Long term dehydration prep for a PCT thruhike

[Katy Y]

Howdy hikers,

I'm preparing for a PCT thruhike next year (2016) and I'd like to make as many of my own meals as possible. I'd also like to avoid a rush of "making all the food" in the weeks preceding my hike, so for the past month or so I've been doing a recipe out of Backpack Gourmet by Linda Yaffe, dehydrating it, vacuum sealing it, and tossing in my freezer. The freezer situation probably won't last long, I share my freezer with two roommates who have been remarkably patient with my weird food preservation saturdays, so I'd like to move the food out of the freezer.

What are the best ways to keep dehydrated/vacuum sealed food good for ~1.5 years? In her book Yaffe mentions that some of these recipes can be stored for 2-3 years (no mention of vacuum sealing) but I wanted to see if anyone here has experience making/storing lots of food for the times scales I'm talking about.

I've also been considering airtight buckets and oxygen absorbers, but should the oxy absorbers go in directly with the food? Any pitfalls I should be aware of?

Any/all tips appreciated! Also I scanned through this forum looking for an existing thread on this topic, apologies if I missed one I should have asked this on.

[Jerry Adams]

"Also I scanned through this forum looking for an existing thread on this topic, apologies if I missed one I should have asked this on."

Funny how some people are too lazy to search a bit : )

http://www.packitgourmet.com/trail-food-facts/fieldguide/articles/foodstorage.html

says freeze dried good for 24 months, dehydrated longer

keep away from light and heat as much as possible

since you're dehydrating, you may not remove water as completely as commercially dehydrated, so freezer is good idea.

Not in freezer – maybe put in sealed light proof bucket, throw in silica jell you can get from craft store. It comes in box so just open the box and put it the box in bucket. Packitgourmet sells tiny packets expensive.

I've been fooling around with dehydrating, and have stored in freezer, but I'm only doing a little and it doesn't last longer than 6 months or so before I eat it

I calculated that I can buy it from packitgourmet not that much more expensive than buying the produce and dehydrating myself

There must be some place you can get bigger quantities, like a #10 can, maybe a survivalist store, LSD, or FEMA

I like to dehydrate individual ingredients – onions, tomatos, peppers, beans with spices, then mix the dehydrated ingredients

Try some of your food at home. Rehydrate the same as if you were backpacking and see how it tastes.

[Dave T]

Unless you are doing it for a special diet, or other similar considerations, I might suggest against it. When I hiked the trail, we hiked for a long time with someone who had made all his meals for the trip, and had sent them all over the place. I think he wasn't even out of SoCal before he was sick to death of the food he had pre-made. And it's a huge logistical chore too (on the front end) and it's not always convenient to deal with Post Office hours for pickup (especially if you hit a town on a Saturday evening, and have to wait until Monday morning to get your food!).

I sent myself a few packages in California (I recall Mt. Laguna maybe, Kennedy Meadows, and Burney Falls?). And then in Ashland you go to the grocery store and the post office, and you send all the packages you need for Oregon. And in Cascade Locks you do it again for Washington (I recall). And done.

It's a long hike. It's nice to go into a grocery store and buy whatever sounds good to you at the moment. You will love some stuff, then hate it, then crave it again.

Anyway, just another view on the topic!

[Gary Dunckel]

Hi Katy. I have been dehydrating and vacuum sealing my meals for 6-7 years now, and this is easier than you think. I usually will keep my dehydrated meats in the freezer, or at least in the back of the refrigerator. Those are the most susceptible to spoilage, due to the fat content. If you are a meat-eater, I would suggest for you to do the dehydrating of sausage, etc. just a few months before your trip, and keep it in the freezer/fridge after vacuum sealing it. If a friend is sending you re-supply boxes, have him/her do the same. I expect that an unrefrigerated pack of meat would not spoil for maybe 2-3 weeks if kept out of the sun.

Most of my meals are made from freeze-dried ingredients, which are very stable for 4-5 years when vacuum sealed (I buy Mountain House's #10 tins and re-portion things into individual meals). My store-bought dehydrated ingredients, like veggies and fruits from Harmony House, seem fine over 3-4 years. The non-meat items I dehydrate myself, when vacuum sealed, remain good for at least a year, usually 2-3.

Using freeze dried or dehydrated ingredients allows one to create custom meals that pleases the palate. You can add your preferred spices, specific ingredients, and control the ratio of fat/carbs/protein and desired amount of calories–all at a rather low weight.

Here are some examples of my favorite meals, with calories, packaged weight, and calories per ounce carried:

1) A 15 oz. can of Stagg Silverado chili, dehydrated: 520 cal, 3.4 oz., 153 cal/oz.
2) 10 oz. of Bush's beans + 7 links of Hillshire Farm's Little Smokies sausage (all
dehydrated): 551 cal., 3.8 oz., 145 cal/oz.
3) Dehydrated Tasty Bites Jaipur veggies, FD chicken: 453 cal.,2.8 oz., 162 cal/oz.
4) FD mac/cheese + peas, dehydrated Spam: 542 cal., 3.7 oz., 159 cal./oz.
5) Mac/cheese, burger, peas (all FD): 495 cal., 3.5 oz., 141 cal./oz.

Freeze dried ingredients reconstitute quickly, of course. Most dehydrated items are slower, and need to be presoaked or simmered for a short while. To speed up the process, I cut the sausages and Spam into thin slices before dehydrating. My method of cooking can sometimes be a bit fuel intensive if I need to do a lot of simmering, which depends upon what the meal is. The Stagg chili, for example, requires that I fire up the stove for 30 seconds several times over 1/2 hour, and stir it, to properly rehydrate the goodies.

If you will only be doing freezer bag cooking, you will need to carefully choose your ingredients. Some things just don't rehydrate quickly. And don't forget the olive oil to boost the calories!

[Jerry Adams]

I boil water, turn down burner to low (to avoid scorching – not always successful), add ingredients, stir, put on lid, let it simmer for maybe 30 seconds, turn off, let sit for 5 minutes.

If you have a meal with a lot of cheese, for example, it's hard to clean out your pot. Otherwise, just rinse with water.

[Katy Y]

Thanks for the recipes Gary!

So far I've only been doing the vegetarian recipes (that's just the part of the book I'm currently in), but now I'll plan on saving the meat-recipes for the month or two before I start.

I've read about the food-fatigue people get on thruhikes so I'm going for a large variety of pre-made (specific recipes only repeated at most a few times), supplemented with grocery visits for new things and fresh veggies where it's convenient. I've looked into Harmony House and will probably pick up a few items for variety's sake and the time I'm sure to run out of in March next year. I'll look into the Mountain House tins. (I'll have a few Mountain House meals sprinkled in as well, LOVE that beef stroganoff)

I was hoping to do mostly FBC in an insulated cozy (I hate dishes), and the while few recipes that I've tested from Yaffe's book are meant to be simmered in a pot for a few minutes, I thought they they seemed to do fine in the FB+cozy combo. But those were mostly veggie meals, and ingredients weren't very chunky or dense. I'll be sure to test rehydration times for my chili and meat meals pre-PCT.

Do you transport the olive oil separately and then add while cooking on the trail? I've read on here that dehydrated oily recipes can turn rancid over long storage periods.

Sorry if my original question was indeed "lazy," but you can only get so far without consulting the pros!

[Gary Dunckel]

Yes, Katy, you need to carry the olive oil separately, and add it to the freezer bag at the last minute. It not only adds a lot of good fat calories, but it seems to make every meal rich and tasty. I have been experimenting with store-bought ghee for the past year, to learn how well it stores without refrigeration. I like the fact that it has even more calories/ounce than olive oil.

Regarding dehydrated veggies, the three to stay away from are peas, corn, and green beans. They don't seem to rehydrate very well at all. Peas are by far the worst. This might be why Mountain House only make/sells those three vegetables. I'm not a corn person, but I only use FD peas and green beans which I buy through Mountain House. All of the other dehydrated veggies that Harmony House sells work fine.

By the way, just down the road from Mountain House in Albany, Oregon is a Eugene, OR online retailer that sells MH food (and a couple other brands). It is called TheEpicenter.com. They tend to have great sales in maybe April. That's when I make my annual purchase of #10 tins. Get on their mailing list, so that you'll know when their sale happens.

On rare occasions TheEpicenter.com will also offer #10 tins of things that aren't available to the public through normal channels. They seem to be the only retailer that is authorized to sell government surplus FD food supplies. Although the unopened Mountain House #10 tins are said to have a shelf life of 30-40 years, the U. S. Government tends to rotate its stock of freeze dried things every 10-15 years. In recent years I have been able to buy jumbo shrimp (wonderful!), hamburger patties, and also uncooked pork chops.

Your roommates must think that you're a bit crazy. I know my friends and neighbors figure that I am. Most long time BPL members know that I'm a geek. So when I get bored with bending titanium or taping cuben, what do I turn to? Vacuum seal something tasty!

Good luck with your food quest, Katy. It's the one exercise in geekdom that actually yields fun (and tasty) results.

[John Almond]

For the last few years, I've been cooking and dehydrating perhaps 1/2 to 2/3s of my trail meals (and the ones that weren't home-made were still individually portioned). I'm currently trying to get away from that, for a couple of reasons:

1.) Being able to walk into a grocery store (or even a gas station) on a longer hike and know what and how to purchase to ensure a variety of tasty, moderately nutritious, high-calorie, easy to make (FBC is my main method) meals is an whole lot easier than trying to meet a set schedule of mail drops. I want to be able to, on a thru, make my own schedule rather than having to stay with a set one. I've found that, in my day-to-day life, this makes me happier, and I can't see it not carrying over to the trail. (Note that I have one, count 'em, one thru under my belt–and that one was over 76 miles in four days. This is theoretical until I hit the trail some time in the next five years; I've set that goal for an ECT thru.)

2.) It allows me to carry less food on trail (and, therefore, less total weight), except where trail towns are far enough apart that stopping every few days to resupply is prohibitive. I've found that, in my endurance training, 3 days up, 1 day down is a schedule that works for me. Some times it's 2 days up, 2 days down. Some times it's 4 days up, 1 day down. But it's almost never more than 4 days at a clip. This means that I can carry 2 to 4 days' food rather than a full week's worth (which is the average I would want to do, given the hassle of stopping at a post office for a bounce box or package).

About the only thing I would recommend dehydrating and sending ahead (as it's hard to find in most grocery stores) is some form of dehydrated ground meat (beef or turkey, for preference). You can substitute store-bought low-sodium beef or turkey jerky for this, but that requires the work of shredding it into portions for rehydration. Which is more hassle than I want on trail.

Of course, YMMV here. Do whatever you think is going to make you happy; this is just a recognition of how my personality works and a method to support that.

Hope it helps!

[Eric Blumensaadt]

BTW, on a related topic.

I dehydrate spaghetti sauce in 1 cup portions, The "leather" is placed in a ZipLoc sandwich bag and I freeze it. A day later I remove it and crumble it into flakes then replace in the freezer. In the 'fridge it lasts about 2 months, in the freezer it's still good a year later. (Using the smell test here. ;o)

I break spaghetti noodles in half & put in a quart freezer bag B/C it will puncture a lighter sandwich bag.
When re-constituting the sauce I add some dried mushrooms.

The prepared sauce goes in my light plastic bowl (cut-down ZipLoc bowl) over the already prepared spaghetti. This is just one reason I carry a bowl to supplement my pot.

A pasta meal dinner like this is a high energy meal for the next day's tough (i.e. very mountainous) hike.

[Kristina Woolf]

Love this…Just did a training HIKE with 3 days of food..Heavy!
The thought of spending months dyhydrating food..not sure I want to do that..Maybe a little..

I love everything all the pro's have to say!!

Great info!
K

[Thomas Conly]

I know this thread is kinda old but I thought I might throw my two cents in. I thru-hiked the AT in 2011 and saw a lot of people getting tired/throwing out food that they had prepared ahead of time. A thru-hike is a long time and you never know how your tastes, preferences, patience, cooking abilities, etc. are going to change. On the one hand, people get food fatigue. On the other hand, just as many people became obsessed with the same meal over and over again. Example: I ate a lot of pop tarts. I got so sick of them after three weeks. I didn't eat any for a month or so. I then became obsessed with them and ate two pop tarts practically every day for the rest of the trip. Go figure.

In fact, I met one couple (who finished the trail, for the record) who had made and mailed enough meals for the first half of the trail. They barely rehydrated properly and the food was pretty awful. They also sent themselves waaay too much.

I did do one thing that was awesome though. I dehydrated just ground meats, beans, lentils and veggies. I did some ground beef and mixed up different sausage meats. I got a local butcher to do several pounds of ground turkey and pork mixed together and divided it into batches. I then mixed in seasonings for the following and cooked it: bratwurst, chorizo, italian, breakfast and garlic. I added bread crumbs to the meat to help it rehydrate. I also dehydrated cans of baked beans and cans of cooked lentils. Both worked really well. (baked beans mixed with dried mashed potatoes are amazing!)

I also dehydrated frozen veggies. The mixed veggies are already cut and blanched so they are perfect! Just throw them in the dehydrator frozen (they thaw out pretty quickly) and they rehydrate wonderfully. I did mixed veggies (carrots, peas and corn), green beans, mixed asian veggies (snap peas, water chestnuts, bamboo, peppers and onions) and a Mediterranean mix that didn't rehydrate as well. All the other veggies rehydrated really well, so I was surprised to see that someone said that green beans and peas don't work. Maybe the frozen ones work better?

The nice thing about just dehydrating proteins and veggies is that you can still buy food at the grocery store, but you can add that extra something that makes the meal more nutritious and delicious. I basically ate ramen with meat and veggies for the second half of my hike. I was, and still am, convinced that ramen is the greatest camping food every created. It's impossible to mess up, it takes no time at all, and it's delicious.

The best thing about just dehydrating those few things was that it was relatively brainless and I did it all in the few weeks before I left. Good luck!

[Gary Dunckel]

Just a heads up–Mountain House is having their annual sale right now, from March 1-15. Now is the time to stock up on the #10 tins of FD ingredients, if you are so inclined. I just now placed an order for diced chicken, mac/cheese, and pasta primavera (I still have plenty of peas and green beans from last year).

[Anthony Meaney]

I can't see anything about a sale on their site…. link?

[Gary Dunckel]

My bad, Anthony–the discounted Mountain House #10 tins sale is at TheEpicenter.com, not at Mountain House itself.

[Sarah Kirkconnell]

Harmony House sells freeze dried vegetables. Yes, green beans, green peas and sweet corn are better FD. However!!!! Once you open the container of ANY FD food, the clock is ticking. FD food absorbs moisture rapidly out of the air and can sour quickly. Hence, small packages can be a better buy than a huge can (Harmony sells small bags).

As for shelf life of dried food:
If it is a starch like pasta or rice, you are talking 1-2 years if properly stored.
Vegetables and fruits. If dried right, a year. You MUST shake the container every month or so – some moisture stays in it and needs to be distributed.
Meat: 3 months. Store in freezer.
High fat meals you dry at home: 3 months. In freezer.
Dairy. 3 months if home dried. In freezer.

Commercially dried milk though is shelf stable for a year or more.

Proper storage at home? Mason jars. Sealed. Kept in a cool, dark area.

[Nick Smolinske]

Gary,

I'm curious how long you've stored meals from #10 cans after opening the cans, and how it worked out. I bought a #10 can and stored it in the freezer and it held up fine for about a year while I slowly worked my way through it. But now I'm tempted to buy a whole bunch and I'm not sure I want to fill the freezer. I guess I could just go through them faster…

[Gary Dunckel]

I respectively somewhat disagree with the Queen of Cuisine here–for me, proper storage at home involves portioning out individual servings, and then vacuum sealing them and storing everything in my cool basement pantry. The meats and cheeses are stored in the fridge or freezer, depending on how soon I expect to eat them. The bulk FD items stored this way are good for over 4 years, and the Harmony House veggies, beans, and FD fruits are good for at least 3 years, and in many cases for 4-5. But note that I live in a semi-arid Colorado climate, and I open the Mountain House #10 tins when we get one of our sub-zero* F weeks in Dec-Jan and do all of my portioning/vacuum-sealing when there's almost no humidity. Summertime in Florida, Houston, or Seattle would require a different approach.

[Michael L]

Why is the storage life on frozen dehydrated meats lower than just frozen meats?

[Sarah Kirkconnell]

Fat. It is cooked in dried meat and can go rancid.

[Sarah Kirkconnell]

Anytime humidity is involved, it goes down quickly. The other issue is that once people open up tins of food, they often don't repack it – or store it correctly…and hence that $30 container of FD meatballs is quickly wasted. What works in the semi-arid won't on the East Coast, in say Florida, in summer ;-)

My Mother In Law once called up so upset because her fruit from Harmony was moldy and a big ball…and I had to explain how humidity ruins FD foods – and that she needed to use the desiccant packets and freeze her items.

I store my dried fruit, beans, starches in my pantry but always in glass jars. For certain items I actually seal them – I have the attachments for doing a vac seal on mason jars, using the canning lids (find it on Amazon, from FoodVac). For long term storage, this really helps.

Even then, once you start going into whole wheat or whole grains….the shelf life is always shorter than white/refined. Why? The natural oils!

[Michael L]

Thanks.

[Jerry Adams]

I put stuff in freezer or at least frig

The price per ounce isn't that much less for bigger amount. If you don't use almost all of it, then you're better off with smaller container. Sort of like buying stuff from Costco : )

If you're storing food in case there's an earthquake or hurricane, maybe it's good, even if you have to throw some out eventually. If I was hungry my tolerance for partially rancid food would increase>

[Gary Dunckel]

Are you just guessing at the price difference between bulk and small packs, Jerry? I just paid $16.50 for 16 oz. of garden green peas in the MH #10 tin. That comes out to $1.03/ounce. Even on sale elsewhere at $2.95 for the 2-serving pouch, which is 1.41 oz, the cost is $2.09/ounce–twice as much. I think that tips the balance toward buying in bulk in the case of the green peas. But this only works if you go through the food item reasonably quickly, which in my situation is well over 2 years.

[Nick Smolinske]

Another option for green peas is "Just Veggies" – you can get them on Amazon for 90 cents/oz.

I'm mostly excited about the Pasta Primavera – I love that stuff! And it's normally so expensive.

[Jerry Adams]

"Are you just guessing at the price difference between bulk and small packs, Jerry?"

just compared price of 8 ounces vs 32 ounces at harmony house

too lazy to copy any numbers and calculate $/oz

yeah, the 2 ounce packages are higher $/ounce

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