Backpacking Porridge Recipe

Instant oatmeal packets are definitely one of the easiest hot backpacking breakfasts you can make out on the trail (no question about that!) but all the major store-bought brands are made up of relatively simple carbs: pulverized processed oats and a lot of sugar.

Even if we stuff ourselves with these instant oatmeal packets at breakfast, we find that we burn through them entirely by mid-morning. So at 7am when we hit the trail, we’re totally full but by 9:30 we’re starving again.

This DIY backpacking recipe starts with a base of oatmeal and then adds layers of nutrition (and flavor!) on top of it. It includes coconut milk and flakes for long-lasting calories from fat, almonds and hemp seeds to add protein and dehydrated blueberries for a little extra fiber.

August 2023 I Trail Cooking

True, you will lose out on the “instant” cook time of instant oatmeal, but the more diverse nutritional profile means you should feel full all the way until lunch. Or at least elevenses.

Coconut Milk Powder: If you want to pick this up locally, the Asian section of your local grocery store is usually your best bet. Otherwise, you can pick it up online.

Freeze dried blueberries: These can be found at Trader Joe’s and Walmart. They can also be purchased online (this larger container is a good deal if you plan on prepping a lot of meals!).

Blueberry Coconut Oatmeal

Chopped almonds: Can sub in any other nut you prefer. The best deals we’ve found on nuts are at Trader Joe’s, but some grocery bulk sections have decent prices as well.

Coconut flakes: Coconut flakes add some texture to this oatmeal and are a great way to incorporate some good, healthy, calorie-dense fats into your oatmeals and trail mixes.

At home, simply combine all of the ingredients in a bowl, then divide between two resealable bags. If you’re going to make this for two people and cook both servings at once, you can put it all in one bag.

Ideas For Backpacking Breakfasts

At camp, add the oatmeal ingredients to your cook pot along with 1/4 cup water for one serving or 1/2 cup water for both servings. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook for 5-10 minutes or until the oats are tender.

BioBag Resealable Compostable Sandwich Bags: If you are trying to cut down on your usage of single-use plastic bags, these resealable compostable sandwich bags from BioBag are a nice alternative. They function just like a standard plastic Ziplock bag, except they won’t take ten million years to decompose in a landfill.

MSR Pocket Rocket 2: We use this backpacking stove (along with the Solo Pot listed below) for many of our backpacking recipes. It’s has a compact, foldable design, a powerful burner, and pretty good simmer control.

Dehydrated Apple Cinnamon Quinoa Porridge

MSR 1.3 liter Cermanic Solo Pot: This is the backpacking pot (along with the Pocket Rocket stove listed above) for most of our backpacking recipes. It has a great non-stick ceramic coating, that makes cooking and cleaning a breeze.

MSR Duo Windburner: We have recently started using this MSR Duo Windburner cook system to increase our fuel efficiency on the trail. It’s an integrated stove and pot system that boils water super fast, simmers really well, and all but eliminates wind buffering.

Calories: 521 kcal | Carbohydrates: 57 g | Protein: 10 g | Fat: 29 g | Potassium: 281 mg | Calcium: 370 mg | Iron: 3.1 mg

Trees And Tents

Megan & Michael are the creators of Fresh Off The Grid, a blog dedicated to helping you fuel your adventures by sharing camp cooking recipes, backpacking meals, and outdoor travel guides. Their recipes and outdoor cooking expertise have been featured in Backpacker Magazine, Outside, REI Co-Op Journal, Food & Wine, and New York Times Cooking.With warming seasonal flavors like apple, cinnamon, and maple syrup, this dehydrated quinoa porridge is a great backpacking breakfast to try on your next trip into the backcountry.

Waking up to a brisk morning in the mountains, nothing sounds quite as appealing as watching the sunrise with a hot cup of coffee and a warm bowl of porridge. Instant oatmeal is usually the de-facto option for backpackers, but sometimes it’s nice to switch things up! That’s why we wanted to explore an alternative and started making this dehydrated quinoa porridge. It’s quick, easy, delicious – and most importantly,

In addition to offering a more complex nutritional profile than oatmeal, quinoa porridge has a unique taste and texture to it that can be a nice change of routine. Just like oatmeal, it can be doctored up however you like. For this recipe, we went with the warming flavors of apple, cinnamon, and maple syrup.

The Dirty Dish Club

↠ It’s not oatmeal! The nutty flavor and distinct texture of quinoa can be a much-welcomed change from the monotony instant oats.

↠ Personalized flavor. By making this porridge at home, you can really dial in the flavor before you put it in the dehydrator. Not too sweet, not too bland, when you can taste-test the end product, you can get it

↠ Quinoa is a great source of complete protein and is a great way to fuel up at the start of the day.

Congee (rice Porridge)

At home, prepare the porridge on the stovetop using a large pot or Dutch oven. Once all the ingredients have been added and the quinoa has fluffed up, taste it. This is the time to make any adjustments. Little more cinnamon? Little more maple syrup? Get it just the way you like it.

When dehydrating, use the solid dehydrator sheets and spread the porridge into even layers using a spatula. Set it to 135 F and run overnight for 8-12 hours. Once the porridge has been completely dehydrated, separate into portions. To give an extra caloric boost, we added 2 tablespoons of coconut milk powder to each serving. You could also use powdered whole milk.

At camp, simply add water and bring to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes or until water is fully absorbed and porridge is the proper consistency. Enjoy!

Healthy Instant Oatmeal Packets For Hot & Refrigerator Oats

↠ Dehydrator: Our current dehydrator of choice is the Nesco Snackmaster Pro. It’s a budget-friendly dehydrator that’s good for beginners just getting started. Fancier models like the Excalibur feature auto-on / auto-off features.

↠ Reusable Bag: In our bid to reduce our disposable ziplock bag consumption, we’ve started exploring packing our dehydrated meals in reusable baggies. They’re great if you’re only going out for a few nights, but might not be the right solution for longer thru-hikes where weight is more of a concern.

Megan & Michael are the creators of Fresh Off The Grid, a blog dedicated to helping you fuel your adventures by sharing camp cooking recipes, backpacking meals, and outdoor travel guides. Their recipes and outdoor cooking expertise have been featured in Backpacker Magazine, Outside, REI Co-Op Journal, Food & Wine, and New York Times Cooking.When you’re out on the trail, food is always an issue. You don’t want to carry too much, as that would add too much weight to your always-too-heavy-burden of a backpack. You don’t want to carry too little, either. The solution, as with everything on a hike, lies with lightweight options. With food, there are many things you can do to lighten the load. In this post, I will let you in on my own recipe for the most important meal of the day: Roel’s Awesome Hiking Breakfast Porridge!

Banana Cinnamon Oatmeal {aip, Gaps, Scd, Paleo, Low Fodmap}

While I’m sure the mention of the word ‘porridge’ sort of gives away the general concept, allow me to share a little more details here. This is a recipe to make an instant porridge mix, mostly consisting of finely ground oatmeal (also known as Scottish oats) and milk powder. Note that I’m not using oat bran or instant/quick oats, as I consider the finely ground variety much tastier!

You’ll only need to add hot water to get a steaming bowl of tasty porridge out on the trail! You can choose to measure out the mix into daily portions for easy reference, or just separate the mix itself from the milk powder to leave the portioning up to the day’s demands. Sounds easy, right? It is!

In the Netherlands, the ground oatmeal I use is called ‘Brinta’. A staple of Dutch morning cuisine since the Second World War, it is exclusively sold in the Netherlands and select stores in Belgium. In other countries, try looking for ‘Scottish oats’.

Littlemafia's Porridge Recipe

When portioning: Set aside a number of ziplock bags, one for each breakfast meal. Then portion each bag as follows: three large tablespoons of milk powder, seven large tablespoons of Scottish oats, two tablespoons of raisins/dried fruit pieces, one tablespoon of sugar and two teaspoons of cinnamon. You can vary the amounts of sugar and cinnamon to your own taste, of course.

When making a single large batch all you need to do is mix everything except the milk powder together. Put it all in one large ziplock bag and put the milk powder in another. That’s it, you’re done!

The reason you’ll want to separate the milk powder is that you don’t want to end up with a watery wheat soup! Separating the milk powder ensures you can add it to the water

Raspberry Coconut Quinoa Porridge