Introduction Dehydrated Camping Food
Winter camping is both a thrill-packed experience and at the same time a peace-inducing one, even though it can be tough to find good caloric sources on the trail. Nonetheless, there’s an easy solution to such problems- camping food that’s in a dehydrated form. A product of this kind has numerous benefits such as low weight, rapid prep, and sufficient nutritional content for outdoor activities. In this article, we aim to get an insight into what every person needs while planning to go for a camping trip including camping food, recipes, and even the best brands for their meal. This paper focuses on Mountain House and Firepot, as well as describes the benefits of dehydrators.
What is camping food dehydration?
Benefits of dehydrated camping food
Best Camping Dehydrated Meals
Dehydrated Foods Used in Camping Meals
Techniques to prepare dehydrated meals at home
The most consumed types of dehydrated meals
Freeze-dried camping meals and dehydrated meals
Ways to pack dehydrated camping food
Conclusion
1. What is camping food dehydration?
What is dehydrated camping food? Dehydrated camping food is the same as camping foods which are meal components that have undergone drying, thus making it possible for it to be easily eaten during camping, hiking, or trekking. This implies that carrying such meals is easy because they take up less space and weigh less. Examples include canned soup, pasta, and packaged dry fruits.
2. Benefits of dehydrated camping food
The list of advantages of camping with dehydrated foods is quite a long one as they include; lightweight and easy to transportation. Such ease of transportation is a result of the moisture content reduction which decreases the weight of the food.
Extended Use By Date: As long as food is properly stored, food can stay dry for several months or even for years.
Quick and Easy to Cook: Most dehydrated meals only require the addition of water to the product for it to be consumed thus saving on time spent on cooking.
Well-Balanced Diet: If properly done, food drying will preserve a considerable amount of beneficial nutrients that can be used during outdoor activities to generate the required energy.
Space Saving: The use of Dehydrated meals helps in lessening the volume that is required which is perfect for space constraints in the backpack.
3. Best Camping Dehydrated Meals
Always consider the best dehydrated foods for camping which blend the best ingredients for outdoor mountain cooking, taste, and cooking time as well. Some of the best-dehydrated options for summer camping may be as follows.
Mountain House Meals: The Towering House is reputable for a wide selection of Mountain House Dry Meals from Beef stroganoff to chicken teriyaki varieties of very delicious delicacies. They are great for outdoor camping as they contain freeze-dried food grains as their primary components ensuring great quality.
Firepot Dehydrated Meals: On the other hand, Dehydrated Fire Pot meals make great wholesome meals as they comprise of natural ingredients hence very suitable for camping.
Having fondly in mind camping, most outdoor enthusiasts wish to save money whilst satisfying their appetite. Providing indeed an economical option, decathlon dehydrated meals, also make a great choice for camping.
4. Dehydrated Foods Used in Camping Meals
The palette of dehydrated food is quite wide with options of either diaghastically dry to extremely scrumptious gourmet cuisine. A good number of such foods can easily be prepared without deep culinary skills. Here are a few of such recipes for campers:
Recipe 1: Dry Filling Hearty Chili
Ingredients Required: Ground beef, beans, tomatoes, onions, aglio, states, and most importantly chili.
Instructions to be followed: One should first prepare the chili. The next step is to dry it using a dehydrator. In this way, It becomes easier to preserve food in the long run. After it cools down, place it in an airtight bag. When fully prepared to eat, pour boiling water all over the meal, wait 10 to 15 minutes, and enjoy.
Recipe 2: Dry Pasta Primavera
Ingredients Required: Pasta, Carrots, green peas, Bell peppers, and Light Creaming sauce.
Instructions to be followed: For this, first boil both the pasta and the veggies, once that’s done, remove the bundles and put it together with the hot water and dried pasta. It should be stored for at least 10 minutes until it’s completely mixed.
Recipe 3: Yummy Apples and oats
Ingredients Required: Oats, Dry apples, and cinnamon sugar.
Overview: Combine all the dry ingredients and store them in an air-tight pouch, when you want to enjoy the meal, take hot water pour it into the pan and mix it.
5. Techniques to prepare dehydrated meals at home
If you want to prepare hydrated meals, the first step is to buy a dehydrator since it will ease your work, here is a simple guide to follow I will suggest to you the next as 1..,2..,3…:
First Cook Your Meals: First things first, decide on which food items you wish to dehydrate, for instance, is it onions by chili, or pasta by vegetables then make the required preparation of them in sufficient quantities.
Dehydrate: For myself, I found most gadgets that could dehydrate food to be inefficient in drawing moisture out of the meal and blending it more. So it is better to evenly spread the foods through the trays and set the temperature net according to food type.
Store: When the food has been left to dry and dry thoroughly, pour the contents and store them in tightly plastic-sealed containers or vacuum-sealed bags.
Rehydrate: What you need to do here is add some hot water to it and wait until it is dehydrated.
Making your dehydrated meals which can be easily designed to your taste and like or buying these cheap ones is a great way to save money.
6. The most consumed types of dehydrated meals
Campers look for a good quality meal that is dehydrated, and several brands can serve that purpose. Here are a few of them:
Mountain House Meals: These types of foods come in diverse varieties appealing to many campers due to their appealing taste.
Firepot Dehydrated Meals: Their products have wholesome and natural ingredients as can be seen from the name given to the brand.
Decathlon Dehydrated Meals: To be fair, one does not have to cut back too much when it comes to the quality of food, it highlights one of the inexpensive alternatives on the market.
7. Freeze-dried camping meals and dehydrated meals
Try not to confuse both frozen and dehydrated meals with each other as their usage will be in the context of different applications. Making a freeze-dried meal involves an entirely different method as the food is flash frozen before moisture is removed which overall aids in maintaining the food’s texture and flavor when compared to dehydration.
Still, they state that it takes less time to restore freeze-dried food compared to regular dry food. However, it takes slightly longer to cook food using food that has been freeze-dried compared to regular dry food.
As already mentioned, food for camping, more than anything else, depends on the taste and budget of one’s self as well as the type of camping and its set of resources to which we want to augment.
8. Ways to pack dehydrated camping food
As far as packing is concerned, consider this packing hint:
Split into Portions: Try to pack food in portions as we suggested, otherwise, only the required portions will have the possibility to move around with the user.
Weather Resistant: All food items have to be placed in waterproof bags or containers to allow no food item to be contaminated.
Rehydrating Time: Affording one some valuable time and focus especially during food preparation and wondering about how long it takes for the food to rehydrate, explains how some foods would have been ready in as little as 20 minutes.
9. Conclusion
Natural cooked meals provide an incredible variety at the places we visit understanding the fact that dehydrated nutritious meals are not a concern while we are out in the wild. They consist of lower-weight feeds that, regardless of whether they are Mountain House chili or bass, replace lost energy and enable us to continue our journey, whatever the destination, with motivation.