Re Packing Your Food

I am preparing for our annual ATC Xmas trip. This year we are heading for Fiordland on the SW corner of the South Island of NZ. This area is infamous for rain and sand flies. I can't wait :-)

Anyhow, I am a big fan of Backcountry Cuisine freeze dried food. It's tasty and light. You use less gas as all you are doing is boiling water. However, this food is designed to be used as "cook in the bag" - rip open the pack and pour in a cup of boiling water, re-seal and sit for 10 mins.

These bags are foil and as such add unnecessary weight. Some may argue you don't have to carry a bowl. But you still have to have a hot drinking receptacle, in my case, one serves both purposes. I use a Ti Jetboil so don't carry a bowl, billy or cup.

Whilst I was re-packing my food today I decided to check out the weight gains.

Here's the scoop...

We are out for 8 days. I use Backcountry breakfasts, Dinners and desserts, that's 3 packages each day, 24 in total.

I weighed the 24 empty Backcountry Cuisine packs in at 445 grams

Before packing, I weighed the 24 18x17 zip lock plastic bags at 86 grams.

As you can see a 359 gram weight reduction, pretty substantial in my book.

Plus, what you pack in you must pack out so this make the weight gain even more beneficial as you have to carry that packaged weight for the entire trip.  

Another feature of re-packing is space saving. My supply of BC food filled a large cardboard box. After re-packing my food fits into a nice mouse and waterproof Zpacks cuben fiber stuff sack.

I might add I do the same for my soup and daytime food (I eat every 2 hours). I tip all my cup-a-soup packets into one zip bag. I also unpack all my Em Cookies, jerky and dried fruit and split these into two zip lock bag - one bag the first part of trip, the other for the balance.