10 days worth of food?

[chrisx]

How does a person carry 10 days worth of food on their bike?¿?
There are rules.
It all has to fit in a large size bear can.  About the same size as an Ortlieb front bag.
No energy bars, candy bars, mono sodium, junk food.
Fire and water are available most, but not all of the time.
Trash should be burnable.

[Done]

Peanut butter?

OK, more seriously: check out what some of the arctic explorers have taken with them: high density calories--which means mostly fat and oils. One pound of fat is about 3500 calories. Assuming that you need 3500-7500 calories/day, that equates to about ten to twenty pounds of fat for your trip (probably closer to twenty pounds unless you have a lot of body fat to burn!) Protein has about 1500 calories per pound, so you'd need to carry 20 to 40 pounds of lean jerky! Carbohydrates are about the same energy/calorie as protein--but crackers have the added downside of being bulky.

Fitting enough calories into a bear can to survive ten days of reasonably intense riding will be a challenge, fat or no fat. Some arctic explorers have literally survived by drinking olive oil that they carried on their sleds---but peanut butter probably tastes better!

[bmike-vt]

Bacon butter.  Like peanut butter. But with meat.
What is the capacity (liters?)  of the container?  Can you fit 35000 calories in there?


Did mikesee give any caloric clues (aside from the ode mike and ikes) from his Iditatour?

[chrisx]

Fat and bacon butter!
One of my best skills is sticking my foot in my mouth, or typing without looking into the info first.
Not the ansewer I had imagined would be forth coming.
I got a book on dehydrating vegetables, but haven't tried it yet.
one more rule,  I have to eat the food for one month - 2 mail drops.
thinking about eating lumps of fat for 30 days      %&¿>ª      r u sure

[6thElement]

I read it as beer can the first time

[jhl99]

A good question,  but is the question how to physically attach the food to the bike, or is the question what food to take, for a 10 days while traveling by bike  Or is it both?

How big is the bear canister? 

Many backpacker books could give menu ideas.

What is the climate/environment?  Does it effect the menu?

[chrisx]

A good question,  but is the question how to physically attach the food to the bike, or is the question what food to take, for a 10 days while traveling by bike  Or is it both?

What kind of food to take

How big is the bear canister? 

About the same size as an Ortlieb front bag.
Commercially available bear cans come in 2 sizes.

Many backpacker books could give menu ideas

I have seen those books.  most of their recipes are 10 ingredients long.  not what I want
simple meals, easy to prepare, one pan, mostly set the pan on the fire to conserve fuel.

What is the climate/environment?  Does it effect the menu?

I can not predict the weather many months in advance.   The word  ( bear )  in the sentence can help select the diet.  Some foods can be smelled at a much greater distance than others.  The smell of tuna can carry 10 miles.  The smell of melted fat is one we all detect at a greater distance than most other foods.  The Environment does affect the menu

[bmike-vt]

OK, if you filled a bearvault brand can (7 liters) with peanut butter you will be @:

1520 calories per cup
1 cup = .23 liters
1 liter = ~6,608 calories
1 bearvault = 46,260 calories

The bearvault folks claim their 7 liter size is good for 7 days of solo backpacking.

Here's a potential resource:
http://www.andrewskurka.com/advice/nutrition.php

backpackinglight would also seem like a good resource...

[Done]

I just did some fresh calculations after discovering that some of my original numbers were incorrect. I don't know why, but for years I've mistakenly believed that a pound of fat is about 3500 calories. Turns out that a gram of fat is 9.4 calories, and a pound of fat is 453.6 grams, so a pound of fat is actually 4264 calories. A pound of protein is 1860 calories, which is the same for carbohydrates. Amusingly, ethanol has 3175 calories per pound (hic). Of course, these numbers are based on ingredients without any water, etc.

Peanut butter, which is mostly fat but also has some protein and carbohydrates, has 5.9 calories/gram (or 2665 calories per pound). Olive oil is almost pure fat and has 3992 calories/pound.

I like bmike's calculations! 46,260 calories divided by 10 days = 4600 calories per day. I think that would be too little food for me. Since my base metabolism is at least 2500 calories, that would only leave about 2,000 calories for riding. Definitely feasible for a couple of days, but I doubt that I'd have enough body fat to keep going happily for ten days--at least not ten hard days. All of this is assuming that you want to eat something with the density of peanut butter, which might present its own issues!

I don't know where you're riding, but another option might be to carry a food bag and cord so that you can hang your food in a tree. Works well in Canadian National Parks, which have a lot of bears. With the flexibility of a bear bag, you could carry more food--not to mention bulkier and more desirable stuff than peanut butter and olive oil!

[Eric]

skip the bear can and use different means ( Ursack(s) or sleeping on it. much easier to pack.
bacon smells... bears like bacon - skip the animal fats.
butter & peanut butter oats and brown sugar, rasins etc. 1 lb per day for snacks and breakfast. then pasta, potato flakes, more butter & cheese etc for dinners.
Big dry bag on top of a rear rack or partially in a frame bag.
I went 3 weeks on this diet and was still loving it at the end and eating it at home. I mean who does not like cookie dough?

[Done]

butter & peanut butter oats and brown sugar, rasins etc. 1 lb per day for snacks and breakfast. then pasta, potato flakes, more butter & cheese etc for dinners.
I mean who does not like cookie dough?

Yummo, sounds good to me! Dense, tasty, and nutritious. Throw in a little jerky and some prunes, and I'm right there with you!

[chrisx]

I am considering going to the Yukon.  The Canol road - trail have some allure over the internet. Or not, I don't know yet.  Still the question of food is useful info everywhere.  My last 10 day trip I resupplied 2 times.  I mostly ate rice, carrots, onions, tomatoes, jalapenos, vegetables that I perceived to have vitamins or nutritional value. I am not pretending that I dint stop at burger king on my way to dairy Queen as I walk around town.  On the days when I pedal my bicycle all day I prefer vegetables.
Or, without junk food I will eat when hungry, not from compulsion.

Most of the time I could change my route and get to a store within 1 or 2 days.  As I did last week, mostly to get coffee, since the rain was going to continue for days not hours.  

Planning 30 days worth of meals is a new task.  Toting 10 days worth of food is heavy.  The desire for more isolation requires greater knowledge, and far less, I don't care where the road goes    

Sleeping on your food would most likely keep it from a black bear.  A grizzly bear has no fear of humans.  If some fool feeds a grizzly human food, to get a better photo perhaps,  well the Griz has the same respect for my life as I do for the life of a fly.  

[chrisx]

butter & peanut butter oats and brown sugar, raisins etc. 1 lb per day for snacks and breakfast. then pasta, potato flakes, more butter & cheese etc for dinners.
I mean who does not like cookie dough?

Yummy, sounds good to me! too, dense, tasty, and nutritious  I wonder if there is a way to lighten the load a little

[Eric]

if you are cooking on a fire then it opens up more doors since you have an unlimited fuel supply. longer cooking things are fine like normal pasta. The cookie dough and cheese plan is nice though since you can always mow on that and not have to rely on dry noodles if it's raining buckets. and its dense.

sounds like a great trip!

[jhl99]

Maybe augment with what you take with what is available by hunting/fishing/foraging to increase variety?    I'm not sure it is really reasonable or not, but it hasn't been mentioned.

What sticks in my mind is there is  a book written about 'traditional' methods of winter camping and travel "Snow Walker's Companion: Winter Camping Skills for the North".   The couple that wrote the book did a 350 mile/ 60 day walking trip in winter, totally self contained in eastern CA.  They killed birds along the way to augment the rations they where carrying.  If weren't for there hunting skills, I kind of think they would't have made it.  For the record,  they where snowshoing and towing tobbogans with their gear.... starting out, there loads were something like 170 lbs for the wife and over 200 lbs for the husband.  Considering that their equipment included a shotgun/axe/ sheet metal wood stove/ canvas tent/ clothing and rations the weight doesn't seem that bad.

[Done]

Maybe augment with what you take with what is available by hunting/fishing/foraging to increase variety?

For the weight and bulk of a gun and bullets, one could carry a lot of cookie dough!

[chrisx]

No guns on my bike. 
To catch trout in a mountain stream,
locate deep pools water
fish 30 minutes after the evening shadows cover the water for the night.
worms work well

I will be living from store bought items. 

Every person should have some emergency survival skills. Know how to catch a fish, build a fire with wet wood, as a last resort eat roots that do not taste bitter.  that is another thread on some other web page somewhere.

What I want is to purchase food at a store, carry some, mail some ahead, not worry about gathering some on the way.  Spend the days taking photos, pedaling my bike, wondering if I should have turned left instead of right. 

How does a person carry 10 days worth of food on their bike?¿?

I am not a chef or a nutrition expert. my food is boring.  I need advice to plan a menu, hopefully one with some nutritional value,  hopefully manageable number of pounds to lug around and mail ahead.

note, I bought a bag of pasta and some cheese to cook for lunch today 

[chrisx]

These days my cook kit consists of
1 GSI kettle 800 ml perhaps
http://www.rei.com/product/798276
1 titanium cup 14oz?
1 msr ti spoon
http://www.rei.com/product/620886
1 stove
varies by season
1 plastic knife from a good will store
I set the kettle directly on the fire. I had to cut the thin silicone from the handle. gsi plastic is for the trash can.
a small amount of heated water and it cleans easily.  I eat a lot of rice this way.
The plastic knife cuts carrots and tomatoes fine, never cuts my hand, no cutting board needed.
 

[sigma7]

http://www.mountainbike-expedition-team.de/stuff/food.html provides valuable information.


-- sigma7

[chrisx]

quote from sigma 7 link
(i) good planning of trip, (ii) excellent and reliable equipment, and (iii) the right kind of nutrition during the tour. Therefore, we usually take self-made dehydrated foods with us and rely only on equipment that we consider among the best and that has in the past proven to work for us.

I gota figure out how to sun dry tomatoes