Bread subs other than tortillas

[AK Granola]

I have mostly used tortillas or naan on trail lately – easy to pack in the bear canister, easy to buy in stores, lasts a long time, lots of calories. But i’m kind of tired of them. Bagels are ok but heavy and hard to pack outside of day 1.  Most of the homemade breads fall apart quickly and I end up with crumbs to mash together. A few crackers seem to hold up ok, like Triscuits (plus triscuit crumbs are good on soup). Any other great ideas out there?

[Roger Caffin]

Genuine artisanal wholemeal sourdough is often good.
Mass-market white bread is basically Kleenex.
Cheers

[Jon Fong / Flat Cat Gear]

make bread on the trail

[Rex Sanders]

Trader Joe’s has a round flatbread, almost a naan but no pocket. The white flour ones hold up well; the whole wheat ones go moldy in a couple of days.

Wanted to try some pilot bread, but was hard to find in the lower 48. Then I started making hardtack using this recipe that evolved from others.

Rex’s Hardtack

1+1/2 cups milk
2 cups white flour
2 cups whole wheat flour
2 tablespoons honey
1+1/2 teaspoons salt

Mix the ingredients into a dough.

Roll out to a thickness of 1/2 inch.

Cut into 40 mm x 90 mm bars

Place on greased cookie sheet, and prick with a fork.

Bake at 375 degrees for 30-40 minutes, until golden brown.
Adjust baking time to desired crunchiness.

Makes about 15 bars, about 2 oz net weight each.

— Rex

Yes, I mixed U.S. and metric units. Don’t remember why.

[Philip Tschersich]

It’s hard to beat tortillas for calorie density in a bread form, because they take up so little volume and are relatively durable. What are you putting inside them? Maybe concentrate on masking the tortilla’s lack of flavor by making up for it with the fillings. Alternately, look to ‘wraps’ like sun-dried tomato or garden spinach. It’s basically just a tortilla, but with herbs, spices and other flavors added.

Peanut butter, jelly, and bacon or Chili Cheese Fritos are nice combos.

[Matthew / BPL]

Mission makes very thick flour tortillas in a small diameter that I like on the trail rather than a big flat tortilla. They are a little more like a mini flatbread. Not life changing but maybe a little bit of variety for you, Karen.

I’m big on Triscuits too and totally don’t mind eating them when crushed. Fritos too.

Seed crackers are very sturdy and are delicious even when they get crushed. I like this recipe.

[Kevin Babione]

I’ve used these pretty successfully:

They’re 4-5″ in diameter and much more sturdy than a slice of bread.

[Duane Hall]

You might try pumpernickel.  This is very dense and last a long time on the trail

[Roger Caffin]

Try eating lots of pumpernickel for several days running.

Cheers

[DAN-Y]

Muligrain flatbread from Subway

[AK Granola]

I used to eat pumpernickel all the time as a kid or rye. My dad was Danish. I’m curious Roger – did that bread give you digestive distress or something? Can’t get good bread like that where I live, unfortunately.

[Roger Caffin]

Hi Karen

I am a hopeless Australian.
Our local pumpernickel comes in very thin slices which is meant to be put on top of ordinary bread. It is very solid and heavy. We did try it once, but could only manage about 1 slice per day.

Cheers

[MJ H]

Eat pumpernickel with brie.  The digestive effects cancel.

[Roger Caffin]

You guys are weird!

[Matthew / BPL]

Wait wait wait wait what?

Australians put thin slices of pumpernickel on top of other bread? I’m going to need more information on that. Details please.

Apologies for the thread drift, Karen but this is a special situation.

[MJ H]

If the English did that, they’d call it a pumpernickel butty.

[Roger Caffin]

Hi Matthew
No explanation possible.
It is just how it is sold – or was when I looked. Very thin slices.
Cheers

[Matthew / BPL]

I get that part. You can get thin pumpernickel here too. It’s the part where you put the pumpernickel on other bread that I’d like more details on. I haven’t found any examples of this online. Do you do this in a sandwich? Toast? I’m fascinated.

[Roger Caffin]

OK, I had to some research.

It seems (to me) that there are two different sorts of ‘pumpernickel’. One sort is classical ‘German pumpernickel’, and that is very solid and heavy. The other sort (which seems to be found in America) might be called ‘pumpernickel bread’, and is much lighter.

So I suspect we are talking about two different things.

Cheers

[Matthew / BPL]

I’m familiar with it! It’s just the Australian application you are talking about.

Anyways perhaps we should move on.

[Roger Caffin]

I am not sure (who can be?), but I think the idea was to ‘dilute’ the very heavy pumpernickel.

A quarter slice of brown bread, a bit of pumpernickel, a pickled onion and a toothpick . . .

Cheers

[AK Granola]

The pumpernickel I grew up with was that thinly sliced, heavy stuff. Not soft squishy bread. And we put cream cheese on it, mostly. On top of that you can put smoked salmon or smoked trout. Or… most of you won’t even know what this is – Braunschweiger. Which may or may not be correctly spelled. A pickle is good on Braunschweiger. I am definitely not taking all that on a backpacking trip! but good memories of home.

The rye bread was darker than what is sold as “Jewish rye” in American supermarkets but not as dark as pumpernickel.

We do get pilot bread here, but it’s so bland. I’ll look for those “sandwich thin” things mentioned up thread.

[Philip Tschersich]

Yes! Vollkornbrot or Schwartzbrot are amazing, but totally crumbly and impractical for travel. With cream cheese and lox and a few capers plus a sprinkle of dill? Awesome. Or Braunschweiger (liverwurst)? Hell yeah (at home). On a trip? No way.

Those sandwich thins are pretty bland. I use them as burger buns when I don’t want to mask the patty and other ingredients.

[Roger Caffin]

What the world needs is a dehi hamburger. May I offer:

Cheers

 

[Rex Sanders]

My hardtack recipe above tastes more like a graham cracker, because the original recipe was “so bland.” As with similar recipes, it’s easy to experiment with flavor additions like spices, raisins, sunflower seeds, etc.

— Rex

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