Food Weights
When adventuring, whether it be backcountry ski touring, backpacking, bike packing or mountaineering, you are likely going to be packing food and after your first outing most learn quickly that minimizing the weight of your food can have a significant impact on the finally weight of your pack. This page is a guide to food weights and can help you to meal plan while keeping your pack sensible. To see a guide for gear weight see here.
A great reference for trip food planning: https://www.johnbaldwin.ca/trip-planning-food.asp
Contents
General
DO NOT bring canned food or food containing lots of water (e.g. watermelon). Go for light dried foods.
Breakfast and lunches are usually packed independently. Overall for food, you want the most calories per gram, no water content, 1kg per day average. 200g for breakfast, 500g for lunch, 300 grams for dinner. If you’re a bit of a smaller eater, reduce each meal by 50-100g. Having a scale really helps for food packing. Keeping track of amounts is a good way not too let yourself starve and to make sure the group dinners have enough food. A group dinner for 3 should be nearly 1kg of dried food.
Breakfasts
Total weight: 200g/person/day
For alpine starts or trips where you want to be moving quickly in the morning, plan for cold breakfasts. Cold instant oats or granola are potential options. Quick oats are easy. Mix with brown sugar, milk powder, raisins or nuts and it can be eaten cold like cereal or hot like oatmeal. Granola with whole or coconut milk powder is another option. Sometimes bagels or banana bread break up the monotony of oatmeal. Instant noodles or chicken noodle soup from a dry mix are possible hot savoury breakfasts.
Lunches
Total weight: 500g/person/day
Lunch is the heaviest as you cant cook anything. It can be good to have 1-2 bagels or wraps /day. Possible spreads/fillings are nutella, butter, cream cheese, jam, cheese, bell peppers, jam, peanut butter-jelly and/or hummus. For snacks: granola bars, chocolate, nuts, gummies, sesame sticks, chocolate covered nuts and raisins, Indian snacks, etc.
Weight break down: 150g for 1 bagel, 50g of granola bar and 300 grams of snacks.
Dinners
Total weight: 300g/person/day
Dinners are typically shared among 2-3 people. With Covid though, people more likely to be cooking for themselves. Dinners are often broken down into being 40% staple/carb, 10% flavour, 30% calories, 20% protein. Example: 1kg dinner= 400g couscous, mac cheese, instant mashed potatoes, 100g of soup powder with nuts, dehydrated veggies, 300g of butter or cheese, 200g of dehydrated pepperoni sticks, pork fluff or dehydrated canned salmon. If you’re including a desert and/or appetizer like a soup just do the same division but a 1kg dinner would be more like 100g soup, 800g dinner, 100g desert.
Possible beverages
- Gatorade/tang
- tea/coffee
- hot chocolate
- Powdered Milk (literally the most amazing thing)
Stove Fuel
Liquid Fuel
White gas is the fuel used in Whisperlite or Dragonfly campstoves.
- Summer - no melting snow 60-100ml/person/day
- Spring skiing - melting snow 120-160ml/person/day
- Winter -with altitude and cold up to 200ml 140ml/person/day or 1 litre per person per week is a good rule of thumb for ski mountaineering.
Pressurized Gas Fuel
There are a few different types of pressurized gas fuels, colloquially known altogether as propane, however, they come in a number of different mixtures and not just pure propane. Pure propane has the lowest boiling point at -41°C and so for very cold temperatures or high altitudes, such as when you are ski touring or mountaineering, pure propane might work, however, it requires a heavy canister because of the high pressure at normal room temperature. For backcountry trips, this is often not practical because of the weight. Most people are not out in temperatures as cold as -41°C, so propane is mixed with different gases to increase the boiling temperature so that a less heavy canister can be used.
The table below shows some of the types of fuels and their propane percentage. The higher the propane percentage, the better the stove will perform at high elevations or at cold temperatures. Many companies like to brag about their high isobutane percentage, like the MSR IsoPro, however, it is important to remember that each percentage of propane will lower the minimum operating temperature more than each percentage of isobutane will (so a mix of 30% propane and 70% isobutane would actually fare better in winter than the MSR IsoPro).
| Type of Fuel | Container | Retail Example | Activity | % Propane
(-41°C) |
%Butane
(-0.5°C) |
%Isobutane
(-12°C) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Regular Propane | Steel 20lbs containers | Any gas station... | Backyard BBQ | 90% | <5% | |
| Propane-Butane Mix | lightweight liquid fuel canister | Coleman PowerMax(discontinued) | Mountaineering | 40% | 60% | - |
| heavy 1lb cylinders | Coleman Propane Cylinder (Screw top) | Car Camping | 30% | 70% | - | |
| lightweight canisters | Optimus LPG | Summer Backcountry Camping | 30% | 70% | - | |
| Isobutane Mix | Primus Power Gas | Fall Backcountry Camping | 25% | 50% | 25% | |
| MSR IsoPro | Backcountry Skiing, Mountaineering | 20% | - | 80% | ||
Butane has a boiling point of -0.5°C so if you use this mix when it is too cold, it will work, but not very well and not for very long since the propane will boil off quickly and burn inefficiently. When the propane runs out, only butane will be left in the canister as an unusable liquid fuel. The compromise between the summer butane mix and pure propane is a winter isobutane mix. Isobutane has a boiling point of -12°C. The Coleman PowerMax was a great device that used a liquid feed rather than a gaseous feed and for this reason the canister doesn't get cold when you burn the fuel because the fuel is not vaporizing in the canister and stealing its heat. Because of this vaporization heat stealing process in gaseous canisters it is super important to keep your canister warm for it to burn efficiently. Sadly the Coleman PowerMax has been discontinued and there is not a good replacement in the market at the moment.
Number of uses out of Lightweight Canisters
Supposing that you are using the appropriate fuel mix for the environment you are in, this is an approximation for how many meals you will get out of your canisters based on a fairly liberal usage on each meal (actually cooking ie. more than simply boiling 2 cups of water each meal to add to your dehydrated food packets). Keep track by using a permanent marker on the can for each meal you use it for. This way when you reuse the canister on your second trip you will know if you have enough fuel left for the meals you need.
- 100g Canister (200g gross weight) = Jetboil claims it can boil 10L of water.They keep their fuel mixture a secret though.
- 230g Canister (340g gross weight) = 10 meals or ~25g of fuel per meal
- 450g Canister (660g gross weight) = 20 meals or ~25g of fuel per meal
Tips for making the most out of Propane Canisters
- Keep the canisters warm! Don't let them burn through the propane in the mix all at once because you let the canister get cold.
- Protect the flame from the wind with a wind screen (you can make one at home out of layered tin foil - layer it thick so its sturdy!)
- Make sure the ground is flat and that it can't fall off of anything, or, get knocked by anyone.
- If you use the tall canisters, consider getting a small plastic base to make it more sturdy (this also lifts it off the ground and uses the air as insulation, supposing the air is warmer than the ground)
- Isobutane mixes are not necessary for summer when its above 0°C so buy the cheap mixes rather than the expensive stuff.
- Do not refill the canisters with gas station propane! Those lightweight canisters cannot handle the pressure of pure propane and could explode if they get hot (such as the back of your car).
Further Reading and Resources
If you are looking to buy lots of dried bulk goods see (it is a bit expensive - VOC members should get a 10% discount for expedition trips): http://www.famousfoods.ca/
Some potential recipes for dehydrated food: https://www.ubc-voc.com/wiki/Recipes
A great reference for trip food planning: https://www.johnbaldwin.ca/trip-planning-food.asp
Info about fuel mixtures: http://bushwalkingnsw.org.au/clubsites/FAQ/FAQ_Mixtures.htm#Iso
Propane vs. Butane: https://primus.us/blogs/blog/propane-vs-butane-does-type-of-stove-fuel-matter
A bit about gas station propane: https://afdc.energy.gov/fuels/propane_basics.html
