The Book Shelf

Recipes for Adventure by Chef Glenn Mcallister

At the moment, this is my favorite book.  No other cookbook has quite the variety and simplicity in creating meals.  Chef Glenn offers great information on dehydrating foods, as well as information on how to take pre-packaged supermarket foods and doctoring them up to make a more nutritious meal for the backcountry.  This is a must have, especially if you own a dehydrator.  Great color pictures along with instructions on how to make the most from your dehydrator.  He also talks about making “bark”, that can be used in a ton of different ways.

NOLS Backcountry Kitchen by Claudia Pearson

This is a great all around book.  It is very small and only $10.  It has information on no-trace ethics, long trip meal planning, short trip meal planning, fuel usage recipes and much more.  If you don’t have a dehydrator and are looking for your first book on backcountry cooking, this would be the one.  One of my favorite parts of the book is that it has lists of foods that work well for lunch in the backcountry.  Few books do that.

Lipsmackin’ Backpakin’ by Christine and Tim Conners

This book has a ton of great recipes to choose from.  No pictures and not a lot of instruction on how to make the meals, but if you want a lot of different meals to choose from, this one is great.  Most of these meals will require a dehydrator, so if you don’t have one, you will be limited on how many meals you can make from this book.  There is also a Lipsmackin’ Vegetarian Backpakin’ book as well.

 

The NOLS Cookery by Claudia Pearson

This was the first backcountry cookbook I ever owned, and I have brought the cous cous pilaf on more trips then I can count.  There are great recipes, it is true, but it also goes into depth on how to bake in the backcountry, recipes for cinnamon rolls and fresh bread and other amazing meals.    NOLS has an interesting food preparation technique.  Since they go out for 30 day trips on a regular basis, and planning 30 dinners, 30 lunches, 30 breakfasts would be very complicated, they talk about getting x pounds of flour, oats, raisins etc.  that you have to figure out what to do with on the trail.  I have never used this system, but it was still a great read and great recipes.