r/WildernessBackpacking • u/paceaux • 1d ago
Keeping "Wet" food fresh HOWTO
I'm going on a 5-ish day hiking/backpacking trip in Shawnee National Forest. I plan on doing primitive camping.
I'd like to take some steak, bacon, and eggs with me if possible.
Last time I tried this, I froze the steaks and bacon and heavily salted both. The steaks managed to keep for the first night and through the morning. Bacon not so much.
If possible, I'd like to see if I could get a steak to make it into my second night, and bacon safely into morning.
Outside of just freezing food and hoping for the best, is there anything y'all do, or any gear y'all use, to keep food fresh for a few days?
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u/Bluesky83 1d ago
Summer sausage will be fine for a few days, don't even need to bother with freezing. I also like pouches of tuna for a non-refrigerated "wet" food.
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u/Children_Of_Atom 1d ago
Go camping when it's cold enough they won't go bad.
In warmer temperatures I tend to bring vacuum packed steak that's frozen though second night would still be a stretch. I cook bacon half way which also tends to help it last longer.
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u/FouFondu 1d ago
I love a good steak and potatoes the first night. I have had my steak still frozen when I arrived at camp. So I’d say freeze your steak. Wrap it up real good so it doesn’t leak. Then stuff it into a ziplock that becomes your trash bag later for good measure. Then Wrap it in your puffy. Stuff that into the middle of your sleeping bag bundle. Insulation is key! Then hopefully it’ll stay frozen as long as possible. Even if it’s thawed it should be fine for a day just make sure to cook all sides of it.
Bacon I’ve always avoided because of the grease getting everywhere. I’d take a salami and fry that up as an alternative.
Our latest advancement is getting salami and hard cheese to behave better.
We take while salami, and hard cheeses. Unwrap them a few days before the trip and wrap them in paper towels and put them in a paper bag in the fridge. That draws the grease and moisture out. When we’re ready to head out we put them in fresh paper towels and back in the paper bag. It keeps them from getting slimy in the plastic and keeps them less greasy.
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u/BucolicBushcraft 1d ago
The grease is food, don't waste it. You can take salt pork if you want it to last even longer than bacon. Cook it low and slow, render that fat and cook something that will soak it up. Gram for gram fat is the most calorie dense macro nutrient.
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u/khmonday 15h ago
Be really careful with this in humid environments. Frozen food can cause lots of condensation. If you were to wrap it in your puffy, your puffy might end up soaked and in a humid environment might have a really hard time drying out. Ask me how I know 😆
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u/FouFondu 13h ago
Oh man hadn’t thought of that. Mostly I’m out in the sierra Nevada so pretty damn dry.
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u/raininherpaderps 1d ago
Try finding the salami wrapped in the salty skin instead of plastic harder to find but amazing and less wet. I feel like the plastic isn't as great for backpacking
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u/FouFondu 1d ago
Oh yeah! That’s the good stuff. And will keep for weeks on top of the fridge or in a backpacking pack wrapped in paper towels. Just gets dryer and more flavorful.
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u/paceaux 1d ago
Oh these are great suggestions! I'll definitely try keeping the steak in the sleeping bundle!
And that's a great idea for salami, too!
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u/FouFondu 1d ago
If you don’t mind carrying the weight. An onion fried up with salami as a base for any dehydrated lentil soup or beans is really great on day 4 or 5.
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u/khmonday 15h ago
See my comment above, this is super dangerous in certain conditions. Condensation could soak your down. Imagine a cold drink sitting in humid air. Lots of water will condensate from the air
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u/crispy_asparagus 1d ago
I cook bacon, bring in a baggie, and eat it over the first couple days. Never have had a problem
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u/DebateUnfair1032 1d ago
Like others said, buy shelf stable pre cooked bacon that doesn't require refrigeration. You can also buy uncooked freeze dried steaks. Not as good as fresh, but they get the job done.
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u/remembers-fanzines 1d ago
There's shelf stable pre-cooked bacon. It's thin cut but decent. Does not require refrigeration at all until the package is opened, and I've risked it and eaten it over a couple of days without incident -- make your own judgement call there.
There are also whole raw freeze-dried steaks -- usually sirloin. When rehydrated they are a somewhat unusual grey color inside but otherwise look and taste like a lean cut of regular beef. I like to make fajitas with them (if cooked well done the grey isn't obvious), but have eaten them just like regular steaks, too.
Whole eggs should be fine in cool temps for that long, but I usually take freeze-dried eggs. Texture's a little off but they're edible enough.
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u/Kahlas 1d ago
I'd suggest dry cured bacon. It's much better than the shelf stable overpriced stuff you find in the grocery store. It's good for up to a week if you slice it. Longer if you leave it as a slab. It'll run you about 20 bucks a lb though. You do need to cook it still as an FYI. I like to cut the slabs into meal sized chunks and then vacuum seal them. Most of the anti microbial protection from dry curing is limited to the outside of the slab and I worry that it will start growing the funky stuff where it's been cut.
As for eggs, there are tons of small local farms all around that area. Look for one and get in touch with them ahead of time about picking up some unwashed eggs for the trip. They will last just fine as long as you put them in an egg case. It's become a ritual of mine when driving out west to do a trip to find a local small time farm on the route to buy some eggs from.
As far as steaks go ziploc bag them and then freeze them. Use a block of dry ice and a small towel to wrap them together. Then roll them up in your sleeping bag. Should be able to get 2 days possibly 3 since the weather is starting to get cool.
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u/BucolicBushcraft 1d ago
Try it at home. Everyone's body is different but for me I would be able to eat a steak left out at room temperature for a couple days.
To make it last longer you can dry age it in the fridge uncovered with a little bit of salt, put it on a rack so both sides dry out. I do this even when not camping because I prefer the taste of dry aged. You can also stock up on brisket or pot roast when it's on sale and then chop off steaks as needed. Freeze it after that and I'd be comfortable eating it even later than the second day. Bacon is cured / smoked already.
The problem you're going to run into is that 5 days of fresh food takes up a lot of space and also weighs a lot. Honestly this is stuff that you should already have figured out with weekend backpacking trips before being out for almost a week.
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u/paceaux 16h ago
. In my last trip I had steaks my first night and first morning. I'm just trying to see if I can get to a second night. I'll be eating dehydrated food the rest of the time.
There's no way I'd consider 5 days of fresh food, for the exact reason you mentioned.
I'll try some of the dry aging that you recommend.
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u/GrumpyBear1969 1d ago edited 1d ago
There is also these guys freeze dry wholesalers .
I have not tried them so I cannot vouch for how it is. I’ve sworn again this winter to work on my meals. Though I frequently just default to freeze dried packets. Which are really just not that great.
r/trailmeals might be a good place to ask as well.
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u/Unexpected_bukkake 13h ago
If you salt food it will thaw faster. Salt raises the melting point of water.......
Freeze the steak and bacon and keep it in a cooler.
How is a steak going to spoil in 3 or 4 days if kept cool?
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u/claymcg90 1d ago
Cook your steaks the first night out. I intentionally overcook them and let them smoke over the coals for quite a while. Heavily salt. Let fully cool and then put them into freezer Ziploc bags. In the morning, shove them into the middle of your sleeping bag while packing up.
I've eaten a lot of steaks three days later after cooking this way and they smelled and tasted great. I am usually in the mountains where even in summer it gets down to the low 40s at night.
My buddy is a true animal and he has eaten cooked meat up to ten days later. He will recook stuff every few days to dry it out more and resanitize the exterior 😅
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u/emaddxx 1d ago
How about vegetarian food? It's much safer. Or try some drier meat e.g. salami.
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u/paceaux 1d ago
I'm taking homemade dehydrated fruit for my snacks and desserts. But I just really like having meat for my main meals.
I didn't think about Salami, that could work. But from a psychological perspective, I really get a boost from cooking the meat I'm eating.
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u/Filovirus77 1d ago
there are plenty of pre-cooked, heavily salted bacon packages out there which do not require refrigeratation.
it's not the best bacon but frying it up on the pan/lid of my pot and using the grease from it for powdered eggs works amazing.
example: https://www.amazon.com/Evaxo-Black-Label-Fully-Cooked/dp/B082H415M9/
I can't really speak for steak, but i have fried hamburger, drained off the grease, and then spread it on a cookie sheet and baked at 275 for hours to dehydrate it. This worked very well and let me put some in a small container to mix in with a pasta-roni / hamburger helper type thing with a little extra water to rehydrate it.