Backpacking food - Mediterranean style pasta

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There are several issues to consider in backpacking food: nutritional

density, weight, spoilage, and time and fuel used in preparation. You

want of course very light food that will cook instantly so you don't

waste fuel and time, be very nutritious so you do not have to carry

much of it, and that will stay unspoiled un-refrigerated for the whole

trip, which could be several days. Of course, you also want the food

in light, resealable and hermetic packaging. If you could have

everything, you would also like it to be delicious and at a reasonable

price. These last couple of points are where commercial pre-packaged

freeze dried meals fail us.

 

Here are a few tasty international vegetarian dishes that can be put

together using very light weight ingredients which are standard

inexpensive items in ethnic food shops.

 

 

MEDITERRANEAN STYLE PASTA (serves 3-4 hungry hikers)

 

Ingredients

 

2 packs of sun dried tomatoes (the trader Joe ones are good)

 

10 oz dried pasta, the chunky smaller ones work better like bow tie,

spiral, rigatoni, etc. Of course, the quicker cooking will save on

fuel, just make sure you like the consistency, I use regular Italian

style pasta but it takes about 10 minutes to cook, so on a long

backpack, substitute quick cooking or instant pasta to save fuel -

 

pine nuts (about 1/4 or 1/3 of a cup)

 

1/4 cup black oil cured olives, pitted (these will last a while with

no refrigeration)

 

3 cloves of garlic, fresh

 

dried mushrooms, (can use the TJ wild mix or the dried shitake from

Asian stores)

 

olive oil – the good stuff – extra-virgin cold-press low-acidity….

 

herbs of choice – you can use dried basil, oregano, I have used fresh

rosemary too, just a tiny bit – get creative, experiment –

 

a little crushed red pepper (the pizza topping type) also goes well

here –

 

salt

 

Preparation

 

at home: Use one large zip lock bag and 3 small ones, that will go

inside. To pack before leaving, take one of the packages of sun-dried

tomato and put it in a coffee grinder to make a powder. This is the

base for your tomato sauce. Add a little salt to it, and you can also

add the dried herbs to it, put it in a small zip lock bag.

 

on another small zip lock bag, put the mushrooms and the other pack of

sun dried tomatoes, cut into bite size chunks, cutting the tomatoes in

half is good enough.

 

on yet another small zip lock, place the fresh unpeeled garlic, the

pine nuts and the black olives, already pitted. Place the pasta in

the large bag, and the small bags with their contents. Take a small

bottle of olive oil too.

 

at camp: you will need a couple of pots for this, and a frying pan.

Boil water, and place mushrooms and dried tomatoes in enough boiling

water to cover, let it sit. Heat some olive oil in the frying pan,

and add the peeled and chopped garlic, and the pine nuts, cook until

slightly golden, add the powdered dried tomatoes, herbs, salt and

water to make a paste. You might want to use the soaking water from

the mushrooms and tomatoes to not waste any flavor. Add the contents

of the other pan, and cover to let it get nice and soft. Add the

black olives too. This is now the sauce and veggies for your pasta.

 

Start boiling a lot of water in the largest pot you have, add a little

salt and olive oil just like at home, when it starts boiling add the

pasta and cook until done. Draining it is tricky, do the best you can

and you could always make the sauce thicker so if there is a little

water left in with the pasta it will be saucy enough....

 

No just simply mix the cooked hot pasta with the sauce and serve.