Anyone have savory complementary items to Belvita Breakfast Biscuits?

[Daniel F]

So, I went to the Costco on-line store and crunched the macros for just about every bar they had. What I was looking for was:

• Carbohydrate
• Lean packaging per calorie
• Not too much saturated fat
• Least sweet possible
• Reasonably priced

The winner, and by a decent amount, was the Belvita Breakfast Biscuit: with 230 calories per thin foil wrapper, the ratio of sugar-carbohydrate to other-carbohydrate was 20%, rather than closer to 30% or sometimes beyond as many other contenders would be.

Costco sells two varieties, Amazon sells some of the others at a not-quite-as-good price, thirty to a box. I think branching out to multiple flavors is a good move given the calorie requirements in backpacking, i.e. lots of biscuits.

I’ve been using these both as hiking fuel and for quick breakfasts with coffee. Overall, a decent product. But, within these rough parameters, have you found better?

The things I’m looking for are an even-better sweetish snack fuel (always, right?), and also something that is well designed on the savory side. So far, I’ve been weighing out bags of Utz pub mix for that side of things, and it’s acceptable, but I somehow feel the carbohydrate is probably high on glycemic index relative to the overall composition of Belvita, which is probably not optimal if you take calories once per hour or so.

[Matthew / BPL]

How about some nut butter on your Belvita biscuits?

Savory? FRITOS.

Another favorite is TJs sesame sticks (too salty) mixed with unsalted sunflower kernels. You can get just the right mix of salty and the kernels up the fat content (calories) and they pour out of a container into your mouth easily. Also the kernels fit in between the sesame sticks (or Fritos) so you don’t waste air space. Try an empty Pringles can in the side pocket of your bag for eating on the go.

Adam White once told me that if you shake a can of Pringles real hard you can get 1.6 cans of Pringles into one can and this number is precisely correct based on careful experimentation. Interestingly they seem to pack as well at ~thumbnail size as they do at rice grain size so don’t overshake.

My kid prefers eating crushed Pringles from a Ziplock baggie but I’m with Adam on the Pringles can. Also Whole Foods gelato containers are lightweight and are the milky plastic that doesn’t melt with boiling water (polypropylene? Polyethylene? I’m too lazy to go look right now) so you eat Pringles on the way in and then rehydrate your dinner in that jar each night.

Also please don’t come at me about junk food I am making lentils, cabbage and brussels sprouts for dinner tonight at home. ✌️💜

YMMV.

[Daniel F]

I have relied on corn chips of that kind before, they’re pretty okay, but not as much a carbohydrate boost as some. I should mix or otherwise supplement that into my pub mix at least. Would make it more interesting. Target’s “Good and Gather” brand has some interesting trail mixes that fit in the category of fattier fuels. They’re also reasonably priced.

Also good idea about adding the nut butter to the biscuits. I thought about doing it, but mostly in the context of tweaking the macros a bit, it may also cut the sweetness with the right choice of butter. And increase the caloric intake to even 1/3rd fat and about 300ish calories in a sitting, which is pretty manageable. The main reason I hesitate is that it adds a bit of prep and mess, but it’s not a huge amount.

Good tips about the pringles can as a container in the side-pocket, and the Trader Joe’s sesame sticks, and gap-filling with a small-gauge nut or seed. I think those all might wind up helpful.

I was experimenting with some carbohydrate powders and was stuck with a rapid way to deploy them that wasn’t as messy or leak-prone as a ziplock, maybe pouring it out of a pringles-like can from the side pocket will do the trick.

[Matthew / BPL]

Search around for “hiking malto” here on BPL. I believe he used the supercheap Costco water bottles (very lightweight) and rammed maltodextrin in with a chopstick through a funnel.

[Terran Terran]

I buy pistachios and macadamia nuts at Costco. I blend my own nut butter with a touch of date syrup and a little red palm oil. Avocado oil.

[Glen L]

[Daniel F]

I used the space-filling sunflower seed trick, this was the best improvement to what I was doing. I mixed it with the pub mix: first I’d fill a ziploc bag with pub mix, then I’d put the seeds on top, and gently shake it so the seeds would sift down and fill free space. Repeat until there’s no more free space. It was amazing how many extra calories I could get in there.

I felt it added something to the mix to make eating it more palatable, as a bonus. This was my climbing fuel of choice.

[Author]

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