NO Clean Cook System

Freezer bag cooking?

http://www.trailcooking.com

Seems it “boils down” essentially to what to do with oatmeal and coffee/tea at breakfast time…

For instant oatmeal, just put it in a ziploc freezer bag and rehydrate, followed by tea/coffee in your cook pot. If there’s no mug and you want a hot drink, something’s gonna have to go into the pot!

My personal sequence is to boil water, use 16 oz for a big cup of very strong coffee (Cafe Bustello instant) in a GSI mug for winter, and then 2 packets of instant oatmeal (Peaches & Cream, I could eat it every day!) in the pot with the remaining 1 cup of water. A little cleaning, but super easy and even easier when there’s snow, which is a great pot scrubber.

Come on, you guys are ULer’s.  Heat the water and let it cool a bit.  Take a spoonful of oatmeal and put it in your mouth.  Take a sip of hot water and swirl it around in your mouth with the oatmeal for a minute or two.  Swallow.  Repeat as necessary,    Oh yeah, you can do the same with your coffee.

Very funny Jon.  Have you convinced Peggy to use your cook in the mouth method?

In response to Matt’s question I never “cook” in my pot. I do use it for dry baking but that’s another story. My pot is for heating water that gets poured into a plastic bag to rehydrate meals or cook things like instant oatmeal.  I use a variety of plastic bags for this purpose. I’ve found regular plastic bags to work just fine and are cheaper and lighter than freezer bags. For short trips this doesn’t make much difference. Rarely have I had a bag leak. I do usually put some air in them to do a seal test before using. I use instant coffee so the cleanup involves wiping out my plastic mug and and washing off my spoon.

Come on, you guys are ULer’s.  Heat the water and let it cool a bit.  Take a spoonful of oatmeal and put it in your mouth.  Take a sip of hot water and swirl it around in your mouth with the oatmeal for a minute or two.  Swallow.  Repeat as necessary,    Oh yeah, you can do the same with your coffee.

Hey, that’s a great idea!

But if it takes a minute or two per bite… lemme think about this one some more… :-)

Depending on the length of your trip, (and the weight of your mug, of course) you could end up carrying more weight in freezer bags than you did in the reusable mug.

Also, give a thought to the environmental impact of the freezer bags.  Sure, it isn’t much in the grand scheme of things, but just like the weight of items in your pack, every bit of trash in the landfill counts.

Matt-

The “cooking in a bag” thing that you are describing is usually called freezer bag cooking, as others have mentioned and, yes, it is very viable.  There are books about it.

That said, a lot of us have tried it and found it to be a PITA to haul around a wad of dirty, smelly, bear-attracting bags until we can find a trashcan.  I for one have gone back to just cooking in my non-nonstick pot.  It’s pretty easy to clean with a handful of sand or river gravel, and it gets sterilized the next time you boil water in it so you don’t have to be too OCD about the cleaning.  I also habitually over-hydrate my meals to keep cleanup easier. Not so much as Skurka, but a bit.

IF you often have a campfire there might be a middle ground- Mary Jane’s Farm organic vegetarian meals.  If you aren’t a vegetarian it is easy enough to throw a handful of bacon bits or pemmican or somesuch in everything. These meals are now sold in REI, as I recall, and several of them are cook-in-bag meals. (I recommend the chili mac.)  But here’s the point: the bag is designed to be burnable- it can be used as kindling.  Unfortunately I have yet to find a similar empty bag on sale anywhere so that I could make my own meals in it.

Thank you everyone for the quick responses!

Thanks for the link Ethan! I knew of the concept, but that site has a ton of info that is helpful.

Bob, My winter trips are very short and seldom. So warmer seasons I tend to omit hot drinks all together.  But I think I’m gonna just repackage things like you said and try that and see if I prefer it.

Jon, very funny haha.  Thats almost my point, just make things simple even if not luxurious.

Don, thats kind of the route I’m going, just wanted to hear other people confirm.

Dancing Bear, I totally thought about that when I was first posting this.  The weight wouldn’t be much added, if any, because I would be eliminating the initial packaging and replacing with only slightly heavier plastic.  But I did think about the environmental impact of just using more unneeded garbage.  Definitely a consideration.

Thanks Dean, I was kind of wondering if anyone found this to actually be more of a PITA.  I will end up having some smelly, bear-attracting garbage anyway, and even on my longer trips I usually resupply/get rid of trash within 4 days.  I tend to get paranoid that my cook system still holds odors after cleaning.  I’ll have extra room for garbage in my canister or bear bag.

As far as the Freezer bags go, is there a minimum thickness or rating that can handle boiling water? or any specific size recommended for eating out of?

Just to clearly how tired of camp chores I’ve become.  I switched back to a CCF pad from inflatable, because I didn’t like outputting 30 breaths after walking 30 miles!

I’ve successfully poured boiling water into common plastic sandwich bags that are 1mil without problem. The freezer bags I have are 2.5mil. My current bag of choice is a slider lock ziplock or generic type that are 2mil. Best to test whatever you use.  I use a quart size.

If you’re concerned about leaching of bad things into your food then you should do some research.  I’m surprised the issue hasn’t come up yet in this thread.

I do hate the idea of using plastic bags in general as an environmental concern. Check the boxes they come in.  Some provide info on how to recycle. It’s a problem though on a long hike when you’re doing resupplies.

I find eating out of a metal cup, 600 ml, so easy to clean that it’s hard to consider anything else. What was rehydrated in the cup can make a difference in how much clean up is necessary.

It baffles me as to why cleaning up dishes is a big issue.  I almost exclusively cook and eat out of my pot.  I clean it up with a little sand/stones and carry a small bottle of bio-soap and a small scotch-brite pad.  I carry out the empty and dry ziploc bags and recycle them at home.   I wash dishes at home, so washing dishes in the field is no big deal.  HYOH, but you might give it a try. My 2 cents

It doesn’t sound like this is Matt’s first rodeo, so I’m pretty confident that he has in fact tried cooking in a pot. He’s just experimenting with other things, as we have all done at one point or another.

Been using Sarah’s 1st Freezerbag Cooking book for several years. Great concept.

BTW, I have a Trail designs Sidewinder ti stove W/Inferno wood burning insert. D@mn stove is miraculous, especially with ESBIT and a Brian Green style modded fuel holder.

In winter with wood it is HOTT!

What you want is a bowl with a secure sealing lid.  I use a 3-cup size with screw on lid.  Add food to plastic bowl and pour in heated water.

To clean: add water, cap, shake, drink, repeat.  Its really easy.

Your food can come from bulk bags, saving waste and weight.

Yes, this might have a 1oz weight penalty on short trips.  But its nice to eat out of a bowl AND have easy cleanup.

A halfway house solution?

http://asthecrowflies.org/2006/10/24/simplistic-dining/

If you are eating those single serving packets of oatmeal just rip the top off and  pour the hot water into the paper bag and stirr it up. Nothing to clean but the spoon.

A simple way to clean a pot:

“Shug” cleaning a cook pot