Beef stroganoff is one of my favorite backpacking dishes. I’ve tried a couple different methods, all of which were reasonable. For me, the best flavor and easiest product to prepare on the trail comes from cooking the entire dish at home, and dehydrating it. I love the flavor of the fresh mushrooms, but I’ve also discovered that some additional dried mushrooms add significantly to the aroma and flavor. I now use some commercial dehydrated oyster mushrooms from Mushroom House on Amazon for a real flavor enhancement. I pulverize some of the oyster mushrooms to add to the sauce as it is cooking, and add some whole mushrooms to the home dehydrated product as I package it for the trail. Because the mushrooms take a bit of time to rehydrate I cover the food with cold water in my pot for 15 minutes or so before heating to boiling. With this procedure the mushrooms are soft and delectable.
On my AT thru this year I had one of these stroganoff dinners near Kinsman Notch. You could smell the food hundreds of feet away as I ate by a pond. Hikers passing by noticed and commented.
Renais