What is Ultra light Food?

[Tae Kim]

Are freeze dried food pack from Mountain House considered as UL?

[Greg Mihalik]

Sure.
It is light.
It requires only hot water.

As opposed to taking in fresh vegetables and a chicken and cooking up a stew.

[Lynn Tramper]

Twinkies, cotton candy and rice cakes could also be conisdered UL food, and have the added bonus that they don't require a stove and fuel to cook them…

OTOH, foods like nuts could be considered truly UL in that they provide a LOT of calories, yet also don't need cooking. So UL food realy emcompasses a broad range of foods and cooking styles, including freeze dried meals.

[Sarah Kirkconnell]

Sure, but the packing could be a lot lighter (and smaller!) ;-)

[Tae Kim]

What do you do with the left over foil pouch after you eat these freeze dried food? I always felt they were unnecessary weight.

Also, what do you all consider as the best brand of freeze dried food out there.

[Gary Dunckel]

That's what I've been doing for the past couple years. The #10 Mountain House tins are far cheaper than buying several 1-2 P packages. I also like to add other ingredients to their recipes, like FD peas, beans or corn, dehydrated onions or other veggies, and ground bison to a mac/cheese base, eg. Another thing you can do with the bulk cans is to make a meal as big or small as you like. In the winter, I like to pull out a stove and heat up maybe a 1/2 portion for a warm lunch. I just take 1-2 used MH foil zip-locs, and my meals are carried in regular quart freezer bags. By the way, it's hard to completely clean any MH bag that had a tomato based meal in it–there's a stain that remains. So I try to remember to take along one that's already been stained if I'm going to have lasagna, spaghetti, or chili mac.

[Dan @ Durston Gear]

What should the weight goal be for one UL meal? Is 2lbs/day a good goal (for an average male)? Or should I aim for 1.5 lbs?

[Sarah Kirkconnell]

Really it comes down to how much you eat and what you like – and then how much $$ and time you are willing to spend to get lighter versions of your favorite foods :-)

[David Drake]

I used to shoot for 100 Cal/oz. and take 2#/day = 3200 Cal. By checking labels carefully, adding in more nuts for snacks and using olive oil to boost calories, I can get about 130 Cal./oz average, and take 1.5# instead. For me, this is a calorie deficit for the hikes and pace I like–anything longer than a couple days and I lose noticeable weight, as much as 1#/day.

[Tae Kim]

Hey Gary

From their website, it says that the item in their can should be consumed within a week of their opening. So do you just eat one kind of mh food the whole trip?

[Gary Dunckel]

No, Kim, what I do is portion out my amounts and vacuum seal them, then store them in my cool basement, sealed in the #10 tin it came in. If I add perishable dehydrated meats like bison burger or diced bison sirloin, I store them in either the refrigerator (if I plan to use them within a couple months) or the freezer (for longer term storage, maybe up to a year). The key here is to experiment first with portion amounts before you commit to the vacuum sealing process. I also portion out and vacuum seal the dehydrated veggies from Harmony House, as well as their excellent freeze dried fruits. I should mention (and this was confirmed by Sarah K.) that Harmony House's dehydrated peas and corn don't readily rehydrate without significant boiling time, so I now go with MH for those 2 veggies. The rest of HH's veggies seem to quickly rehydrate for the freezer bag meal concept. If you like seafood chowder, be sure to consider MH's version. It's splendid, especially if you add a foil pack of salmon or crab to the mix for 2 people. And if you aren't into dehydrating your own meats, MH has chicken, beef, and burger that work well. Have fun with your experiment.

[Tae Kim]

I don't have a vaccum sealer. Do you think it will be good idea to instead of carrying all the MH foil package food in their own container, empty them out in a zip lock bag (i am assuming that zip lock bags are lighter than the foil pouch) and just use one foil pouch for reheating.

DOes this make sense to you all?

[Gary Dunckel]

Sure, that would work, but you'd be eating the same food meal after meal.

[Tae Kim]

i meant getting different foil packaged food and just emptying out the content in a zip lock bag considering that those foil pouches are heavier than a zip lock bag.

[Brad Groves]

It does not make sense to me. I'm not sure you'd notice the negligible weight difference between foil and ziplocs. Just adding waste to the world. Re-packaging makes sense if you're mixing up your meals or working from a larger volume to smaller.

[Gary Dunckel]

I agree with Brad. I just weighed an empty MH ProPak zip bag. It was .40 oz. A quart Zip-Loc bag is .25 oz. You won't save significant weight by transporting your meals in the Zip-locs. Also, keep in mind that the quart Zip-locs don't seem to be completely odor-free, unlike an unopened MH bag. I take MH Pro-Paks when I'm in griz country for this reason.

[Tae Kim]

sounds good, wait does that mean that unopend MT foil pouch is completely odor proof?

[Sarah Kirkconnell]

No. The packages do smell and as well, they have food scent on the outside. Chipmunks will be all over the packaged meals if you set them down ;-)

[Sarah Kirkconnell]

The reason behind consuming a #10 can within a week of opening is due to humidity. Once opened the freeze dried food is exposed to air and moisture – freeze dried foods will suck up moisture out of the air quickly. You can prevent this with Food vaccing, using desiccant packets or by sealing tightly and freezing.

While #10 cans are cheaper on average than individual meals they are more of a hassle – you need to measure or weight out the servings to be accurate in getting an even distribution of carbs/protein/sauce.

[Mark Regalia]

I figure on 2400 calories per day for myself. I can't eat more than that. I have tried. If it was from pure fat, say olive oil, that would be .6 lbs per day. From pure carbs that would be 1.3 lbs per day. Pure carbs without any water would be hard to find. Maybe dried out sugar, yech!

You get the idea. I find that one lb of carefully mixed trail mix will supply 2400 cal per lb. So in theory that should be your target. Everything else is luxury. Bring on the luxury.

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