PCT Preparation

Meal Prep

We’ve been hard at work since mid-December figuring out which meals everyone likes, dehydrating food, assembling meals, packaging meals, finding meals we forgot we made and so on and so on. A lot of the meals we’ve prepped rely on some sort of powdered dairy (milk, butter, cheese, cream cheese, etc) to help drive up calories and minimize weight. We’ve added enough variety that none of us should have to eat the same meal more than about 8 times over the first 4 months.

The assembly process usually involves Andrew making food saver bags, Angela measuring ingredients to fill the bags, and then Andrew sealing and labeling the bags. Shown below is a snapshot of a couple hours worth of work (granola and fruit crumble for breakfasts, Southwest dip, strawberry cream cheese and peanut butter cream cheese for lunches). Once meals are packaged they get added to a tracking spreadsheet and stored in boxes that are overtaking our house.

Prepping 60 days of food for one person doesn’t sound too bad by itself, but multiplying that by the four of us turns into quite the feat. As of January 24 we’ve completed 500 of the roughly 720 meals we originally planned to prep. Will we get to 720? Maybe, maybe not. We’ll continue to add to the total as the trip gets closer, but our focus is now shifting to loading re-supply boxes, training, and organizing a network of friends and family to support us along the way.