High Sierra Topix

On multi-day trips, I use various dehydrated backpackers meals for my dinners (Mountain House, Backpackers Pantry, etc.). Depending on the meal, they can be a bit on the bland side, as i'm sure many here will agree.

What are some lightweight ingredients you add to these meals to improve your dining experience?

Parmesan cheese. I use freshly grated. The packets work in a pinch

And Ground black pepper. I grind some before i leave in a spice grinder and put it in a really small plastic container. I have also mixed up spices that i think help some of the freeze dried crap and put them in snack ziplocks. red pepper, paprika, dried minced onions, etc.

you could just take food.... dehydrated leftovers work great.

sounds like work to dehydrate. easier to fix some good base products (if you pick correctly) with admonishments.

WORK to dump stuff on a tray instead of in a container and putting it in the fridge?

Yeah... ok.

look at the OP ask. There are really great base packages out there to build off of for a meal. It's not like he's asking do I need to carry extra TP with MH Lasagne w/meat sauce. (yes, btw)

That aside, Look at things like chicken breasts, green beans, or go off the chart with lentils and add some extra indian spices. Add Garlic. Bring some Ginger.

If it's a standard meal, know what works with that and amp it up. Heck, it's in almost any recipe book. expect that a prepak will be bland and do anything but add salt to it.

Russ

Thanks for the suggestions, guys.

The spices should help, and I found a big package (dried) French fried onions. I've seen dehydrated mushrooms, too, which would go nicely in the MH beef stroganoff.

Sometime soon, i'll look into getting a food dehydrator. For now though, with a trip next weekend, i'm looking to find easy additions to just add into pre-made backpacker's meals. Costco used to carry a great mixed dehydated vegetable mixture, but, alas, that was years ago.

I am nuts about nuts! Sliced almonds go well with a lot of meals. I also take margarine and olive oil and add a tablespoon to each meal - adds calories for the least amount of weight. My latest spice obsession is Tajin seasoning (lime and hot pepper), however, it is salty and fd meals are already quite salty which makes adding anything to them tricky because a lot of additions are also salty. Sun dried tomatoes are good. The best supplement is fish. I just returned from a trip where I had fish with every meal- what a luxury!

I get a good crop of green onions in the spring, too much to eat. These go into the dehydrator and are used the next few month, particularly for backpacking.