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A small company based in Bangor, TentMeals offer a focused range of dinner, breakfast and trail snacks with an emphasis on healthy, all-natural, vegan ingredients. They pack a lot of calories into tiny packets, and in terms of energy per pound spent they're unbeatable value. But how about enjoyment? Dan Bailey taste-tests the range.

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If your meals were lukewarm after rehydrating, it begs the question of whether you were using a cosy? My experience of rehydrating meals is that they are still almost too hot, when using a two-layer reflectix cosy. The maintained temperature also encourages rehydration, as does having sufficient water (which also keeps the temperature up: you're adding more energy).

Short answer - no. I've made a bottle cosy out of foil bubble wrap in the past but not used one for camp dinners

So like the other awful expedition foods but worse?

A cosy does, of course, take up extra space in a pack, but I use a 'russian dolls' nesting setup, where the stove fits inside the pan, the pan fits inside the rehydration/eating pot, and the pot fits inside the cosy. So quite space efficient, as well as fuel efficient.

There's a recycled 300ml buttermilk pot & lid in there, too, that has a handy 50ml graduated scale on the side. Used for measuring water and as a cup. Inside that is the meths burner, lighter & little fuel measuring cup...

Nice

Crikey, you had nice weather on... Cul Mor?  And then Strath na Sealga.  Lovely!

Glad you found one meal - the Jalfrezi - that was good tasting.  That's all you need.  I find the Summit To Eat meals generally excellent, providing you ignore the instructions - stir for 8 minutes - that would be ludicrous.  They mean stir, then seal for 8 minutes.  Must have got lost in translation.

I had the misfortune to accidentally buy a Firepot chilli NON carne meal recently.  It was the worst de-hy camp meal I've ever had, and that includes the dreadful stuff you used to get 30 years ago.  The prices of all these meals have gone up too much now - I just can't afford them.  I like the sound of the jalfrezi and will try it soon.

I've bought myself a dehydrator on Ebay - should be arriving tomorrow or Monday.  I'll report back!!!  I'm quite excited!!!

Cul Mor, Ben Loyal, Fisherfield... I rarely bother these days unless it's a decent forecast (or I'm testing waterproofs) 

We were sadly disappointed by Firepot meals too - they had such good reviews that we splashed out despite the price.

They were nowhere near re-hydrated after 15 mins, and of course camping on a Scottish mountain in April meant that they were stone cold too.  I might try Captain Paranoia's idea of a cosy another time, though prob not with a Firepot meal.

Tucking the pouch into your clothing performs the same function as a cosy, while transferring valuable heat into the body, for zero extra grams.

Just don't do anything vigorous while it rehydrates, or you'll end up with scalding curry welding your base layers to your skin. Or so I've heard.

Never had a problem with Summit To Eat meals.  Stir, seal the pack, wait 8 minutes and it's ready, and still hot.  The packaging/waste is an issue which I have to admit, I'd not really thought about.  

Summit To Eat meals were regularly about £5 each when on offer, but there aren't any offers any more.  I also bought a job lot on Ebay from someone's cancelled expedition during covid.  I've now run out.  

I'll be trying a jalfrezi from Tentmeals soon!... and my dehydrator arrived today!  I'll start by making a basic chilli beef mince which I can then add to noodles on the hill after rehydration.

Dehydrate and then freeze for storage until needed. Otherwise the fat will go rancid.

even if they're in foil bags with double zip locks?  It's possible I should be buying some oxygen absorber sachets - good idea?

Freezing seems easier...

In my online research with dehydrating food for camping meals, no one's mentioned freezing them as well.  Is that what you do?  Can you explain why please.  I have all the foil zip lock bags ready to go.  Some people have mentioned oxygen absorbers to prolong the life of the packs.

It's about rancidity in storage after you've prepared them.

It depends on how long in advance you prepare them. A couple of days before: fine. Weeks? Stick them in the freezer.

What about vacuum sealing them?

Ok, will do.  Thanks for the tip!

There was some chat about this on a recent hut-to-hut ski tour, where one of the other skiers had access to a freeze-dryer and used that for the meals they took.

Freeze driers - expensive - can remove 99% of the moisture.

Dehydrators - much more affordable - can remove 85% - 95% of the moisture, so eventually the food will spoil.

So, if you put your dehydrated food in the freezer after dehydrating it, it will keep for longer.

Yeah; it's not something I made up...

https://www.google.com/search?q=dehydrated+meal+rancid+freezer

One other technique used is to scoop off excess fat after cooking, before dehydrating. Then carry some oil to add some fats back into the meal when rehydrating.

I remember discussing this stuff on OM or BPL in the late noughties.

I did buy a vaccum packer from somewhere like Tchibo (a precursor to the Lidl/Aldi invasion). It had a fairly weak vacuum, and had a heat sealer and a roll of 'tube' packaging, which you sealed at both ends. Ziplock bags are a lot less fuss, and re-usable...

We started making meals with a dehydrator about a year ago. We use the oxygen scavengers and also bought a vacuum sealer and store them in foil (lightproof) mylar bags. With that combination they should last a long time, according to the dehydrating recipe book, perhaps a few years. I ate one, a year old, couple of weeks ago and it was fine. If I recall correctly, without vacuum sealing they only last about 3 months.

That said, non of ours have meat in as that reduces their shelf life, though I can't remember by how long. Maybe freezing would work as suggested above?

We got a decent vacuum sealer and re-use the vacuum bags, cut them open just below the seal and reseal them again. Much better and safer than ziplocks for long term storage.

Yeah, a proper vacuum packer would make it much more worthwhile, if you can get an 'industrial' level of vacuum packing. Where did you get yours?

I'll stick with my mugshots I think.

I'll check this evening (my wife bought it) and get back.

They seam as vacuumed now as when they were sealed though and the oxygen scavengers should have taken care of any oxygen remaining in the bag.

This is the one we've got, bought after much reading of reviews (by my wife). She thinks she bought it direct from the manufacturer but it's available elswhere.

https://homesweettable.com/geryon-vacuum-sealer-review/

Thanks; that does look like a very tight vacuum packing...

Dunno... as I haven't tried it yet but that was my first thought when I saw the article, you know like "expedition food" in big pouches.

But... as I read it, it seems that this isn't exactly the same product. There's a time and place for the classic expedition foods like an evening meal and hot breakfast for 1 overnight perhaps (mix in the big pouch convenience). But the classic pouches are huge. I tried to shove 3 main meals and deserts into a Daren Drum recently (by which I mean one of these things: https://starlessriver.com/shop/daren-drum-standard ) and they took up way too much space!

Tent meals look more robustly packed and much more compact, presumably better for cycle tours or multi night trips.

Personally... this looks a bit different and interesting, I need to taste some before I can judge it! Smoked paprika and chilli flakes for the win!! 😉

Sounds pretty bad, from both the nutritional and taste perspective, at least given the review's most important point (most of their foods tasting really bad, per the review).

Couscous is probably the least nutritional of all the cereals, as is rice. But they are the cheapest...

At least they seem to vacuum‑seal it properly, though.

Still, I find it much easier to just mix my own. Quinoa, steam‑cooked and dried instant flakes (no worries about bad rehydration, unlike the TentMeals) as the carb and protein base. Add whatever spices, dried veggies and dried proteins or fats you like. Dried veggies from Aldo or any Asian market. Dried fat from any pub food supplier (you can get full‑fat cream dried from them, as well as dried reconstituted eggs on the cheap). All the ingredients are out there and usually cheaper.

Oh, and the quinoa base has lots more nutritional value than their white rice or couscous sole dinner bases, which are basically the worst‑ever instant meal bases, nutritionally. Plus most quinoa flakes rehydrate so much easier than their rice...

Same for their breakfast menus – it's still cheaper and much more nutritious to bag one's own, using much better ingredients. And cheaper...

The only plus TentMeals have are being packaged in some heavy duty PE bags. Which is to me, frankly, their mistake. HDPE being just fecking irresponsible as a packaging material. Any DIY bags work just as well, from zip-locks to vacuum bags.

Why? HDPE (High Density Polyethylene) is easily recyclable. LDPE less so; maybe you are confusing which PE they have used for their packaging (not mentioned in the article).

The big problem with all recycling is the use of paper labels that are not easily removable, and thus contaminate the material. Fortunately, TentMeals seem to use directly printed labels on the the packaging, with no paper carrier.

Metallised PET 'foil' packaging, with an aggressive adhesive paper label; now that's irresponsible...

Apologies, I had mixed up the two. I blame Tired Tuesday, but that's no excuse...

And you are right, at least their packaging is much better than aluminised PET foil in that regard.