Food

Lentil stew

1. Dried vegetables in water,  2. 1-2 hours later, 3. The Lentil stew

Put some dried vegetables in water. For two persons ca half full 75 cl bowl.
Suggestion: Leek, paprika, sweet potato, peas, carrot, celery and broccoli. This combination gives good taste, nice color and is nutritious.
The vegetables will be ready to use in 1-2 hours.

Boil ca 2 dl of red lenses (we choose red lenses since you don’t have to boil them for more than 10 min.)
Boil ca 1 dl of bulgur.

Fry the vegetables and put in some spices
Suggestion: cumin, ginger, cinnamon, thyme, chili, curry paste, pepper, salt and vegetable extract cube. And put in some honey and balsamico for a little taste of sweet and sour.

Mix the vegetables, the lenses and the bulgur in the pot and put in some cream (cream is luxury in the mountains and something you don’t have in your backpack all the time, you can of course skip it) and stir. Take the stew of the stove and serve with some fried union on the top.

This really taste delicious especially with the cream. The sweet potato and lenses is such a good mixture.

Annas tips on drying mushrooms

I (Anna) have another passion in life and that is picking mushrooms in the autumn.

One way to preserve the mushrooms and enjoy the mushrooms for your hike and the rest of the year, it is to dry them. Some mushrooms taste much stronger when dried. 70-703 This is very simple to do but if you have been lucky on your mushroom hunt your harvest can take up a lot of space for a few days. You can also use a circotherm oven or a mushroom dryer but I prefer to dry the mushroom on my big table, maybe because I like the sight of them.

Mushrooms I recommend to dry is: Funnel Chanterelle (Cantharellus tubaeformis), Black chanterelle or Black trumpet(Craterellus cornucopioides) and Porcino (Boletus edulis).

Don’t pick any mushrooms if you are not sure they are edible or not. Never ever take any chances. The best way to learn how to pick and find mushrooms is to accompany someone who knows and who is willing to teach you. I have picked mushrooms since I was a kid, my father was my first teacher and later also my brother. A good website for mushroom pickers in Sweden is svampguiden.com.

Start by cleaning the mushrooms with a brush, the Funnel Chanterelle should be divided as you sometimes find insects or snails hiding inside the funnel. Cut the bigger mushrooms in small pieces and spread them out on some newspaper. MB2-718 In a few days they will shrunk and if they feel dry you can put them in a glass pot. But wait some extra days before you close the pot, just to make sure they are completely dry.

The dried mushrooms can be stored for many years as long as you keep them dry in a container.

Dried mushrooms are really nice to bring on a hike, to be used in pasta sauces, risotto or a warm hot soup. Just let them soak in some water for a while and then fry/parboil them in a pan, add oil or butter when the water is gone.

1. Black trumpet 2. Dried Black Trumpet

Ýrrs oatmeal breakfast

I usually eat oatmeal for breakfast. It’s easy to make and takes no space in the backpack.

1 dl oatmeal
1 dl  water
salt
boil together

I like to add sugar and some dried fruits like apples, apricots or dates and put some honey on the top.

On my luxury mornings I eat it with ”Varma koppen” fruit soup where you only add hot water.

Ýrr is doing yoga and making breakfast at Rif. Nuvolau in the Dolomites.

Mountain Risotto with Mushrooms

It takes quite a time on the stew to make a regular Risotto. In the mountains you always pursue to use as little fuel as possible. That’s why we boil the rice first until it’s almost ready.

Put dried unions and mushrooms in water for about 30 min, depending on what type of mushrooms you are using. You can of course use different varieties of mushrooms, funnel chanterelle taste really good and they only need to be in water for 10-15 min. read more about dried mushrooms here.

1. Boil rice and take it of the stew.
2. Fry the mushrooms in a pan, start without oil.
3. Add oil and onions. Fry until the onions get soft.
4. Add 1/4 dl of water and 1/2 mushroom extract cube.
5. Add the rice and boil together, add more water if you like. And some salt and pepper.
6. Take the pan of the stew and add Parmesan cheese.

Maybe you’d like to add some meat like ham or sausage.

Another variant is to use different types of vegetables and different taste of extract cube and add some spices.

Drying vegetables

We have tried to dry many different kinds of vegetables, some have worked better than others. Some have become our favorites like red paprika, zucchini and mushrooms. Those vegetables are easy to dry and quick to prepare for cooking when you are in the field, which is good when you are tired and hungry. If you have more time and energy, carrots, sweet potatoes, cauliflower and broccoli are really nice. A good idea is to already start soaking them at lunchtime so they’ll be ready to cook for supper.

How does it work? It’s good to use a circotherm oven, then you can work with multiply layers of baking-trays simultaneously. It’s really important to heat the oven at a low temperature, it shouldn’t be more then 50° C. Also make sure not to close the oven door, you want the moisture to get out, otherwise it’ll just circulate inside the oven and the vegetables will not dry. We use a big wooden spoon to block the door.

Some vegetables need a little precooking before you dry them, this is true of broccoli, cauliflower, fresh beans and root crops. Just boil them for a short while. Dried beans like kidney beans and chickpeas first need to be soaked (24 hours) and cooked in water until soft (this may take over an hour) before you dry them. You can also use beans from a can that are already precooked and dry them as they are.

All you have to do with vegetables like paprika, tomatoes, zucchini and eggplants is to slice them in thin and small pieces. Put them in the oven on some oven paper and let them dehydrate until they are completely dry.

Most vegetables need to dry in the oven for at least 8 hours.

Thai stew

Thai stew with vegetables is one of our favorite dishes in the mountains.

Soak some dried vegetables in water for about 1,5 hour.
Suggestion: paprika, onion, peas, tomatoes, zucchini, broccoli and carrots.
Read more about drying vegetables here.

Make ca 3 dl of coconut milk by mixing some coconut milk powder with water, read more about coconut milk powder here.

Boil couscous or rice or bulgur. We often chose couscous even if it is not Thai stile. Couscous is great in the mountains since it’s lightweight and it’s fast and easy to cook (thinking of saving time and gas).

Fry the vegetables with some green or red curry paste.
Add some more spices
Suggestion: chili and ginger
Add the coconut milk, ca 1/2 vegetable extract cube and lime leaves.
Add the couscous and stir together.

Finding the perfect balance between the salt, sweet, sour and the spicy taste is very important! Therefor add salt, spices, balsamico and honey as needed.

Thai stew with couscous, coconut milk and curry paste

A box of spices

We like to cook and to eat good food.  We agree that it’s important to eat good and tasty food in the mountains. Therefore we bring a lot of different spices which makes the cooking more creative and the food tastier.

Spices: sea salt, pepper, cinnamon, ginger, paprika powder, cumin, bruscetta mix, curry paste, thyme, bay leaves, lime leaves, vegetable and mushrooms extract cubes, some Lebanese spices we don’t know the name of. And for the touch of sweet and sour  flavor honey, sugar and balsamico. Mmmm…

1 kg carrot = 50 gr carrot

To save weight for your hike, one way is bring dry food. This is really easy to do yourself and I would say also much tastier. Today I dried 1 kilo carrots and now it has a weight of 50 gr.

I sliced the carrots really thin and small. Pre-cook them for a little while, just so they get a little soft but still with a little crunch left. Rinse them in cold water and but them on a baking-plate to dry in the oven. Set the oven to less than 50° C and leave the door open to let the moist get out.

Dried carrots