Food Weights

When adventuring, whether it be backcountry ski touring, backpacking, bike packing or mountaineering, you are likely going to be packing food and after your first outing most learn quickly that minimizing the weight of your food can have a significant impact on the finally weight of your pack. This page is a guide to food weights and can help you to meal plan while keeping your pack sensible.

=Liquid Fuel

White gas is the fuel used in Whisperlite or Dragonfly campstoves Summer - no melting snow 60-100ml/person/day Spring skiing - melting snow 120-160ml/person/day Winter -with altitude and cold up to 200ml 140ml/person/day or 1 litre per person per week is a good rule of thumb for ski mountaineering.

Pressurized Gas Fuel

There are a few different types of pressurized gas fuels, colloquially known altogether as propane, however, they come in a number of different mixtures and not just pure propane. Pure propane has the lowest boiling point at -41°C and so for very cold temperatures or high altitudes, such as when you are ski touring or mountaineering, a regular propane mix will work, however, it requires a heavy canister because of the high pressure at normal room temperature. For backcountry trips, this is often not practical because of the weight. To solve this, propane is mixed with different gases to increase the boiling temperature so that a less heavy canister can be used.

There are essentially four types of mixes that you should know about:

• regular propane mixes (Steel heavy canisters ie. your typical 20lbs barbeque canister)
• regular butane mixes (the heavy coleman 1lb cylinders)
• lightweight summer butane mixes (lightweight backcountry MSR, Primus, ect. canisters)
• lightweight winter isobutane mixes (also comes in lightweight backcountry MSR, Primus, ect. canisters)
• mountaineering propane-butane mixes (midweight liquid fuel canisters)

Instead, most will opt to use either a lightweight summer butane mix or a winter isobutane mix which can be stored in a significantly lighter canister. Summer butane mixes are roughly 90% butane and 10% propane. Butane has a boiling point of -0.5°C so if you use this mix when it is too cold, it will work, but not very well and not for very long since the propane will boil off quickly and burn inefficiently. When the propane runs out, only butane will be left in the canister as an unusable liquid fuel. The compromise between the summer butane mix and pure propane is a winter isobutane mix. Isobutane has a boiling point of -12°C

and propane stoves and a number of factors can influence how much propane you use. Some of these factors are:

• Temperature: If it's below freezing outside, propane may have trouble lighting with reduced propane flow and non-winter mix iso

General DO NOT bring canned food or food containing lots of water (e.g. watermelon). Go for light dried foods. Breakfast and lunches are usually packed independently. Overall for food, you want the most calories per gram, no water content, 1kg per day average. 200g for breakfast, 500g for lunch, 300 grams for dinner. If you’re a bit of a smaller eater, reduce each meal by 50-100g. Having a scale really helps for food packing. Keeping track of amounts is a good way not too let yourself starve and to make sure the group dinners have enough food. A group dinner for 3 should be nearly 1kg of dried food.

Breakfasts Total weight: 200g/person/day For alpine starts or trips where you want to be moving quickly in the morning, plan for cold breakfasts. Cold instant oats or granola are potential options. Quick oats are easy. Mix with brown sugar, milk powder, raisins or nuts and it can be eaten cold like cereal or hot like oatmeal. Granola with whole or coconut milk powder is another option. Sometimes bagels or banana bread break up the monotony of oatmeal. Instant noodles are a possible hot savoury breakfast.

Lunches Total weight: 500g/person/day Lunch is the heaviest as you cant cook anything. It can be good to have 1-2 bagels or wraps /day. Possible spreads/fillings are nutella, butter, cream cheese, jam, cheese, bell peppers, jam, peanut butter-jelly and/or hummus. For snacks granola bars, chocolate, nuts, gummies, sesame sticks, chocolate covered nuts and raisins, indian snacks, etc. Weight break down: 150g for 1 bagel, 50g of granola bar and 300 grams of snacks like

Dinners Total weight: 300g/person/day Dinners are typically shared among 2-3 people. With Covid though, people more likely to be cooking for themselves. Dinners are often broken down into being 40% staple/carb, 10% flavour, 30% calories, 20% protein. Example: 1kg dinner= 400g couscous, mac cheese, instant mashed potatoes, 100g of soup powder with nuts, dehydrated veggies, 300g of butter or cheese, 200g of dehydrated pepperoni sticks, pork fluff or dehydrated canned salmon. If you’re including a desert and/or appetizer like a soup just do the same division but a 1kg dinner would be more like 100g soup, 800g dinner, 100g desert.

Possible beverages Gatorade/tang tea/coffee hot chocolate

Further Reading and Resources

If you are looking to buy lots of dried bulk goods see (it is a bit expensive - VOC members should get a 10% discount for expedition trips): http://www.famousfoods.ca/

Some potential recipes for dehydrated food: https://www.ubc-voc.com/wiki/Recipes

A great reference for trip food planning: https://www.johnbaldwin.ca/trip-planning-food.asp