Food on the PCT

hey guys it's Darwin and today we're talking about food specifically food that I carried on my thru-hike of the PCT [Music] all right so before we get started talking about all the food that I carried and what I ate and how it worked out for me let me say that just because we're talking about what I ate doesn't mean that's gonna work out for everybody there are a ton of different diets and people's dietary restrictions and allergies so just because it works for me doesn't mean that it's gonna work for you so since I have been back off my thru-hike of the PCT I've gotten a ton of questions on what type of bars that I ate during the day what type of coffee that I was drinking what type of food that I was eating at night cold soaking or cooking a bunch of different questions people wanting to know what I ate over the last four months so today I figured that we would kind of dive into my typical trail diet some of the reasons why I ate the food that I ate and you know if it's gonna work for you out there years ago on through hikes like the 80 I was basically just looking for calories and I think I've said it a ton of times in my videos just get calories it's all about fuel out there anything you can eat any type of calorie you can get in your body you're just creating fuel to give you more power to get up that next mountain and then make it to camp however over the last couple years I definitely tried to watch what I eat a little bit more as I get older I noticed that some foods don't really agree with me so jamming things down like pop-tarts and instant mashed potatoes every night doesn't always work for me anymore on the PCT I really tried to figure out some different foods that I could eat to where I was still getting enough nutrition enough calories but I wanted to stay efficient in what I was eating keep it pretty lightweight and dense now you guys are probably aware if you watch my videos that within the last a year and a half I've gone to a lot of cold soaking and going stove us on the trail on the PCT and specific Icode soaked almost the entire trail however I did pick up a stove while I was going through the High Sierra now not really one that believes that hot food warms you up I think that any food warms you up so that wasn't the reason I just kind of wanted to switch it up so I didn't get to burn out on what I was with all that being said let's go over some what kind of my main staples that I basically ate almost every single day on the trail most the time for breakfast I would wake up and it would be number one coffee for me so the coffee that I drank most of the trail was this Alpine start instant coffee really cool company I used to use Starbucks via a lot and then I started using Alpine start and I just I like the taste better and for most of the trail I would just take my water bottle I'd put it in here in the morning and just drank cold coffee again because I was cold soaking and not carrying a stove for me it's just efficiency I didn't want to wake up in the morning fire my stove up wait for the water to boil and then wait for it to cool off so most times I was just having cold coffee there were a few times in the Sierra where I did have hot coffee just cuz it's a little chilly in the morning and it sounded like a treat so I did try that after that basically I would have some sort of a bar like a really dense heavy-duty bar most times I was reaching for something like a pro bar these things have almost 400 calories in them they're pretty light this thing comes out to three ounces so I was having this and then typically I would use something like a Jif cup or some sort of a peanut butter there were times where I did carry a whole jar of peanut butter but I do really like those jiff cups and then later on down the trail I found these things which are called trail butter it's basically just a higher-quality peanut butter again on this trail I was really looking to get some good calorie dense and nutritional dense food and what I liked about the trail butter is it's made not just from regular old peanut butter but a lot of it's made from almond butter macadamia nut butter sunflower butter so a little bit better fats just for overall energy so I really really did like this stuff and then once I got tired of eating the pro bars I switched to these things which became one of my staples for most of the trail it's called a Bobo's bar and essentially what it is is it's oats so it's kind of like eating a giant bowl of oatmeal which is great trail food but it's in a bar it's nice and dense its compact and there's almost 400 calories in this thing so overall for breakfast I was getting about 600 calories between my nut butter and you know one of these dense breakfast bars now later on down the trail I started eating what is affectionately known as second breakfast where I would stop at about 10 a.m. and just kind of eat something else I drank a little bit more coffee I would have another big snack bar sometimes I would carry two of those bolos bars and that would be absolutely perfect for a second breakfast just kind of a second boost after I burned off all those calories in the morning and then from lunch I was typically stopping at about 12:30 one o'clock and I would on the regular eat something like one of these complete cookies if you guys watched my videos you've probably seen me eat a ton of these and then another bar called a green belly the green bellies were really really good too again super calorie dense one of those green bellies had 600 calories for the pack which was insane and then I would eat something like some chips a lot of times I carried Fritos or some sort of jalapeno cheetos which are insanely good and from time to time I would carry out-of-town something like an avocado some hummus some bread just to change it up but most times again I was eating some sort of prepackaged bar like the complete cookie or the green belly so for lunch I was typically getting between six and seven hundred calories trying to get as much protein and fat and then every once while I would do what is affectionately known as the coffee nap so after I got done eating while I was taking my break for lunch I would drink something like one of these coffees that have creamer on them so this is another one of those Alpine starts but this is a coconut creamer latte I would have that and then as soon as I drank it I would basically pass out for 20 or 30 minutes which was just kind of give me a little bit more energy and you know I would really just kind of run off the caffeine all the way to camp so the coffee nap was really a good trick that I started utilizing now for dinner if you guys watched my PCT series you'll know that most nights I ate nothing but couscous couscous on the trail all the time I would say about 95% of the trail I was fueled by couscous the reason I like couscous is because you can cook it you can cold soak it it's pretty light and its really calorie dense so for about a cup of couscous there's really close to 600 calories just for a cup you can put it in your cold soak in jar put a little bit of water in it and it rehydrates really fast and then on top of that I was using tuna packets towards the end I started carrying these chicken creation packets just to kind of change it up but what I typically tried to reach for or the highest calorie tuna packets that I get fine so some of the tuna packets have like olive oil sunflower oil or some sort of an oil in them and they can get all the way up close to 200 calories and then for flavor in my couscous I would add things like taco seasoning hot sauce like these awesome little sriracha packets or sometimes even some coconut oil just to kind of give it a little more fat a little more flavor and to where it just didn't taste like couscous now a lot of people have just been like ooh gross why would you eat couscous for that long it's boring again for me I'm all about efficiency and I'm one of those people who can even my normal everyday life eat basically the same thing every single day I don't need a lot of variety so long-distance hiking and the types of food that I eat I typically eat the same thing from the beginning all the way to the end every single day and I don't really get burned out on it now I don't eat that stuff off the trail I kind of saved that for the trail but it's why I was able to eat couscous almost every single night and the calories from my dinner ended up being right around 700 to 800 calories and then sometimes I would add a couple of extra things on there and in other days if I had bars leftover from my snacks during hiking I would jam those down too just to get those extra calories now speaking of bars I was typically eating between 4 and 5 bars a day now whether that was a granola bar or some sort of a protein bar or these things that I really come accustomed to eating which are our X bars it's it's pretty good whole food there's not a lot of crap in these and this guy has 210 calories Laure bars were another one of my favorite but about four to five of those a day and I always tried to find bars that were at least 200 calories and then really the only other thing that I was eating during the day to kind of keep my nutrition up was everyone swell in the morning I would have like one of these emergency vitamin D packs so the immune plus packs I really liked these especially with second breakfast and then a lot of times I carried these green superfoods powder so I would just mix this up in some water just to make sure I was getting some sort of green vegetable nutrition even though it was in powdered form it's not a whole food it was better than nothing it was better than having a bunch of sugar from a candy bar or something this trail I really tried to up my nutrition levels and make sure that I was repairing good it's probably why I on this trail I was able to hike between 20 and 30 miles every single day just because I was getting better nutrition so overall my main calorie intake on an average day was right around 2800 calories now again some people need a lot more calories than that I've been able to just be efficient and be fine be happy and comfortable on 2,800 calories it's dense it's light weight and what's going with options like the pro bars or the green bellies are the RX bars I tried to keep my nutrition a little bit higher than you know on the 80 when I ate nothing but Snickers and pop-tarts and candy there's a lot of people that fuel their hike that way and what I found over the years I just can't do that anymore I need some good fats I need some good proteins I need some good carbs just a complete food just gives me better fuel on the trail so hopefully that helped you guys kind of see some of the stuff that I eat maybe that'll help you drum up some ideas of the food that you're gonna take on your next long-distance hike but again like I said it works for me it doesn't mean that it's necessarily gonna work for you everybody has different diets different restrictions different allergies so figure out what works best for you and figure out what you're gonna need to get the most efficient fueled hike that you can have while you're out there you have on how to change it go over and check me out on Instagram I'm posting a ton of new photos lately of some of the things it's numbers and I have going on throughout the week plus some pictures from my PCT through Ike if you found any value in this video go ahead and hit that like button subscribe to my channel if you haven't already as always guys thanks for watching [Music] [Applause] you

Channel: Darwin onthetrail

Views: 376,738

Rating: 4.9284835 out of 5

Keywords: UL Hiking Gear, PCT, Pacific Crest Trail, PCT Thru-Hike, Thru-Hike Gear List, UL Backpacking, Backpacking Food, BoBo Bars, Protein Bars, Trail Food, ProBars, Complete Cookie, Alpine Start, Alpine Start Coconut Creamer, Green Belly, Green Belly Meals, RX Bar, Trail Butter, Amazing Grass Superfood, Greens, Emergen-C, Hiking, Hiker Trash, Trail Meals

Id: SsJ7Nferk6E

Length: 11min 51sec (711 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 11 2018