Live to eat…

I guess I am in both camps, so to speak. I eat healthy to live (because I'm diabetic) and I live to eat because I enjoy good food with good flavors and wouldn't be able to choke down ramen (ate too much of that as a broke university student).

I love the sound of the hard cheese and Chinese mustard. A month ago I might have said "ewwww" and grimaced but my dear friend just opened a cheese shop. Two weeks ago she had me try a cheese called "Red Dragon" and it is a mustard cheese. Yummy. I'm going to try the hard cheese with mustard for lunch sometime when we are out on the trail.

Yummy on the dessert too – you could even carry in a crepe to go with that (you can buy them pre-packaged like tortillas sometimes) – or a piece of pound cake (toasted on the pot lid of course). Even on their own the berries would be delicious.

Now cut that out! You are making my mouth water! :P

Eating is 3/4 the reason to hike ;-)

Good food is only increased by how pretty the scenery is. Do ya ever add brandy or similar to your berries? Oinks!

When I was a drummer in a Revolutionay War reenactment regiment we used to say the hobby was just "another excuse to drink".

Sometimes I think backpacking is just "another excuse to eat well".

But seriously, you two have given me great recipies and tips that have made my backpacking much more enjoyable. At the end of a tough trail or a rainy day the prospect of a great meal makes the pack a bit lighter in those last miles.

Keep up your important work, and thanks.

I prefer to call it "Extreme Picnicking"

;-)

Thanks…

"At the end of a tough trail or a rainy day the prospect of a great meal makes the pack a bit lighter in those last miles."

This sounds so much like something I would say – lol.

With that in mind… I'm off to dehydrate some food for my next wilderness trip and for the workshop I am teaching next week.

"I'm off to dehydrate some food for my next wilderness trip and for the workshop I am teaching next week."

I hope your students don't complain that it is a dry subject.

–B.G.–

lol… that's funny Bob!

Yes, I've heard that they actually taste sort of like almonds. But, like all foods if you havent eaten it before and then you consume too much you may get sick.

I have a pantry full of food which I take out backpacking and it is food which is not eaten while I am at home as I do not want to get used to it or tired of it, so I save it for the trail. This includes my Tasty Bite collection, pouches of beans and rice (Seeds of Change), baked tofu pouches and assorted granola bars (probars, etc). When I start a trip therefore I am carrying stuff "new" to my palate and desired. For this reason I never eat oatmeal at home, so it becomes a treat on the trail.

I may even fast a few days before a trip just to get my tongue primed and my body relaxed and ready for a "feeding frenzy" once a trip begins.

I like it!

I'm on the live to eat side, and it shows a bit. |=)

Walter… baked tofu pouches? Now I am intrigued. Please tell me a little about these.

I tend to eat some of the same foods we'd eat at home I just bump up the caloric intake. We are a small family of four and there are often leftovers. For example, the quinoa and bean stuffed peppers I made a few weeks ago. I chopped the peppers up and put the food on the dehydrator and then into the freezer for a wilderness trip we are taking in August. I tire of leftovers easily at home so this works out well and it means I'm not tossing something furry into the composter when I do the weekly fridge clean-out. It's also time and cost-effective.

How do you like the Seeds of Change products? I haven't had a chance to test them and was curious.

You can find baked tofu in sealed pouches in nearly any grocery store or in natural food stores, they are sold in the fresh produce section, next to the regular tofu. Depending on the brand it is either baked, smoked or can be a sprouted version as well.

"You can find baked tofu in sealed pouches in nearly any grocery store…"

… in Seattle.

Not around here!

You gotta ask! If you bug the manager of a department enough they sometimes will order it! And btw, I have found it all over the US – again, it is often well hidden!

Here's my favorite—

This is an elusive product but I found a bunch at a big whole foods market outside Knoxville. Of course it "must" be refrigerated but I had several packs last 19 days on my last trip (in June) with no spoilage, or at least I ate it anyway.

Tempeh is another fairly good soy product that keeps very well on the trail and can be fried up in olive oil and soy sauce just like tofu. It is often found nowadays at grocery stores. Here's the Wildwood website:

http://www.pulmuonewildwood.com/baked.asp

Wildwood is soooo good!