backpacking food

Backpacking with children presents special challenges. Kids can carry no more than 7 ounces of weight in their backpack or they will find the first shady spot on the trail and refuse to move forward. This means that, apart from the clothes they are wearing, they can only carry a tube of chapstick, a dried apricot and a piece of dental floss. We had good family friends growing up who took their 5 kids backpacking. The "baby," Charlie, was 5 years old. After tossing off his backpack and throwing an admirable tantrum at mile 0.2, his parents convinced him to continue by allowing him to carry the bag of marshmallows instead of wearing his backpack. When they arrived at their first campsite, Charlie was a sticky mess. I remember our first family trip as well, in which my father carried his mammoth pack on his back and my little brother's pack hanging like a grocery bag from his hand. So, as you see, the father usually gets stuck carrying just about everything: the tents, the food, the sleeping bags, the water, the gear. It seems the kids and the mother get to skip up the flowery hillside like Julie Andrews with neat little packs while the father trudges behind with a Serpa-worthy pack towering majestically above his head like you see in those National Geographic pictures.

Backpacking food can be a powerful motivator for kids. Good food includes M & Ms, salami, cheese sticks and triathlete food like Power Bars and Power gels. We let our kids pick out their own energy bars at the sport's stores beforehand, so they don't end up with "Midnight Banana Luna Bars," or the "Chocolate Expresso Cliff Bars" which frankly look like bear turds. Freeze dried dinners are usually ok, though beware of Turkey Tetrazzini which can induce what I will simply call "death flatus." On a trip years ago with my hiking buddy, Pete, there was a Turkey Tetrazzini dinner which lead to the "Turkey Tetrazzini Incident," in which the tent zippers were ruined in our haste to evacuate. Also, avoid Pad Thai. Clare chose that for her dinner on our recent trip to Cathedral Lakes and could only describe the taste as peanut-flavored styrofoam. Pastas like spaghetti and lasagna are definitely safe bets.

Breakfast is tough. Henry was incredulous on his first trip when he exclaimed, "That's it!? Pop tarts and raisens for breakfast? What kind of breakfast is this?" Oatmeal with dried blueberries works slightly better. Dried milk is pointless and Carnation Instant Breakfast, though it contains some protein, can mimic giardia when it hits your intestines.

A good dinner bet and a hit with the kids is the "backpacker's pizza" as pictured above. Boboli Pizza dough is vacuum-packed and fits nicely in a bear canister. A small packet of sauce is supplied with the dough. A packet of pastrami and a few cheese sticks can be melted into the dough by heating over the stove. It's light weight, high calorie and salty and requires no refrigeration. Mmmm!