Preparing for a camping or hiking trip takes lots of list making and forethought. After all, you don’t want to be stuck out in the middle of nowhere without your water or food, or without your backpacking tent. It’s easy to forget major things when you’re all wrapped in the excitement of just getting away and experiencing nature first hand. That’s why you must plan carefully and list out everything you’re going to take with you. One thing you definitely don’t want to forget is food. Food can be expensive, however, if you buy it already made at the store. Meals prepackaged for camping can quickly eat up your backpacking budget. That’s why it might be better to make homemade backpacking food. Making your own homemade backpacking food will free up your budget for more important things, like those new camping gadgets. You only have to decide what kinds of foods you want to bring with you and how much you can carry inside of your backpack.

Recipe Books

If you’re not much of a chef and your cooking skills pretty much involve frozen oven pizzas, don’t worry. You can get homemade backpacking food cook books at your local bookstore or even at your local camping store. You can find homemade backpacking recipes that will allow you to take raw foods, such as your own homemade beef jerky or dried fruit or trail mixes, and you can even find recipes for cooked foods if you have a portable grill you’re going to take with you. Don’t worry if you don’t know how to cook, as these books are for everyone, even the most unskilled chef. All you need are the ingredients and a kitchen and you can make all the homemade backpacking food you can carry.

Packaging

Remember that when you make your homemade backpacking food, you’ll need to package it correctly so that it stays fresh inside your backpack for long periods of time. Sandwich bags work great, but you can also think about mini coolers, plastic containers and even just paper bags if the food is dry enough.

When you’re out hiking or camping and you get hungry, it’s a very freeing feeling to be able to pull out your very own homemade backpacking food to satiate you. Who needs store bought, expensive foods, after all, when you can make your very own at home? Just don’t forget the water as you’ll need plenty of it even if you’re only going out for a day of backpacking fun.