food and nutrition related questions and tips for episode three of the POD!

Something about decent nutrition from out-of-the-way groceries, please.  Most of the literature seems to assume the hiker is fine with pop-tarts and ramen, but some of us are too old/otherwise fragile for that.  Would be nice to have a discussion of creative options for actual nutrition (that is still light enough for the trail) from small trail town groceries.

When I go out for a weekend trip, I often just buy fast food (burritos/simple hamburgers) on the drive up along with a box of granola bars.  Given all the preservatives in that stuff, they will easily last over a 2-3 day trip just fine and still taste better than most traditional backpacking meals.  But obviously not full of high quality nutrition.  But for a short trip like that or even one up to around 2 weeks, if you normally eat well at home, you really don’t require a careful diet as long as you are getting your calories from the different sources (protein, fat, carbs) so you don’t bonk.  Though if you resupply in a town, you should take advantage of options to at least eat nutritiously while you are in town with large green salads, etc.  However, for longer trips, and especially months long trips (like a PCT/CDT thru-hike), it requires eating a higher quality of food; especially when you are no longer in your 20’s.

I’m interested in easy methods of getting the vitamins and enzymes found in vegetables/fruit in your on trail diet from a supermarket type resupply typically used on thru-hike. And a bottle of vitamins isn’t going to do it.  I need real food sources.  Though at least dried fruit isn’t too hard to find in stores.

For past hikes, I’ve mailed dehydrated/FD veggies and green powders to supplement my store bought meals.  Making my own dehydrated meals works even better.  You can also just buy the better commercial ones.  In recent years, I’ve seen services where someone will make your nutritious food for you and mail it along the trail making it even simpler. Problem with these methods is they require careful resupply planning and mail drops.  Though with commercial freeze dried (FD) meals, you sometimes can find them in trail towns if they actually have an outfitter, but that seems to be the exception rather than the rule.There has to be a better easier way.

One comment on commercial freeze dried foods.  A lot of people complain about the high salt levels.  Which is a valid complaint when you are home.  But when you are backpacking and regularly sweating, having the extra salt doesn’t seem to be a problem.  Especially given many are adding more salt to their drinks (along with hopefully other electrolytes).  I admit to making fun of a friend who was complaining about his mountain house while downing a quart of Gatoraid.

Good questions. Thanks! We will certainly talk about these.

Hey Andrew –

Wake up the Sys Admin guys and ask them to fix the link to “Recent Topics” .

They seem to be asleep at the wheel.

Thanks