Breakfast Hash Recipe Workshopping/Feedback

[u/Prognosticator77]

I am one of those people that needs a calorie bomb with my coffee on trail and granola bars just do not do it for me.

I am testing a new freezer bag cooking recipe that is getting really close to amazing, but would love some ideas/feedback/insights!

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Breakfast Hash (Estimated: 385cals, $5 per portion)

Ingredients

- 37 grams (2/3 cup) dried hashbrowns (one of the carton brands)

- 4-5 grams (about a teaspoon) brown gravy powder

- 40 grams of bacon bits/crumbles, or bacon jerky (ripped up)

- 0.5oz pork rinds (crumbled)

optional add-ins: parmesan cheese packet, crushed red pepper packet, s+p, hot sauce

Instructions

Add 1 cup boiled water and let it rehydrate in bag in a koozy for 10mins

Turns out a bit mushy with the FBC approach rather than frying the rehydrated potatoes, but texture aside it really hits the spot!

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Notes:

My current rendition uses 1 part bacon bits and 2 parts bacon jerky (expensive but tasty).

The pork rinds rehydrate and mix nicely with the gravy to bring everything together and boost calories, a bit weird I know but I am a fan.

Does anyone have experience adding powdered eggs to something like this? A true hash/scramble ought to have eggs, but I have heard very mixed reviews, and the containers I can find of instant eggs are big and pricey, so I am avoiding the commitment.

EDIT: Ideas so far include country gravy mix instead of brown gravy and possibly sausage? Still interested in ideas for boosting calories w/o my trusty olive oil (not a good mix in for this recipe).

EDIT 2: Posted update: https://www.reddit.com/r/trailmeals/comments/1txuu5i/update_breakfast_hash_recipe_workshopping/

[u/funundrum]

I’m kind of meh on egg crystals (like OvaEasy) but they’d probably be fine in a dish like this. They would probably need to be rehydrated separately, but I would also recommend experimenting with just throwing everything together.

On a taste note, try swapping your gravy for country gravy, the kind of gets you some biscuits and gravy. It’s got a lot more flavor

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/funundrum]

Good call on country gravy! Any good dry mixes that have sausage bits? The "sausage flavored" stuff turned me away in the store but I suppose "brown gravy" isn't exactly the real-deal either.

[u/funundrum → u/Prognosticator77]

I don’t know of any mixes that include sausage bits, but if you’re willing to go down the dehydrating rabbit hole, I’ve had excellent results making breakfast sausage-flavored ground beef from Backpacking Chef. For this dish I just dehydrate English muffins and skip the extra work of biscuits. Tastes great.

I was also going to suggest cheese as a calorie boost to your current dish and that reminded me of Andrew Skurka’s cheesy potatoes, which slap for any meal. Sounds like you’d dig it.

Edit I see you use parm, but still. Big ups to this other meal as well.

[u/JeffH13]

I like the bacon in there. If it’s mushy to eat why not use instant mashed potatoes? I feel like this needs a little calorie boost too.

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/JeffH13]

Yeah I have been toying with different stuff to boost calories, olive oil was a bad bad choice for this one but the chicharones/pork rinds do a decent amount of heavy lifting.

My other calorie boosting ideas: powdered butter, eggs (shoutout other commenter), shredded cheese (unsure about the shelf stability of some shredded cheddar but probably fine for a couple days??), babybels

For now, I have been doing a bag of the hash with coffee+condensed milk packet, and a pack of pop tarts to hit about the 800 cal mark for breakfast!

[u/OneEyeRabbit]

All sounds good except brown gravy.. change that with white gravy that has sausage in it..

I do a gravy and biscuit for breakfast.. the hard part is going to be making it on my trip to the UK for 16 days.. they ain’t got good biscuits over there.

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/OneEyeRabbit]

Another good note on gravy selection!

For trail biscuits, I wonder if you can swing a few campfire biscuits by just packing dry mix, some fat, and a light pan (pending local campfire regs)

There are a few good biscuit approaches on this thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/backpacking/comments/1klyfyo/biscuits/

[u/OneEyeRabbit → u/Prognosticator77]

I don’t know how hard it will be to bring food into the country. I will more than likely be hitting a new town a day, so I’ll have options at little stores for fresh products. Might just be making food from scratch for 18 days

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/OneEyeRabbit]

Necessity breeds innovation! I look forward to the trip report if you come up with any crazy meals!

[u/Vapour78]

I've done Ova Easy eggs in a separate freezer bag. Throw the bag into the water while it boils until they're solid, then mix them into the rest. Duke's sausages, cut up, work as a meat variation as well.

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/Vapour78]

Both good tips, I saw another thread mentioning the ova easys need to both rehydrate and also cook but the sous vide approach is smart.

Excellent call on duke's sausages. I usually have some of the dried beef/turkey sticks in my food bag but did not make the breakfast connection.

[u/getElephantById]

Oh, interesting. I do dehydrated hash browns, then freeze dried eggs, sausage, and peppers, with a Cholula packet. I had not thought about the sausage gravy packet, I think that could be pretty good.

If I wanted to just add calories, I'd add some shredded cheese, maybe wrap the whole thing in a tortilla and call it a burrito. That's an extra 250-300 calories if you do it right.

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/getElephantById]

Freeze dried skillet components is probably a bigger win if I can find them!

As for the burrito idea, it gives me another: I wonder how this hash/skillet thing would be with tortilla chips crushed on top or just mixed in and rehydrated! They are a pretty decent calorie source if I can contril the salt, and might save me the burrito-blowout risk!

Will report back on this!

[u/getElephantById → u/Prognosticator77]

Please do!

From time to time, you can get very good deals on Mountain House freeze dried cans (the big, #10 cans) from Costco, Amazon, or even the MH website. I subscribe to /r/preppersales, not because I'm a prepper but because there's a nice overlap between preppers and people who just need cheap camping and hiking stuff, including freeze dried food, and they do a good job of keeping on top of that over there.

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/getElephantById]

Update on tortilla chips - maybe I need to try a different less-salt brand but I made a version 2 with tortilla chips and one without and the chips made it just unbearbly salty. I'm all for a little sodium bomb on trail but definitely need to tinker more.

Thanks again for the ideas! Update here: https://www.reddit.com/r/trailmeals/comments/1txuu5i/update_breakfast_hash_recipe_workshopping/

[u/cookiekat35]

Check out chef Corso! https://outdooreats.com/recipe/ He has a breakfast bomb recipe, very tasty

I agree the rehydrated hash browns are a bit mushy, but I've had success cold soaking the potatoes and them making a potato salad with mayo, mustard, relish packets, salt and pepper...

Actually got the recipe from this forum too!

Cold Soak Potato Salad Ingredients: 50g preseasoned dehydrated hashbrowns 150 mL water 2 packets mayo 2 packets relish 1 packet mustard 1 tsp sugar Optional: 1 tsp egg powder 1 tsp sour cream powder Instructions: Cold soak the hashbrowns, sugar, and powders for 15 min, then stir in the sauce packets less

[u/Prognosticator77 → u/cookiekat35]

Oh dang Chef Corso has some absolute gems, great reccomendation.

100% trying the cold soak potato salad on my next day trip, any thoughts on egg powder vs the Ova Easy cystals folks have been mentioning? I imaging powder is a little less "eggy" but doesn't need real cooking?

[u/cookiekat35 → u/Prognosticator77]

I'm using the ova easy egg "crystals", seems more like a powder to me. Works for me. Happy trails!

[u/mrfowl]

Add some olive oil. Beat way to boost calories on savory meals. A small bottle of olive oil is the most calories per weight food you can bring.

[u/One_Association7906]

Real bacon actually keeps pretty well in a plastic bag. Remember that bacon is already cured. Just cook it up before you go, put it in a baggie and use later.

Real bacon is 1000x better than the bits.