Backpacking meals

The Mrs JJ had a significant birthday recently. We had planned to go out for a celebratory nosh at Greasy Lizzy’s, Timperley’s answer to the 5 star Cordon Bleu restaurants of Paris, London and Rusholme. Anyroadup, when it came to the crunch she didn’t feel up to it. I can’t imagine why.

Instead of going out to eat, I nipped round the corner for a couple of take-away curries: a Chicken Tikka Mosala for her, Vegetable Dopiaza for him. Both served with pilau rice of course.

You know how it is, we only got half-way through our meals and found that we couldn’t eat another mouthful. The leftovers were put in the fridge and would have likely been forgotten about…but I had a cunning plan.

Next morning I finely chopped up all the lumpy bits of the left-overs and put the resulting mush into my dehydrator. 8 hours later all the moisture had been driven off and the resulting crunchy bits emptied into zip-lock polybags. Along with Tesco’s garlic and something-or-other naan bread, I had two excellent backpacking meals.

Dehydrated Chicken Tikka Mosala 

Rehydration of home dehydrated meals is a much slower process than with the commercial stuff, but the results are immeasurably better. And so it was.

Whilst my neighbours were tucking into their rehydrated cardboard (with added MSG) I was enjoying my excellent curry. Stormin’ was the only exception I was aware of – he dehydrates his own meals and was enjoying a similarly delicious evening meal.

If you fancy making your own meals all you need is a dehydrator. I use an American Harvest Snackmaster, similar to this one. I’d suggest a bit of experimentation, but it won’t be long before you’re making your own backpacking meals.

May 2013

LDWA Introductory Walk

May Day Bank Holiday was pencilled in as an introductory walk for newcomers and potential new LDWA members. The walk was supposed to be in North Wales but it needed to be re-located….the walk that is, not North Wales.
Advertised as 15 miles, at least two potential members took part in what was expected to be a pleasantly demanding walk in a new location, Rivington in Lancashire.
28 (?) walkers and two doggies started, I think everyone completed. You can read a very good report on the walk on Alan’s Blog.
For an introductory walk I feel it was much too fast and, and….  Read Alan’s report.

  Pre-walk address

Towards Rivington Pike

 

Rivington Pike

Jon (on R) with his full TGO Challenge kit…and he’s still smiling!

Alan and Sheila cooling their sizzling feet

Excitement for the day – Bolton Mountain Rescue call out

I’ve little idea of where we went, although I do know we visited Rivington Pike, Great Hill, White Coppice and Brinscall.

What we did:

17.5 miles
2400ft ascent
4.9mph max speed
3.3mph average speed
More piccies here….but no map, I’m not sure if anyone knew where we actually went!

Saturday 18th May

Dunham May Queen: a procession, rain, cold, Morris Dancing….and tractors.
Some photos for Alan:

 Unusual in that it’s petrol-driven

An old Fordson

Then there was my mate Matthew’s birthday party on the Wirral in the evening:

The Birthday Boy….and no, he’s definitely NOT a Tory!

Yvonne, my favouritist singer….resting singing

Mary, Yvonne, May and John R

That was a good do…with loads of Scouse too!

Sunday 19th May

A recce…in between decorating duties:
John Bullen, walks secretary of the East Lancs LDWA, bullied pencilled me in to lead a walk in October for the group. My plan is to walk from Lostock Gralam to Hale. The will be beer at the end…so I know at least 2 or 3 will turn out on the day! When you’re responsible for leading a walk it’s important to recce it thoroughly…so here are some pics from the recce:

 

NOT a trig point

Plumley

More photos for Alan:

This last photo taken close to Bexton Hall…perhaps Bexton Hall Farm?

This is the first part of the walk…it will be tweaked before the big day:

This bit I did yesterday was 10.5 miles, including the bit where I got lost. On the day the walk will go furtherer, around 15 miles altogether. And there will be beer. Did I mention that before?
Now I’m going to do some more decorating and then I’m going Scotland to catch up with my mates. Sue is driving…she’s meeting up with Martin at the end of his Challenge. Ain’t she nice?!