Potatoes are good and last a very long time.
 
Instant hot cereal for breakfast. I like instant Cream of Wheat with some dried cranberries. Obviously wouldn't work for you, but oatmeal...?

Lunch is usually a sandwitch with a bagel I have crushed flat at home (to save space) with good salami and cheese. Never get tired of that unless it is like a 2+ week trip. Then I may mix it up with ramen on cold days. Again, crushed ahead of time.

Dinner is invariably one of the superb 2-portion entrees from packitgourmet.com (that I can finish by myself with relish as I also have 'caloric needs'). Awesome stuff. Shepherds Pie, Tuscan Beef Stew, Bangers And Mash, Chicken and Dumplings, Texas State Fair Chili, Chicken Gumbo.... all totally awesome and easy to prepare with only boiling water.

Various snacks during the day like trail mix, energy chews (like those from Honey Stinger), and Payday bars.

For desert it's dark hot chocolate with 100 proof peppermint schnapps (Yukon Jack Permafrost). F**k yeah. :)

Same stuff when I go backpacking. Suits all my solo outdoor adventures.

No idea on the water question. In coastal Alaska fresh water is never scarce.
 
Philip.AK said:
Instant hot cereal for breakfast. I like instant Cream of Wheat with some dried cranberries. Obviously wouldn't work for you, but oatmeal...?

Lunch is usually a sandwitch with a bagel I have crushed flat at home (to save space) with good salami and cheese. Never get tired of that unless it is like a 2+ week trip. Then I may mix it up with ramen on cold days. Again, crushed ahead of time.

Dinner is invariably one of the superb 2-portion entrees from packitgourmet.com (that I can finish by myself with relish as I also have 'caloric needs'). Awesome stuff. Shepherds Pie, Tuscan Beef Stew, Bangers And Mash, Chicken and Dumplings, Texas State Fair Chili, Chicken Gumbo.... all totally awesome and easy to prepare with only boiling water.

Various snacks during the day like trail mix, energy chews (like those from Honey Stinger), and Payday bars.

For desert it's dark hot chocolate with 100 proof peppermint schnapps (Yukon Jack Permafrost). F**k yeah. :)

Same stuff when I go backpacking. Suits all my solo outdoor adventures.

No idea on the water question. In coastal Alaska fresh water is never scarce.

Thanks for sharing, there are some good ideas here. Of course trail mix for snacks. That packitgourmet.com looks interesting, I wonder if I could just make something like that to take with me. I'd rather cook my own. How do you prepare them with just boiling water? Are they those dehydrated meals?

Edit: Nevermind, finally found where it says they are freeze dried and dehydrated LoL.
 
Burritos, based on the larger corn tortillas, use small cans of sliced olives, Chiles, salsa, add diced cabbage for roughage, mexican 4 cheese from supermarket. Tortillas keep well when stored near the hull. Handy for share a meal when others are around. Half a cabbage will keep for two weeks if kept cool in a mesh bag. Cans require no protection from the water and can be slid into the packed yak crannies.

Vacuum packs of salmon, tuna, etc are a good base for a meal, with a sauce pack and pasta and maybe some sliced ginger and bell pepper. The latter are good for several days. Carrots, for a week or more.

Parboil quartered potatoes until they begin to soften slightly, maybe 10 minutes, then slice and saute. Save excess parboiled spuds for breakfast with cheese on top.

Instant potato mixes are hearty, come in 4 different varieties, need a little butter or olive oil, and a bit of milk. Soy milk works, and available in 8 oz packs. Supplement with fish or a can of chicken or tuna.

Consider grits if you can find them. Ditto cous cous as a quick cereal in the morning.

At a natural food store, check the bulk foods section for tabouli mix and refried beans pinto or black. The beans reconstitute quickly and you are by yourself in the tent anyway, no? No worries. The beans are good rolled up in a tortilla with some cheese.
 
thunderseed said:
Edit: Nevermind, finally found where it says they are freeze dried and dehydrated LoL.
The packitgourmet stuff is not anything like Mountain House or your normal crappy freeze dried fare. It's actual food with complex taste, good texture (with adequate rehydration time), and an overall positive tummy satisfaction. I love to cook at home, but when I'm on an expedition, I put all my effort into traveling. On trips, I don't fish or collect wild foods other than some salmonberries, etc, because by the time I'm off the water I'm usually ravenous. The ease and quality of their freeze dried meals may make your home prep alternative seem like a questionable effort. I understand the make-it-yourself impulse, but get a few different 2-portion entrees and see if they don't win you over. Nothing else I have experienced comes close. I usually will try a new meal at home or on a quick overnighter to see if it's up to snuff. Not ALL their food thrills me, but the ones I mentioned earlier are now staples on all my trips.

They do have a pretty impressive inventory of freeze dried ingredients you can order if you still have a hankering to create your own culinary masterpiece.
 
Astoriadave said:
Burritos, based on the larger corn tortillas, use small cans of sliced olives, Chiles, salsa, add diced cabbage for roughage, mexican 4 cheese from supermarket. Tortillas keep well when stored near the hull. Handy for share a meal when others are around. Half a cabbage will keep for two weeks if kept cool in a mesh bag. Cans require no protection from the water and can be slid into the packed yak crannies.

Vacuum packs of salmon, tuna, etc are a good base for a meal, with a sauce pack and pasta and maybe some sliced ginger and bell pepper. The latter are good for several days. Carrots, for a week or more.

Parboil quartered potatoes until they begin to soften slightly, maybe 10 minutes, then slice and saute. Save excess parboiled spuds for breakfast with cheese on top.

Instant potato mixes are hearty, come in 4 different varieties, need a little butter or olive oil, and a bit of milk. Soy milk works, and available in 8 oz packs. Supplement with fish or a can of chicken or tuna.

Consider grits if you can find them. Ditto cous cous as a quick cereal in the morning.

At a natural food store, check the bulk foods section for tabouli mix and refried beans pinto or black. The beans reconstitute quickly and you are by yourself in the tent anyway, no? No worries. The beans are good rolled up in a tortilla with some cheese.

Yum, these are good ideas, I like mexican food. Not a fan of cabbage but I'm sure it'll do the trick. Isn't cabbage and sauerkraut the main thing sailors used to eat back in the day, well along with rotting ham LoL? I'll definitely bring some carrots and potatoes those are excellent carbohydrates and nice filling root vegetables.
You'd think there would be enough wild greens to forage around those islands, but then again there's apparently weird vegetation that doesn't grow on vancouver island. Grits... I could eat that because it seems to be made of corn but I'm not sure about cous cous.
Haha yeah I'll be alone so I should be able to eat some refried beans.
 
Philip.AK said:
thunderseed said:
Edit: Nevermind, finally found where it says they are freeze dried and dehydrated LoL.
The packitgourmet stuff is not anything like Mountain House or your normal crappy freeze dried fare. It's actual food with complex taste, good texture (with adequate rehydration time), and an overall positive tummy satisfaction. I love to cook at home, but when I'm on an expedition, I put all my effort into traveling. On trips, I don't fish or collect wild foods other than some salmonberries, etc, because by the time I'm off the water I'm usually ravenous. The ease and quality of their freeze dried meals may make your home prep alternative seem like a questionable effort. I understand the make-it-yourself impulse, but get a few different 2-portion entrees and see if they don't win you over. Nothing else I have experienced comes close. I usually will try a new meal at home or on a quick overnighter to see if it's up to snuff. Not ALL their food thrills me, but the ones I mentioned earlier are now staples on all my trips.

They do have a pretty impressive inventory of freeze dried ingredients you can order if you still have a hankering to create your own culinary masterpiece.

That's cool, it does the trick. I can see why something fast would be desirable. I know the feeling of wanting something quick rather than taking the effort to hunt or prepare it myself, but for that reason I'll just bring some snacks to hold me off.
There's just a few reasons why I would rather not go the freeze dried route personally, enjoying cooking is not one of them LoL because I just hate cooking: It's because I can't afford it and it's a lot cheaper to just bring real food that I have to prepare myself, you know getting all the things necessary to be safe on this trip is costing me a lot in the first place, also I prefer to eat all organic, which I'm probably going to have to get over when restocking at random grocery stores because I doubt they will have an organic section, and lastly freeze drying kills of some nutrients. I mean, I even eat my meat mostly raw because getting proper nutrients from my food is important to me. Having it cooked and then freeze dried and then boiled in hot water again would destroy tons of nutrients.
I like survival outdoors but I don't want to have to lower my food standards LoL. I guess those ready made packaged meals are super popular to outdoor explorers, maybe because they are fast but I'm in the mindstate that fast easy food is not necessarily healthy all of the time.
I mean I can understand freeze dried berries and fruits to last over the winter when you are in a rut but if it's not winter and you are in a giant ocean or a giant forest, which is like a giant refridgerator full of seafood and edible seaweeds or in the case of a forest full of animals (which is unrealistic considering hunting restrictions) and wild edibles, it's not a necessary cost because food is so abundant during the nice seasons around here.

I'd rather bring my fishing rod, some crab traps, go collect oysters, find some wild greens and berries, it's all part of the adventure for me. That's literally eating like a rich person for free in my eyes. I'll bring some real food and snacks to eat if I can't find any and in case I get injured and can't go find any, but I sure hope I can, I think I'm looking forward to that the most. I used to love fishing when I was younger. I don't kayak just to get to point a to point b, I do it to explore and take my time so stopping to go fishing along the way isn't a big deal for me, especially if I see an area that has a lot of fish jumping. I am pretty sure I arranged my trip so that I can take my time.
Getting a kayak is a super good investment for me. Buying a frozen fish at the grocery stores here costs 30 dollars!!! I just can't afford that! So I'm going to feast a lot on seafood during my trip LoL.
Even when I get home, I'm going to go kayaking often to collect dinner, I think it will greatly lower my cost of groceries.
Yum, eating raw fish during this trip for sure. Might have to supplement with black walnut tincture after. Haha, sometimes I really do not care about parasites but I swear I have rarely eaten sushi grade fish and have never had any problems so far.
I actually got very sick after eating cooked salmon twice in a week recently, I think my body has become used to eating it raw.
 
There have been a couple threads recently describing various ways to simplify fishing out of a kayak cockpit. Vanislepaddler also put up a couple photos of his rig, based on a mooching reel, which reduces the bulk and backlash potential of a conventional casting reel. His is a high quality setup.

Dunno what the salmon possibilities are within the Gulf Islands. Might check the regs for closures. Not sure what the current status is for ling cod, for example.

Likely open fires will be off limits when you go, in case you were going to slow smoke or cook fish.

On gluten free carbo choices: cous cous is out, but grits and polenta are both OK. Is oatmeal OK?
 
Astoriadave said:
There have been a couple threads recently describing various ways to simplify fishing out of a kayak cockpit. Vanislepaddler also put up a couple photos of his rig, based on a mooching reel, which reduces the bulk and backlash potential of a conventional casting reel. His is a high quality setup.

Dunno what the salmon possibilities are within the Gulf Islands. Might check the regs for closures. Not sure what the current status is for ling cod, for example.

Likely open fires will be off limits when you go, in case you were going to slow smoke or cook fish.

On gluten free carbo choices: cous cous is out, but grits and polenta are both OK. Is oatmeal OK?

Oatmeal doesn't bother me, thank goodness.

I wasn't even planning on having fires, though it would be nice to learn how to slow smoke a fish LoL with a campfire. Don't you have to have a covered area to smoke it inside?

I haven't fished for a long time so I'll need to relearn it before I leave and I still need to go get a fishing licence. I was hoping to find a lightweight fishing pole, one that can possibly fold up and become compact.

Fisheries website isn't working for me right now so I can't see if there are any closures. I'll just go check with one of the fishing stores around here, they probably know.

Near Montague they allow fishing, but there is a permanent shellfish closure due to poor water quality within the harbour.
And there is a rockfish conservation area around there.
 
For water I bought a number of the wine-box bladders from Home hardware (about 3 bucks each and found in the homebrew aisle). I put those into a mesh laundry bag, with a hole cut out for the spout. Cheap and very durable, they will also form to the bottom of your hull. I have never had one leak, and there is absolutely no plastic taste from these bladders.

They hold 6 litres each.
 
Finn said:
For water I bought a number of the wine-box bladders from Home hardware (about 3 bucks each and found in the homebrew aisle). I put those into a mesh laundry bag, with a hole cut out for the spout. Cheap and very durable, they will also form to the bottom of your hull. I have never had one leak, and there is absolutely no plastic taste from these bladders.

They hold 6 litres each.

Nice, I love cheap ideas.
Just a little confused, did you put them all into one mesh laundry bag, or put each into its own mesh bag, and what is the purpose of the mesh bag?

That's pretty good, 6 litres might last me 2 days.
 
thunderseed said:
Nice, I love cheap ideas.
Just a little confused, did you put them all into one mesh laundry bag, or put each into its own mesh bag, and what is the purpose of the mesh bag?

That's pretty good, 6 litres might last me 2 days.

Each into its own mesh bag. They don't leak easily, and the pour spout is actually quite handy.

The mesh bag provides something that can easily be hung from a tree, and a little more protection from wear and tear.

D
 
Sabrina,

We use small mesh bags to corral veggies and give them room to breathe. Otherwise, they sweat and rot.

Also, a large mesh duffel is handy for ferrying gear from boat to tent site, and hung from a branch works as a drip dry station for dishes, etc., keeping rodents off your dinnerware. Nice thing about the mesh over an Ikea bag is it takes up very little packing space.
 
A lot of my on-the-water eating strategies are informed by racing as much as backpacking. Take some old plastic spice containers with flip-top lids, cut off/out the perforations so it's a wide mouth dispenser, and fill it with stuff. If you have problems with chewy food, crush up things like Pringles, yam or sweet potato chips, pita chips, dried lentils/garbanzos (often available spiced)...these things give a salt kick as well as flavor and carbs. We dehydrate our own jerky so we can make it the texture we want, and control the sodium levels, too. But crushed dry snacks totally works well, and many small containers keeps the variety high. GORP/trail mix remains a mainstay of our snack rotation.

Breakfast is usually granola mixed with oatmeal and a little milk and coconut powder. Lunch is either cold sandwiches (cheese and bread, mostly) or a hot meal that sits in a 16 ounce thermos from breakfast until lunch to rehydrate: Ramen and pasta works well, and is great on cold, rainy days as a morale boost. Dinner is dehydrated home meals, often from http://www.trailcooking.com/ and Sarah's other books.

I always carry one extra days' supply of water than I think I'll use. On the West Coast between Brooks and Nuchatlitz, I carried 4 days' worth of water. This provided a little luxury supply for washing and extra coffee, and was just one extra thing I didn't have to worry about. Pro tip: That extra day of water can be unfiltered, and you can use it for washing or cooking.
 
atomick said:
A lot of my on-the-water eating strategies are informed by racing as much as backpacking. Take some old plastic spice containers with flip-top lids, cut off/out the perforations so it's a wide mouth dispenser, and fill it with stuff. If you have problems with chewy food, crush up things like Pringles, yam or sweet potato chips, pita chips, dried lentils/garbanzos (often available spiced)...these things give a salt kick as well as flavor and carbs. We dehydrate our own jerky so we can make it the texture we want, and control the sodium levels, too. But crushed dry snacks totally works well, and many small containers keeps the variety high. GORP/trail mix remains a mainstay of our snack rotation.

Breakfast is usually granola mixed with oatmeal and a little milk and coconut powder. Lunch is either cold sandwiches (cheese and bread, mostly) or a hot meal that sits in a 16 ounce thermos from breakfast until lunch to rehydrate: Ramen and pasta works well, and is great on cold, rainy days as a morale boost. Dinner is dehydrated home meals, often from http://www.trailcooking.com/ and Sarah's other books.

I always carry one extra days' supply of water than I think I'll use. On the West Coast between Brooks and Nuchatlitz, I carried 4 days' worth of water. This provided a little luxury supply for washing and extra coffee, and was just one extra thing I didn't have to worry about. Pro tip: That extra day of water can be unfiltered, and you can use it for washing or cooking.

Awesome ideas, think I might crunch up some dry things for snacks. I'm definitely going to learn how to dehydrate jerky before I leave LoL, then I can make it more tender.
If I could bring bread I would but my gluten free bread doesn't last long at all, and the slices are so small I'd have to eat a full loaf with sandwhiches to be full LoL.
 
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