I've been holed up in the state of Ohio attending school. It's flat. No one hikes here. Thank god I discovered road biking or I would have lost my sanity. Anyways, I'm returning to my home state of WV for a week and a half and I plan on spending most of those days outdoors.

I have some dehydrated meals back in WV, but they've been sitting around for a while. I'm trying to put together a NEW menu. I like to keep things as simple as possible. I can dehydrate some meals if I need to, but my dehydrator is back in WV.

I'm wondering if anyone has experience with Bob's red mill soup mixes. Especially the "black bean soup" and the "whole grains and soup" mixes. I haven't seen them in person. Is it just raw ingredients? If so, it seems to me like it would take a long time to reconstitute in a cozy, and the ingredients would be heavy. They also call for chicken broth or something of the sort. Is there any way around this? Is there a powder form?

I'm just trying to figure out a very easy meal plan. During the day I just munch, so I really need simple dinner recipes. I don't like taking meat pouches or anything heavy. Dehydrated all the way if I can. If I remember correctly, this question is probably best directed towards Sarah and Mary D. If it helps, I have access to a Trader Joe's and a Whole Foods store...

http://blog.trailcooking.com/2012/06/26/vegan-friendly-broth-powder/ Easy to make!

I haven't used their soup mixes (although I have used most everything else Bob's makes)

I have though made soups with their raw products - this is one for example:
http://blog.trailcooking.com/2012/07/07/green-pea-soup/

PS: I'd call up Bob's and ask them about the soup mixes - they are really nice people (I have even met Bob - he is SO nice)

Thanks, Sarah. I think I have about 3/4 of the necessary ingredients already. Does Trader Joe's offer broth packets? I haven't been there enough to have a good handle on the store yet. I will call bob's red mill about the soups this week.

Yes, go to the soup aisle and poke around - they sell broth packets in small boxes :-) They often also have bags of sun-dried tomatoes and wild dried mushrooms hanging nearby as well - those are good!
TJ's also carries coconut oil too.........

This isn't really pertinent to the OP's question but Bob Moore is an interesting person and his story is worth reading:

http://www.inc.com/magazine/20100501/how-i-did-it-bob-moore-bobs-red-mill.html

Great story!!

Sarah,

Coconut oil was one of the first TJ purchases I made!

I think Bob's red mill black bean soup has uncooked dried black beans and requires looooong cooking. The directions say cook for 1.5 hours: http://www.bobsredmill.com/recipes.php?recipe=1685
I use the plain black bean flakes from here:
http://tasteadventure.com/products/soups/index.htm
This stuff rehydrates quickly with boiling water. Amazon carries some of their food.

Also, Sarah's website and books have some really good recipes for freezer bag cooking (or no cooking). http://www.trailcooking.com/

I know you mentioned the BRM soups which I haven't tried, but I can attest to using BRM for breakfast. I actually used Sarah's Super Charged Oatmeal recipe (http://www.trailcooking.com/recipes/super-charged-oatmeal) as a guide, incorporating the BRM Muesli for most of the natural ingredients --

3/4 c. BRM Muesli
1/4 c. dry milk
1 T. brown sugar

In pint or quart freezer bag, then 1 c. boiling water for 5 minutes on the trail. Easy and tasty breakfast.

Also try BRM Scottish Oats + dried milk + walnuts + raisins with cinnamon & sugar...

Jim

I tried muesli and oatmeal and I can't get myself to like them. I was always a cold cereal person growing up. Breakfast is definitely my weakest meal. I've used powdered milk in dinners, but I have a mental block when it comes to eating it with cereal! I probably need to suck it up and try it.

In Europe (where I learned to love it), they eat meusli as a cold cereal--I never saw it cooked! In Norway you can buy ready-made packets of meusli and fruited yogurt (in various flavors) which you mix together and eat. I can't stand cooked cereal, but meusli (plus some freeze-dried berries or fresh-picked huckleberries) is my favorite backpacking breakfast.

Just mix the dried milk with the cereal (1/6 C. dried milk), add 1/2 C. cold water, mix thoroughly. If the water is cold, the resulting milk/cereal mix will taste just fine. I prefer the dried skim milk, but if you want whole milk, use Nido.