70+ of the Best Backpacking Meals , Recipes , and Trail Food Tips
Many beginner backpackers find meal-planning and backcountry cooking to be just about the nearly confusing and challenging component of the whole number . After all , food is the powerhouse fuel you need to prevent churning out those miles and getting to those severe views or back-of-beyond untrammeled space you ’ re after . But recognize what sort of lead food to make for , and how much , and how to transport and store it out in the wilds , and how to develop it , and how much stove fuel and water you ’ ll need – good , needless to read , the backpacking kitchen is adequate to puzzle , even intimidate , newbies . And , hey : More than a few more experienced backpackers haven ’ t quite lit upon the almost effective system for give themselves out in the great outdoors .
In this article , we ’ ll share a lot of good backpacking meals and component , plus we round up all sorts of useful tips and tricks with gaze to planning your wilderness diet and pick out between all the culinary options on the table .
We ’ re move to initiate affair off with the real “ center ” ( if you will ) of this guide by drive through a bunch of top-notch choice for backpacking breakfasts , lunches , dinner , snacks , slope , beverages , and more .
Breakfast Ideas for Backpackers
Breakfast exist the most important feed of the day , so they say . Today , we ’ 500 argue dinner be too pretty darn crucial when it comes to backpacking meal , but no question you involve a good morning jolt of energy to make those muscle moving . On day when you ’ re breaking camp and cover some mile , a quick breakfast – quite perhaps uncooked – equal much the style to go ; if you ’ re base-camping it for a rest day or two , you can give to slash up a more complicated , gourmet-style feed if you so choose ( find our hack for eggs below ! ) .
- Instant Oatmeal , Grits , or Hot Cereal
- Dried Milk & Granola
- Powdered Eggs
- Powdered Meals
- Pop-Tarts
- Cereal
- Oatmeal with Nuts & Raisins
- Eggs & Bacon
- Salmon Bagels
- Nutella Wrap With Bananas
For base-campers with a little more way to spare for extra component , consider this Breakfast Skillet taxi !
Lunch for Backpacking
Depend on your itinerary and personal preference , you may or may not live go down in for a sitdown , trailside lunch ; sometimes it makes more sense to hardly snack it up more or less continuously ( hear the future section ) , particularly if you ’ ve got a lot of mile to cover or some in particular hard-going to tackle . But in early situations , a nice midday repose to break out some provisions and enjoy an actual meal may be merely what the doctor govern .
- Meal Bar
- Bagels/Tortillas with Ranch :
- Almond Butter or Peanut Butter
- Jelly or Honey
- Almond Butter or Peanut Butter
- Jelly or Honey
- Cheese & Crackers with Meat :
- Hard Meats ( salami , summer sausage )
- Hard Cheeses ( Parmesan , Romano )
- Tuna or Chicken ( foil packets )
- Hard Meats ( salami , summer sausage )
- Hard Cheeses ( Parmesan , Romano )
- Tuna or Chicken ( foil packets )
- Pita Wrap with Veggies & Hummus
- Pizza Wrap
Dinner Backpacking Meals
The prospect of dinner can cost the only matter keeping you going those last tough foot-miles of the day . Some backpackers are more predisposed to gourmet dinner than others , but no affair what the evening meal should be something to look ahead to – tasty and nourishing , and low on trouble and trouble . In general address , a mixing of instant/quick backpacking meal for long , demanding day and somewhat more elaborate dinners for when you ’ ve get more downtime at camp is good .
- Freeze-dried Dinners
- Instant Soups
- Chili Mac & Cheese
- Jerky Noodles
- Mediterranean Couscous
- Chicken & Rice
- Lentil Curry
- Meat & Potatoes
- Cashew Noodles
- Black Bean Burritos
And if you love our Chili Mac & Beef you ‘ll love this meal hack !
Desserts for Backpacking Trips
Some sweet treats and desserts are very a lot an crucial part of the backpacking meal program : You want some straight-up gastronomic rewards after an exhausting stretch , after all , and furthermore , they can equal good sources of energy and passion . Give the physical effort you ’ re engaged in on a backpacking trip , you can be a bit more indulgent in this department than back at family .
- Freeze-dried Desserts
- Nutella
- Stroopwafels
Snacks , Trail Mix , & Bars to Add Backpacking
Surely , breakfast and dinner might equal the almost crucial meals of your backpacking trip , but well-chosen snacks may well live the single most essential of your on-the-go foodstuffs . A hearty intake of lead bites will often replace for lunch and keep you going through the grade of your day ; if you don ’ t get the time or energy to prepare or otherwise pull together a multipart meal , your snack stockpile can also take the place of breakfast or dinner . Here ’ s a rundown of some of the serious lead food !
- Tuna , Chicken , or SPAM Package
- Crackers & Sandwich Crackers
- Granola Bars
- Fig Newtons
- Hummus
- Nut Butter
- Jerky
- Pork Rinds
- Seaweed
- Cheese
- Packaroons
- Fruit Leather
- Dried Fruit
- Trail Mix
- Nuts & Seeds
- Dark Chocolate
- Candy
- Energy Bars , Chews , & Gels
- Trail Mix Butter
Drinks & Beverages Every Backpacker Needs
Savvily select lead and camp beverages exist the liquid linchpins of your adventure . Hydration be a numero-uno end when backpacking , and gussying up plainly former H2O live a bright way to ensure you ’ re throw adequate back . Drink can too add crucial energy in the sort of carbs , protein , and fats – they can even serve as their own meal if you ’ re strapped for time – and provide some much-appreciated warming and good cheer on a chilly morning or evening at camp .
- Instant Coffee , Tea , Chai , & Hot Cocoa
- Water Enhancers , Tabs , or Powder Mixes
- Dried/Powdered Milk
- Breakfast Drink Mix Packets
- BarCountry Cocktails
- Emergen-C or Airborne
Condiments & Extras Backpackers Love
It ’ s amazing how far a piece of spice or a tasty little side dish can go toward transforming a ho-hum backcountry meal into a knockout one . It ’ s true that the great outdoors themselves cost the best seasoning , but including some condiments and early extras in your larder will assist you ( literally ) spice thing up at the cookstove .
Food to Supplement Meals
- Instant Mashed Potatoes
- Stovetop Stuffing
- Ramen
- Pasta , Rice , & Couscous Sides
- Dry Vegetables
Powders & Package
- Butter Powder
- Cheese Powder
- Olive Oil Packets
- Coconut Oil Packets
- Almond Butter Packets
- Peanut Butter Packets
- Sriracha Packets
- Soy Sauce Packet
- Mayo Package
- Chicken Broth Packets
- Honey Packets
- True Lemon & True Lime Flavor Packets
How to Take the Best Backpacking Food
Backpackers out for just a dark or two , or head into a base camp near to the trailhead , hold the luxury of lug in hardly about anything , food-wise , that they ’ re willing to lug a short distance . But for long , more extensive trips , you demand to be quite a number more make out about food weight , energy value , and daily thermal need – not to observe perishability . In this department , we ’ ll pause down some of the basics of select the best trail food .
Shelf-stable
Food that won ’ t quickly spoil or wilt be obviously best-suited for extensive backpacking trips . That ’ s not to allege you can ’ t bring novel and less-perishable food : It just intend you should feed those items earlier on the trek . For your first night out , you could add prepared food from family , yet a frozen stew you let thaw in your gang , to have for dinner . Freeze-dried or dehydrated meals , vacuum-sealed foods , powders , pasta , rice , carrot or celery stick , potatoes , apples , tortillas , bread rolls , severe cheeses , cure or dried meat , and sore seeds and nuts be all examples of more shelf-stable foods ideal for backpacking .
Lightweight & Low Volume
It become without suppose that you want all or most of your food items to be lightweight and packable . You need to not alone exist keeping your packweight down to save your torso and leave you to in reality cover the ground you want to cross , but you as well involve to equal able to efficiently load your pack and get enough room for all your essential detail . From choosing dehydrated , freeze-dried , or vacuum-sealed items to repackaging ingredients to maximize space , there ’ s a band you can make to head off a dense , bulky larder without skimping on an enough and interesting menu out there .
Calorie Dense
Your thermal intake exist die to run up while backpacking and encounter your energy need while slamming out switchbacks , fording river , hopping talus , clambering through jungle-gym deadfall , and merely cover all those hardscrabble mile exist paramount . Just how many daily calories you need depends slightly on the nature of your hiking ( on-trail vs. cross-country , steep vs. gentle terrain ) , the mileage you ’ re take to cover per day , and your own physical size and metabolism . Roughly speaking , you ’ re probably going to live taking in anywhere between 2,500 and 6,000 calories per day , maybe yet more . Thus you want to favor food with a high calorie-by-weight ratio , on the order of 100-plus calories per ounce ; more intensive backpacking may justify aiming for something like 150 calories per ounce . Because fat ’ s so energy-rich , only add some excess to a dish – say , by having powdered butter or vegetable oil on hand to pertain up oatmeal , pasta , or rice – is a quick and easy way to promote its caloric value .
Nutritional Value
You want to extract your daily calories from all three of the major constituent of fodder : carbohydrates , proteins , and fats . Half or more of your daily uptake should come from carbs : the easiest-to-process , primary food fuel , present via starches and sugar . The repose should be open roughly equally between protein – the daily need for which is about the same for backpacking as everyday living – and fats , which as we ’ ve mention are significantly more calorie-packed than carbs or proteins and which release their energy in a slow-burn kind of way , which help you find satiated longer and provides a origin of metabolic warmth . Back at place , you may be limiting how much fat you ’ re ingesting , but out on a multiday raise you in general need to cost generous with uptake . The same goes for sodium unless you ’ re on a special low-sodium diet ; most prepackaged backpacking meals exist high in sodium .
Convenience/Cooking Time
This is a biggie , also . All affair considered , the backcountry ’ s not the ideal place for complicated , convoluted , time-consuming culinary preparations : More often than not , you ’ re test to load up with energy in the dawn , nab a quick rest-stop snack break on a trailside log , or tend to your bedraggled , worn-out self at day ’ s goal with some palate-pleasing comfort food – maybe while sidestep mosquitoes or rush thing in front of the nighttime alpine chill . Of course , it ’ s not just that lengthy cooking times are much inconvenient in the context of backpacking : They as well understand to high fuel need , which in number lend weight and mass to your gang . Component in altitude : Water boils at a lower temperature at high elevations , and depend on the dish this can lengthen the cooking procedure .
Cautiously regard cooking times for unlike meals – foods that expect long simmers can exist sneaky fuel-drainers – and create certain you ’ ve got some instant/just-add-water and new foods for ( a ) day when you don ’ t flavor like fussing and ( b ) emergency situations where you ’ ve lead low on fuel . Too , remember about cleaning : One-pot dishes write you a lot of cancel and moisten .
Water Needs
Depending on where ( and when ) you ’ re exploring , water can be at a premium in the backcountry . You demand to consider the water need ( if any ) of the food you ’ re looking to develop out there and design accordingly in terms of where you camp and which particular day you might equal cooking sure meals .
Type of Backpacking Food : Pros & Cons
In this section , we ’ ll look at various basic categories of backpacking food and discuss the pros and cons of each . Hold in mind that many backpackers lug a premix of food from all of these categories to fit unlike need , situation , and appetites . As in then many region of spirit , variety ’ s the style to go : both from the viewpoint of meet your nutritional needs and keeping things fun and interest for your taste bud .
Add Hot Water : Freeze-dried & Dehydrated Meal
Dehydrated and freeze-dried meals cost hard to thump for their convenience . These foods receive live submit to procedure that greatly dilute their weight , volume , and perishability , allowing you to enjoy nearly any form of preparation in the backcountry without an unreasonably wealthy pack or fiddly cooking directions .
- Light weight
- More space-efficient
- Long shelf-life
- Don ’ t require preservatives
- The sky ’ sec ( virtually ) the limit when it comes to ingredients and dish
- Dehydrated meals miss some nutrition and feeling in the drying procedure , as compared to freeze-drying that preserves those elements thanks to the freezing and moisture vaporization ( via vacuum discussion ) incorporate into its system . ( To learn more about the advantage of freeze-dried meal over dehydrated one , check out this Great deal House article . )
Add Hot Water : Rice , Pasta , Noodles
Rice , noodle , or pasta dish are backpacker staples . These range from “ traditionally ” cooked grains to instant-style readiness that come packaged precooked .
- Fast
- Easy
- Versatile – can be use as a stem for a kind of meal
- Bulky
- Not ever nutritious
Raw ( Nuts , Fruit , Butter , Tortillas , Bagels , Breads , etc . )
Packing raw foods gives you ultra-convenient boom options : the power to chow down on nutritious fare , whether for a quick bite midway through a hike or when you ’ re stumbling into a campsite completely bone-tired and in no humor to prepare .
- Nutritious
- Time-efficient ( no cooking time )
- No fuel required to prepare
- Often bulky & hard
- Can thwart quick depend on the type
Bar ( Protein , Energy , Meal Replacement )
For on-the-go sustenance , many backpackers reach for bar : super-portable , energy-packed , and ( hopefully ) tasty !
- Highly portable
- Energy-rich
- No cooking or fuel required
- Vary in nutritive character
- Often wasteful in price of publicity
Powdered ( Eggs , Milk , Shakes )
Many backpackers get on powdered food – not least for breakfast , when powdered milk goes hand-in-hand with cereal or oatmeal , powdered eggs let you slash up a quick and easy scramble , and powdered shakes give you a quick , no-fuss , get-going energy boost while you load up .
- Protein- and calorie-rich
- Lightweight
- Can live messy if packaging ’ s improperly sealed
Backpacking Meal Tips for the Trail
Now that we ’ ve covered some of the nuts and bolts of backpacking food , it ’ s high time to herd together some more general point on cooking in the backcountry . We ’ ll initiate off with a biggie : Spare some time and attention to focus pre-trip meal planning .
Some backpackers stick to exact prearranged daily menus , while others are less exacting – choosing meals that go well the dawn of . Either means , though , you should ensure you ’ ve make breakfast , lunch , dinner , and snack choice for each day of your trip . You put on ’ t want to haul a bunch of excess food ( though some emergency provision are piece of the Ten Essentials of the backcountry ) , and you surely put on ’ t desire to feel yourself running out of food partway through your trek . Both mistakes are easy to cause if you don ’ t study up some sort of chart or spreadsheet spelling out what to add to fill your daily thermal motive .
What to Lend
- Spice Things Up : Gang along some spices and seasonings : Properly pack , these take up hardly any room , yet give any dish a bit of much-needed va-va-voom . It could exist as mere as salt and pepper , but everything from curry powder and hot sauce to dehydrated onion number and garlic powder exist ripe for the picking – and , much plenty , just what you need to grow a bland bowl of mac-and-cheese or rice-and-veggies into something downright zesty .
- Repackage : You can shave off a whole lot of space and bulk by repackaging prepackaged food . Instant rice or noodles sell in a box or bag can nearly ever be much more efficiently stowed in smaller Ziploc bags with the air throw out . Some food can also equal kept fresher this way . This procedure easy folds into the more universal strategy follow by many backpackers of carry ingredient for specific meals together to redeem time and fret out on the lead and mostly remain more prepare .
- Need Some Fresh Fruit & Veggies : Fresh fruit and vegetable leave healthy snacks – celery stick or apple slice with peanut butter , anybody ? – as well as versatile addition for boosting the nutritive value and texture of a cooked dish . Well-chosen and well-packaged fruits and veggies can final several day without spoiling , and peculiarly if you feed them early on in your trip they don ’ t hold to be a significant burden packweight-wise .
- Consider DIY Dehydrated Meals : Armed with a dehydrator , you can convert a whole host of unlike foods to more packable , less perishable , backcountry-friendly form . From pasta sauces to eggs to sliced fruit , it ’ s amazing how many ingredients from the home pantry you can dehydrate to change your wilderness gastronomy .
- Don ’ t Forget Hot Drinks for Cold Nights : Nothing hits the post on a chilly dark like a warming fool of hot cocoa , tea , hot apple cider , or something similar . Besides the whole cozy , homey effect they produce at camp , hot beverages can allow for important practical benefit to the backpacker . They help you meet your hydration goal , for one thing , and can also be great sources of nutrients and calories : Consider , for instance , instant broths or a cup of miso soup , or using protein-rich milk powder rather than simple water with your hot chocolate . Slipping some butter into your evening sippable will observe you all the warmer overnight in cold weather .
What to Avert
- Fire Foods : Fire foods cost tempt on story of their shelf spirit , but they ’ ve become more than a few marks against them for backpacking – too dense ( particularly those with high liquid content ) and too bulky , for starters . They also generate trash that ’ s messy and takes up quite a second of space ( and might slice a finger , to boot ) .
- Also Much Alcohol : A touch of whisky or wine at camp be great – not least for toast a showstopper sundown or killer show of alpenglow on a wall of peaks , or for unwinding after a particularly grueling traverse . But hold in idea that alcohol ’ sec dehydrating , thus make sure you ’ re taking in lot of other liquids along with it ; moreover , indulging right earlier bed might see you make more than one nocturnal trip out of the sleep purse , wrecking a well night ’ s sleep . And it goes without say that an honest-to-goodness hangover isn ’ t much fun to take with on a day when you ’ re hoping to cover a bunch of miles .
Minimize Impact & Avoid Animal Skirmish
It ‘s significant to minimize your impact on the natural environment you ‘re explore and enjoy for ecological ground and to assure you are n’t impair the wilderness experience for fellow adventurers . Unfortunately , food and cooking in the backcountry often create opportunities for less-then-exemplary environmental stewardship .
Packing out any and all trash and food waste you yield while backpacking is cardinal . Choosing ingredients that come in minimum promotion , repackaging and consolidating your foodstuffs forward of your trip , and selecting publicity or container you can convert to storing trash ( Mountain House pouches , for example ! ) help out big-time in this regard .
Another circumstance when it occur to cooking and eating in the backcountry ? Favoring stove over cookfires , particularly in heavily employ recreation area or landscapes with naturally confine dead and consume wood .
Act everything you can to head off attract animals with your backpacking food and cooking smell . Proper food storage in the backcountry exist essential : Wildlife accustomed to scavenging at campsites may become dangerously habituated , which can negatively touch their long-run survival and also advance more belligerent behavior toward people . Hoisting up a “ bear bag ” or using bearproof canisters ( which are increasingly expect in many national parks ) does n’t alone serve go on your viddles out of reach of grizzly and/or dark bears : You also need to worry about smaller scroungers such as raccoons , skunks , jays , and rodents . If you ‘re cooking with a campfire , avoid burning food waste : The result aromas and charred bit may draw in wildlife , which may cause problem for those camping after you . ( Learn more about savvy food pattern in bear country . )
Never Backpack Hungry ! Take Mountain House on the Trail
Hopefully all of the above pay you a useful starting point for thinking about chowing down out thither in the wilds . Remember , design ’ s the most significant step , as it ’ ll see you ’ ve got plenty ( but not also much ) of the right kind of eats and drink to prevent your energy – and your liquor – up on an adventure .
Our Adventure Meal are designed to extend a rest of taste , nutrition , and convenience , essential for preserve energy during outside activities . Adventure meals from Mountain House include a sort of choice , from hearty breakfasts to satisfying dinner , all organize for easy formulation and portability , insure adventurers can enjoy delightful and nutritious food even in remote locations .
The challenge of observe food that ’ s lightweight , packable , delicious , and nutritious plenty for backpacking is reach a whole band easy by choosing Mountain House for some of your wilderness menu . Our just-add-hot-water freeze-dried dish and sides feature the long shelf spirit in the business , deliver well-rounded nutrition , and taste mighty well as well . Receive a spirit at our broad choice of easy backpacking meals right here . Bon appetit !
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