Hiking with Powdered Drinks, Lemons and Powdered Butter

“Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by dragging day, in all the thousand small uncaring ways.” ~ Stephen Vincent Benét

A few odds and ends in this post, first something about these powdered drinks mixes – Am I the only one that thinks they just might be repackage, over priced cool-aid?   If you hike with a hydration system in your backpack like a Camelback or a platypus you probably don’t get as much use out of these things as I do.  I never really got used to drinking out of a bladder in my backpack.

So I find these powdered drink mixes quite useful, for when I just get bored with plain water or when the water along the trail might taste a bit nasty.  I started out using Gatorade mixes, but have found several others I like better, especially just plain pure lemon juice.  Often you can pick up a few these little packages of lemon juice no charge and gas station convenience store – normally where they have the sugar for you coffee.

If you can’t find it, you can buy the packets on-line  from “WildernessDining.com” our newest affiliate advertiser. Click on the picture of Lemon Juice to buy it on-line.

I ran across Wilderness Dining a couple weeks ago and was impressed enough to have BackpackBaseCamp.com become an affiliate of theirs.  I found them because I was searching for dehydrated powdered butter for backpacking.  This dehydrated butter comes in a package of 36 tsps, weights just 2 ounces for the entire package. Each teaspoon of it can make a tablespoon of butter.  I found a few suppliers for dehydrated butter, but that all wanted to sell in very large quantities (for the survivalist and emergency food markets). I didn’t need a lifetime supply of powered butter and didn’t want to spend that much.  Fortunately I found WildernessDining.com, they have reasonable price on a great variety of dehydrated backpacking foods and camping cookware supplies.   

On a completely unrelated subject; If you have a few more minutes, this is an excellent article on the REI web set on Ultralight Backpacking.

BackpackBaseCamp.com is now an affiliate with Wilderness Dining:

 

 

 

 

And…Since we just got a new puppy at home…Check out the dog gear at altrec.com – They are having some great sales:

Columbia Outdoor Sale - Up to 55% off

Memorial Tent Sale - Up to 30% off

Starbucks VIA Instant Coffee for Backpacking

OK, So people have been telling me for a year that Starbucks VIA Ready Brew instant coffee is really good and since one pack of it weights only 4 grams (0.2 ounces) it’s pretty much perfect for hiking, camping and backpacking.  Problem was:

A. I’ve tried all different kinds of instant coffee and they all pretty much suck.

B. I don’t like Starbucks: I don’t like their coffee, I don’t like them being so overpriced and don’t like their urban / yuppie marketing.

Here’s the thing though, I been hearing it so much, when I saw it in Target last week I figured I would risk the $3 bucks and give it a try.  Actually I tried both the Columbia (medium) and the Italian Roast (Extra Bold). 

I think what made be buy it was that Starbucks used a normal English word like “medium” right on the label.  Usually at Starbucks I think the word “Grande” translates to “medium”. 

Anyway, all the marketing B.S. aside, the stuff actually tastes like real coffee.  Best instant coffee I have ever had by far. So I’m reluctantly going to bring it on my next backpacking trip, which happens to be with my daughter next weekend.

It looks like Starbucks is now selling this stuff in various grocery stores and Targets all over the place.  If you can’t find it you can get it from REI Click HERE.