Cup for smoothies/shakes

[Haiku]

Last summer on the AT my cooking and eating containers consisted of a EpiGas 800ml titanium pot with foil lid, no handles (3 oz) and Campbell’s cup (1 oz).  I got some good deals on protein powders and decided I want to do shakes for breakfast, at least some of the time.  What do people use on trail?

The main ideas I have are:

1. Somehow melt the plastic on the Campbell’s cup to close the sippy hole.  Drink protein shake in 2 courses (probably not big enough for entire breakfast shake)
2. Get something like a Vargo Bot that I can cook and also use to shake things in.  Doubles as extra water vessel?  I heard the lid isn’t great though.
3. Some other lightweight solution to the cup/lid dilemma.

Thanks for your suggestions!

[Matthew / BPL]

I like using one of these with a lid for dinner, protein drinks, coffee… Very durable. It rinses out easily and I “wash” it with a drop of unscented Dr. Bronner’s every now and then.

[Haiku]

Oh that’s interesting.  How much does it weigh with cap?  It’s ok for hot drinks? (You’d be surprised how well the Campbell’s cup insulation works)

[Andrew D]

Ball Jar makes a plastic freezer screw lid container. I use a 8oz one for my cup, but they also make a 16oz one.

[Matthew / BPL]

Dawn, I’ll weigh the jar later this evening. In the mean time, here’s another option I’ve experimented with. It’s a bit small but seals nicely, has a large mouth and I just make the shakes really thick.

https://www.rei.com/product/402054/nalgene-polyethylene-bottle-8-fl-oz

[Matthew / BPL]

Dawn, my HDPE jars are 51 grams for the 16 ounce version and 53 grams for the 12 ounce version. Both weights are with the lid, it’s the white one with the foam liner and a square edge (not the decorative rounded one).

I think they are comfortable to drink out of and easy enough to hold with hot liquid inside. The HDPE is supposed to be heat resistant and I have zero deformation or weirdness after 30+ boiled meals/drinks in one of these. Another option is just a wide mouth Gatorade bottle. A friend of mine uses a wide mouthed but narrow disposable bottle that was some kind of Korean aloe juice. Honestly, a dedicated smoothie bottle is a nice thing because it keeps your potatoes from tasting like smoothie and vice versa.

[Alex Wallace]

A 20 ounce plastic Gatorade bottle works pretty good. Add a hand full of whole almonds to the mix to help break up things when you go to shake it up. High quality protein powder mitigates the funk & clump factor.

[Don Burton]

When I’m doing bigger days I like smoothies for breakfast.

-Carnation Breakfast shake packet

-1/4 cup of Nido powder milk

-1 tablespoon of freeze dried fruit. I’ll make it into a powder in my coffee bean grinder.

I prep by putting it into individual ziplocks then dump the contents into a 16 oz plastic peanut butter jar with a blender ball inside. I think the jar and blender ball weigh about 1.3 oz combined and the shake is about 400 calories. I also like to substitute the powdered fruit with a Starbucks Via packet to get a caffeine start in the morning.

[Haiku]

@Alex- almost thought you meant one of those old school sippy top bottles.  Actually a plastic gatorade, powerade etc with larger mouth might not be a bad idea anyway for cow-patty water.  I was using the Campbell’s cup to dip before, but it isn’t multi-use in that I can store water in it.

Yeah, I like recipe ideas!  Unfortunately I can’t do milk, whey, and some other products, so Carnation and most typical protein powders are out.  I have sourced some good quality brown rice, pea, and hemp protein powders at discount so will be trying those.  I might consider egg white powder as well, I hate eggs and occasionally can react to them, but I ate a lot of those RxBars last summer to no ill effect (actually, they were my favorite bars on trail).  Did you find freeze dried fruit powder to work better than simply dehydrated?  Just curious.  Was thinking to get some banana powder (if such a thing even exists) to mix in there.

[Don Burton]

I’m sure there’s some recipe you can find that works for you. There’s a lot of milk alternative choices at Whole Paycheck, um I mean Whole Foods. ;-) Dehydrated fruit is not dry enough to make into a powder. Although, dehydrated bananas may work because they’re so dry/crunchy. If you can find powdered fruit that would be a lot easier. A quick search found this

https://www.northbaytrading.com/freeze-dried-strawberry-powder?gclid=CKylu4ewp9ECFQ9EfgodbpoJpA

Seems pricey but when compared to my Trader Joes bag of freeze dried blueberries that I have to make into powder myself it seems about the same price. Figuring in your time and also that some fruit is lost in the “powdering” process.

Online: $9.95/2.25 oz

Trader Joe’s: $3.50/1.2 oz

i just check the weight on my jar and blender ball set up. A little heavier than I thought. 1.8 oz.

[Haiku]

Ok I will take a look for freeze-dried then.  I am often able to source things cheap on discount with Amazon, and combine with various discounts/credits.  I will only have a few days in the US before I start my hike so I’m mailing all to one address (this worked great last year on the AT and I saved a ton of money too, besides eating well).

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