Late last year, when the concept of my trip was slowly coming to fruition, Sara asked me if I was going to dehydrate food. I really hadn’t thought about it up until that point. I kind of just thought I’d wing it, buy some instant rice meals, packets of tuna and chicken, trail mix and jerky supplemented by grocery or convenience store stops along the way. It was around that time where she ordered a book that was going to fundamentally and nutritionally change my summer.

Shortly after the book arrived, we started looking at food dehydrators. It helped that Sara (and now me) is a regular visitor to the r/trailmeals subreddit. We opted to not go all in and start with the Cadillac of Food Dehydrators, but something a but more economical and entry-level, the Honda Civic of dehydrators – the Nesco 5-tray Snackmaster Pro. (The only downside to this particular dehydrator is a lack of a timer, initially meaning I had to get up in the middle of the night to turn it off. Never fear, technology is here: I picked up a cheap smart outlet than can be controlled from your phone or turned on/off via timer.)

Shortly after the new year, the dehydrator arrived, and I went ahead and tried it out in earnest the first few days. I started with a few easy things, kiwi and potatoes. The kiwis were amazingly delicious, sweet as candy. The potatoes, super thinly sliced were a pretty good snack but not spectacular. Then I went all in and did jerky. I picked up some high quality, Eye of Round and then some 90% lean ground beef. Over the course of a weekend, I followed the recipes in my book to prep, spice and marinate the meat. While I didn’t have a true jerky kit, I improvised my way through it. The results were fantastic, especially the ground beef jerky.

I was hooked. I quickly moved on to more adventurous things: plantains (not good), broccoli (great rehydrated), beans, canned chicken, jasmine rice and pasta. Next was the leather. Thicker liquids can generally be dehydrated then rehydrated at camp with good results. First came pasta sauce, then blended blackberries, bananas with raspberry and bananas with blueberry. The result is indeed a leathery sheet that can be torn and divided to make single serving snacks like a fruit roll-up or rehydrated and added to oatmeal for a tasty breakfast. Then I went back to some whole fruits: blueberries, strawberries, banana, apricots, mango and…pineapples. Probably my favorite item so far, I slap 5 cans of slices pineapple to fill the dehydrator to the max, 12 hours later there’s a chewy delicious snack.

I started assembling meals with 3 or 4 ingredients. Usually it was a protein like chicken, ham, ground beef or tofu, then either rice or pasta, with a veggie like broccoli or edamame.

Of course, with all the food coming out of the dehydrator, I needed to be able to preserve the meals for longer term storage. We went ahead and sprung for a NutriChef vacuum sealer. As the meals and snacks started piling up, I began packaging, sealing, labeling then into the deep freeze for longer term storage. Freezing the items isn’t totally necessary but will extend shelf life a few months. Almost nonstop since the new year, I’ve had something in the dehydrator and my new hobby has turned into a bit of an addiction.

This week I’ll be packaging up what will likely be my last meals for the trip – roast turkey, brown rice and edamame. I have almost 70 total meals. I anticipate this being enough for a 100+ day trip as I’ll also be buying fresher groceries and eating real meals along the way. Jerky and fruit will be my snacks or breakfasts. I’ll likely carry 2 to 3 weeks’ worth of meals at a time, then ship boxes along the way with another 2 to 3 weeks’ worth.

I’m happy I listened to my wonderfully thoughtful wife to pursue food dehydrating. The summer will absolutely mean much more nutritious and delicious food options as I watch the spectacular sunsets along the river over the Great Plains.

(I have quite a few photos of the results on my Instagram feed – link over on the right.)

Log of dehydrated foods and ingredients:

What	Temp	Time
Kiwi slices	135	~7hrs
Potatoes	135	~6hrs
Ground beef jerky	160	~8hrs
Eye of round jerky	160	~12hrs
kiwi, pineapple, clementines, mango	145	mango-10hrs, the rest 15 hrs
Plantain	135	~7hrs
Broccoli	125	5.5hrs
Rice – jasmine	125	5.5hrs
Chicken – canned	145	4hrs
Black beans – canned	125
Broccoli	125	7.5hrs
Tomato sauce – jar	125	9hrs – flipped at 7.5hrs
Chicken – canned	125	5hrs
Ground beef	145	5.5hrs
Pasta – elbow mac	135	4hrs?
Blackberry leather	135	9.5hrs
Pineapple – canned	135	12hrs
Ground beef jerky	160	11.5hrs
Rice – jasmine	125	5.5hrs
Pineapple – canned	135	5hrs
Ham – sliced	145	8hrs
Pasta – elbow mac	145	4hrs
Fruit bark – banana, raspberry	135	9hrs
Fruit bark – banana, blueberry	135	9hrs
Sauerkraut	125	7hrs
Banana	135	8hrs
Pineapple – canned	135	12hrs
Pinto beans	125	7hrs
Apricots	135	11hrs
Blueberries	135	14hrs
Strawberries	135	11hrs
Tomatos – cherry	135	14hrs
Potatoes – thin sliced	125	6hrs
Pineapple – canned	125	12hrs
Pears – canned	125	12hrs
Ground beef jerky	160	10hrs
Butter chicken sauce	135	10hrs
Chicken – canned	145	6hrs
Rice – jasmine	125	7hrs
Pasta – tubes	135	5.5hrs
Soup – chunky chicken noodle	125	10hrs
Ground beef	145	7hrs
Tomato sauce – jar	135	10hrs
Edamame – shelled	125	6hrs
Mixed veggies	125	6hrs
Blackberry leather	135	12hrs
Pineapple – canned	135	12hrs
Mandarin oranges – canned	135	12hrs
Blueberry leather	135	12hrs
Rice – jasmine	125	7hrs
Pineapple – canned	135	12hrs
Pasta – shells	135	6hrs
Applesauce leather	135	14hrs
Lentils	125	9hrs
Chicken – canned	125	8hrs
Broccoli	125	6hrs
Ground beef jerky	160	9hrs
Kiwi	125	8hrs
Ground beef – taco	125	6hrs
Wild rice	125	7hrs
Broccoli	125	6hrs
Various cheese	95	18hrs
Brussel sprounts	125	8hrs
Tofu	125	8hrs
Goat cheese	95	18hrs
Turkey – oven roasted	145	8hrs
Rice – brown	125	10hrs
Blackberry leather	135	18hrs
Strawberry leather	135	18hrs

 

Log of assembled meals:

Meal/Item	Quantity
Chicken, Jasmine Rice, Broccoli	4
Macaroni & Meat Sauce	12
Ham, Noodles, Sauerkraut	7
Beef, Ramen, Beans	2
Ham, Ramen, Sauerkraut, Beans	1
Ham, Ramen, Sauerkraut	1
Butter chicken, rice	5
Chicken, rice, beans, tomatoes	2
Rice, beans, tomatoes	1
Beef, beans, pasta, tomato	3
Mac & Cheese w/broccoli	2
Chicken, edamame, tomato sauce	2
Chicken, edamame	1
Chicken, lentils	1
Chicken, lentils, rice	7
Ground beef – taco	3
Tofu, lentils, wild rice	2
Tofu, brussel sprouts, wild rice	1
Chicken, brussel sprouts, wild rice	1
Chicken, broccoli, wild rice	4

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