Thursday, December 30, 2010 - Blog on a Log

Feeding Frenzy - How to eat on $5 a day while traveling

It's one of the first things new backpackers discover when they stumble off the plane in a foreign country with jetlag, a warped internal clock and less possessions to their name than ever before: eating is hard.

Oh, not the act of eating. As any picky eater-turned-garbage disposal will tell you, nearly anything tastes good when you're walking 10 hours a day. I'm talking the actual business of finding, buying, and preparing meals. For first-time travelers--many of whom come straight from living in a home stocked with full cupboards--feeding yourself on a budget can be a pretty daunting task. There I was, fresh of the plane, a mediocre cook with an empty wallet trying to feed an incredibly mobile lifestyle...and I had no idea how to do it. How do you buy your daily bread on a limited daily budget?

The biggest difficulty is in sizing; most groceries just aren't sold in single-serving portions (or if they are you paying triple for the packaging). All solo shoppers know the frustration of trying to buy one piece of chicken or a half-cup of rice. Now add to this the difficulty of changing locations every day, or few days. Sure, you can buy 2L of milk or a whole container of butter when you only plan to use a little, but perishables don't travel well, and most of your purchase will go to waste.

Personal example: one day, craving comfort food, I found a battered old box of macaroni and cheese on the top shelf of a German corner store. I gleefully scurried my find back to the hostel...only to realize I had no butter or milk. Frustrated by the thought of buying a carton of milk or tub of margarine when I only needed a few spoonfuls of each, I tried making boxed macaroni with nothing but noodles, cheese powder and water. It's not recommended (though, in line with the ‘garbage-disposal' conversion above, I still ate it).

I'm a better cook now than I was then, and a lot more willing to experiment - but all the culinary wizardry in the world doesn't solve the issue of buying appropriate portions. When forced to buy each ingredient for every meal, the total cost of a day's food can skyrocket to a point where cheap fast food starts to seem pretty appealing. A meal as basic as spaghetti can mean the purchase of 4x too much pasta and a huge tin of sauce, coming in at a few dollars at least. Add some ground beef for protein and maybe a little milk, and you're easily approaching $7 or $8 for a very basic dinner - and the McDonald's down the street will cook supper for you at a fraction of that cost. Why spend time and effort slaving in a hostel kitchen if someone else will make you dinner in 5 minutes for half the price?

Backpackers need to take a leaf out of the books of campers, who manage meals in far less cushy conditions with even less gear. Travelers already have a significant culinary leg-up in that most hostels provide accessible kitchen space. There's bound to be a supermarket nearby as well, so there's no need to plan and pre-package your food or worry about the means of cooking like when you're on trail. All that the average traveler needs is to start carrying a few basics ingredients in their pack so you don't need to buy each ingredient for every meal you make along the way.

I recommend two absolute basic ingredients for any traveler: oatmeal and rice/couscous. Both are inexpensive, non-perishable, lightweight and not crushable. They can be stored in any waterproof container (hard-sided or flexible) without being particularly worse for the wear. Since both expand with water a little goes a long way, so they'll take up more space in your stomach than they did in your pack.

Some hostels provide free breakfasts, but even those that do tend to load up on breads and cheap cereals - a sure-fire path to a full stomach that won't last. Pick up a GSI spice shaker in store to tote some basic flavouring (cinnamon and brown sugar, say), and with a little boiling water you've turned your oatmeal into some serious sustenance. If there's an apple or some berries around, more's the better.

Rice is a good base that will help stretch any meal. Add a can of beans for a filling combination that makes a complete protein (all the nourishment of meat done easy). You could include a package of dry beans as a basic you keep in your pack - a cost analysis shows they're cheaper than canned, and they're certainly lighter - but few people want to spend several hours soaking and cooking them from their dry state. (If you're going for dry protein lentils are a better bet, since they don't have to pre-soak and can be cooked in about 20 minutes). The great thing about a basic meal like rice and beans or lentils is that you can add almost anything to it that you might happen to find available: onions, peppers, a little meat... anything will go. If you like your spices, try another GSI shaker with some different staples. Garlic powder and oregano, perhaps.

Personally, I prefer couscous to rice. It can be traded out in place of pretty much any rice or pasta, and is healthier than most forms of rice. Where it wins big is in the ease of preparation - couscous takes about 5 minutes to cook, and is much less finicky than rice (always a plus when your cooking in varied kitchens with untested utensils.

These basic products can be bought in bulk, and you can easily carry a good portion in your pack without taking up too much room or adding significant weight. There's major benefit in terms of ease when you have the ability to throw together a simple meal without a trip to the supermarket, but where you really win out is in the cost. A serving of oatmeal, rice or beans costs only pennies, and even a can of beans can be purchased for around a dollar. An industrious cook could easily find themselves with three full meals--and real meals, mind you, with enough sustenance to keep you going all day--for less than you'd spend on one trip to the golden arches. That's cooking advice you can take to the bank.

Bon Appétit!

B