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ajgoodkids Member
Joined: 11 Aug 2002 Posts: 113 | TRs | Pics Location: Issaquah |
Our short backpacking trip staple is corned beef. Our lunches are field-assembled sandwichettes of crusty sour-dough or rye bread, corned beef, Vermont sharp cheddar and tons of mustard. Chopped up corned beef is also the perfect addition to anything you can cook on a backpacking stove.
We don't know what corned beef's official unrefrigerated life is, but in our experience it looks, smells and tastes fine after three days if it's not too hot out.
Here's easy, expert, pre-trip preparation advice:
Buy the leanest corned beef brisket you can find. The quality of different brands varies, so shop carefully and don't bargain hunt.
Simmer the corned beef in lots of water in a big pot for two hours. This gets most of the salt out.
Then bake it in a loosely covered casserole, fat side up, in a quarter inch of water, at 300 degrees F, for one hour. This gives it a nice baked texture.
Trim off all the surface fat and chill well in the refrigerator.
In the field, slice perpendicular to the grain for sandwiches.
Prepare a lot more than you need for your camping trip. Here's the recipe for home-made corned beef hash:
Melt a little bit of unsalted butter in a large frying pan.
Add diced cooked corned beef.
Add a lot of diced sweet onion.
Add diced yellow Fin or Yukon gold potatoes, about one and a half the volume of the corned beef.
Add fresh ground pepper, a pinch of dry ground ginger, and lots of ground coriander seed.
Add salt only to taste, as the corned beef's salt content varies.
Cover and fry over low heat, scraping the bottom up occasionally, until the potatoes are soft.
Fry a little longer uncovered, occasionally scraping the bottom.
Refrigerate. Reheat meal-size batches in a microwave oven.
I realize we're the only non-vegetarians left in Seattle. Sorry; this stuff is gourmet fare. Eat your celery hearts out.
Our other backpacking goodies, all from Safeway:
Lipton rice and pasta with sauce dried meals.
Nature Valley Trail Mix Fruit & Nut granola bars.
Safeway Hot Cocoa mixed 50/50 with powdered milk.
Cream of the West hot cereal - try this 100% toasted whole wheat cereal; you'll never eat oatmeal again.
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Ulrich Member
Joined: 02 Feb 2002 Posts: 174 | TRs | Pics Location: Seattle |
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Ulrich
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Wed Aug 14, 2002 11:41 am
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I'm interested what kind of food people take on day-hikes, especially during this hot weather. Any suggestions?
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catwoman Member
Joined: 16 Dec 2001 Posts: 888 | TRs | Pics Location: somewhere near Tacoma |
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catwoman
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Wed Aug 14, 2002 12:07 pm
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Ulrich,
Fresh fruit is a must for dayhikes, particularly on a hot day. Love to have some cut up watermelon -- oh, so refreshing! I also like to take a thing of yogurt and about a 12 or 16 oz bottle of oj also hits the spot. Made an awesome sandwich to take along, too, with garlic bread-cream cheese-fresh tomato-smoked salmon. Yum!!!
I've taken apples and brie cheese for an afternoon snack on an overnighter and that was awesome.
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-lol- Member
Joined: 17 Dec 2001 Posts: 767 | TRs | Pics
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-lol-
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Thu Aug 15, 2002 10:22 am
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MCaver Founder
Joined: 14 Dec 2001 Posts: 5124 | TRs | Pics
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MCaver
Founder
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Thu Aug 15, 2002 10:39 pm
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Since the coffee issue came up again... Has anyone ever taken espresso beans to munch on instead of brewing up some coffee in the backcountry? Chocolate covered espresso beans are oh so good. Seems they'd be a nice solution.
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Stomp Terminally Indolent
Joined: 28 Jun 2002 Posts: 65 | TRs | Pics Location: Bellevue |
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Stomp
Terminally Indolent
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Mon Aug 19, 2002 2:08 pm
Coffee beans
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Quote: | Chocolate covered espresso beans are oh so good. |
And Trader Joe's has a giant 18oz tub of assorted chocolate-covered beans for only $4.99. Milk, dark, white, and some sort of mottled chocolate coatings.
Stick those in your trail mix, if you dare. M&Ms are for the weak!
# Stomp (fifty score key-tapping monkeys)
# Stomp (fifty score key-tapping monkeys)
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3fngrs Member
Joined: 13 Feb 2002 Posts: 42 | TRs | Pics
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3fngrs
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Mon Aug 19, 2002 7:30 pm
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Gotta love those Trader Joe espresso beans!! Only drawback with them is the chocolate melts so easily in hot weather.
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Vine Maple Victim Member
Joined: 14 Aug 2002 Posts: 23 | TRs | Pics Location: Shoreline, WA |
My average food intake goes something like this:
Breakfast: cornmeal mush or oatmeal (always bring some brown sugar )
Lunch: rykrisp or akmak crackers, summer sausage or italian dry salami, new zealand cheddar
dinner: cornmeal mush, beans, or soup
Lately I realized I need a bit more protein, so probably will eat more beans for dinner and less cornmeal.
Cornmeal is the most convenient food though...it is extremely dense when dry, and expands tremendously. You can pre-soak to reduce cooking time, and with salt, brown sugar, or fresh huckle/blueberries, or a combination thereof, is really good.
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packgoat Member
Joined: 15 Aug 2002 Posts: 145 | TRs | Pics Location: Idaho |
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packgoat
Member
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Tue Aug 20, 2002 5:55 am
bakepacker
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I "discovered" the BAKEPACKER 10 years ago and use it for all my trip cooking. It enables me to use supermarket packaged foods like Lipton rice dishes, noodle dishes, tuna helper, etc. The beauty of the system is that I can remove the meals from the large packages and place them in the plastic bag that has been identified as to content, amt of H2O and cooking time. I select the meals for taste and low cook time and keep a dozen in the frig for easy access when it is show time. There are many ways to prepare trout in the field but baking them in the BAKEPACKER is very tasty. I also pre package cake mixes, corn bread, etc. The cleanup is better than freeze drieds if you eat directly out of the bag with only the spoon requiring cleaning since the freeze dried bag is bulky. Freeze dried foods will take less fuel since there is only the time to boiling whereas BP takes about 10 minutes of simmer. Another advantage of BP is for reheating a frozen meal like I take in on my hunting trips, (dirty word in this group?). I freeze a meal in the plastic that fits exactly into my 3# coffee can, Titanium doesn't fit my budget, which is protected by the 1" of water in the can bottom. I turn on the heat and go on about my business and check occasionally for thawing with no concerns of scorching. The bags are even reuseable by turning them inside out and rinsing in a stream but I simply stuff them into a garbage sack since they only cost about 3 cents.
George
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Mt. Frank Member
Joined: 17 Jan 2002 Posts: 46 | TRs | Pics Location: Renton, WA |
Chocolate-covered espresso beans are dangerous! Years ago, our boss fed them to us in the morning and we would get more work done by 9 AM than anyone else could do all day! Boy, was she sadistic.
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Newt Short Timer
Joined: 21 Dec 2001 Posts: 3176 | TRs | Pics Location: Down the road and around the corner |
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Newt
Short Timer
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Tue Aug 20, 2002 6:27 pm
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Ok, I'm dumb.
What's a BAKEPACKER?
NN
It's pretty safe to say that if we take all of man kinds accumulated knowledge, we still don't know everything. So, I hope you understand why I don't believe you know everything. But then again, maybe you do.
It's pretty safe to say that if we take all of man kinds accumulated knowledge, we still don't know everything. So, I hope you understand why I don't believe you know everything. But then again, maybe you do.
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